Strategies for evaluating possible interventions in a system
In this Course
In this course, you've:
Learned how to map systems
Explored the dynamics of different systems
Considered both the benefits and unintended adverse consequences of intervening in a system
Learned about the importance of improving your mental models and consulting both professional and lived experts
These are all essential steps when you want to intervene in a system to improve its outcomes. But how do you decide where to intervene most effectively? In this concluding module, you'll explore some approaches to answering this question.
Here you'll examine the meaning of “system change” and assess whether it's always the best strategy for achieving social change. You'll also consider the value of multiple points of intervention rather than a single one.
The Spectrum of Interventions in a System
You can think of the types of interventions in a system as being on a continuum. The continuum ranges from ameliorative and symptomatic remedies at one end, to preventive remedies aimed at the problem's underlying causes at the other end.
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Drivers of Systems Change: Technology and Behavior
Not all systems change is the result of deliberate interventions. Many of humankind's greatest systems changes have been the result of technological advances:
Steam engine
Electricity
Automobile and airplane—and the fractionation of fossil fuels to power them
Telegraph and telephone
Radio and television
Computer
Internet and social media
Artificial intelligence
Technologies can sometimes cause systems change more effectively than intentional behavioral interventions. For example, the advent of renewable energy resources has a greater potential to mitigate climate change than behavioral "nudges" to reduce energy use.
But even when technologies can potentially transform systems, they often depend on behaviors that are difficult to change. Vaccines can save millions of lives, but their potential can be compromised by fear and antagonism to vaccines.
How to Evaluate Possible Interventions
After you've identified a desired outcome and the systems dynamics related to making a change, the next step is to determine where you can intervene effectively.
Watch the video to learn about methods you can use to evaluate possible interventions and to see how policymakers evaluated remedies for the problem of homelessness.
Malaria
Malaria kills 400,000 people a year and sickens many more. The possible approaches to dealing with malaria include:
Approaches to Address Malaria
Type of Intervention
Examples
Ameliorating symptoms and mitigating infections
Analgesics, such as aspirin or ibuprofen to relieve fever
Antimalarial drugs to counter the infection
Preventing infections
Insecticide-treated bednets to protect against mosquito bites while sleeping
Indoor spraying of insecticides to kill mosquitoes
Housing improvements to keep mosquitoes from entering houses
Vaccines to prevent illness
Eliminating causes
Vector controls, such as draining wetlands or releasing genetically modified mosquitoes, to reduce the prevalence of the parasite or eliminate it entirely
Key questions:
If you were a policymaker and could choose only one intervention, which one would it be—and why?
If you could choose more than one intervention, which ones and why?
Unintended Pregnancies
The unintended pregnancy rate in the U.S. is high among poor women without high school degrees and is a particular problem for teenage girls.
The nonprofit organization Upstream seeks to prevent the problem by "working in partnership with health centers to strengthen reproductive care and autonomy by increasing equitable access to the full range of contraceptive options." But even in the best-case scenario, women will have unintended pregnancies.
Key questions:
If you were a foundation or other funder, would you place resources only in upstream or preventive solutions, to the exclusion of downstream or ameliorative remedies (such as adoption, abortion, or providing support for raising the child)?
Should preventive solutions go beyond providing contraceptives to addressing the social conditions that lead to unintended pregnancies?
Climate Change
Catastrophic climate change can be addressed with preventive or "mitigation" strategies that seek to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. These strategies include developing new alternative energy sources and taxing greenhouse gas emissions.
But mitigation strategies will not succeed in time to prevent rising sea level from submerging many regions—in some cases, entire countries. That calls for adaptation strategies.
Key questions:
Should policymakers and funders allocate resources only to mitigation, to the exclusion of protecting identifiable, vulnerable regions?
Youth Homelessness
Recall the case study of youth homelessness discussed in module 6. In addition to recommendations to improve existing social services to prevent and ameliorate homelessness, the Steering Committee on Prevention of Youth Homelessness recommended that the state of Washington: "Divert the majority of state funding to BIPOC grassroots organizations and to ‘By and For' organizations—organizations led and staffed by people who have personally experienced the homelessness issues that the organization is addressing."
Key questions:
Trace through the implementation and the consequences of this recommendation. What unintended consequences might it have?
How would you assess this recommendation from the perspective of expected value?
Expected value = (Benefit x Likelihood of Success) – Cost
Wrap-up
Major systems change is a complex and uncertain process. Smart systems thinking:
Does not favor preventive over ameliorative remedies
Does not favor systems change that addresses the root cause of a problem over efforts to alleviate its symptoms
Instead, systems thinking provides a framework for setting out and considering all options so that you can make an informed decision about the best strategy to achieve a desired outcome while limiting adverse unintended consequences.
In this course, you've learned the importance of approaching problems as a systems thinker.
As you consider how to intervene in a system to achieve a desired impact, take time to:
Map the system
Consider the range of possible points of intervention
Consider the consequences of intervening at different points in terms of:
The potential benefits (and any unintended adverse consequences)
The costs
The likelihood of the intervention working
Consider the value of multiple points of intervention rather than a single one
Systems thinking is inherently nonlinear. Its very purpose is to identify places where a change in one element, or variable, may loop back to eventually affect itself.
However, the decision to intervene in a system to affect that element calls for a theory of change that is essentially linear and helps predict how the activity of intervening will produce the desired ultimate outcome. For any intervention you're contemplating, develop a theory of change that:
is informed by the best available evidence;
specifies essential intermediate outcomes;
specifies activities necessary to produce the intermediate outcomes, including changes in the behavior of individuals, groups, and institutions; and
assesses the likelihood that you will succeed in achieving the intermediate outcomes and the ultimate outcome.
A Brief History of Systems Thinking and Short Bibliography of Key Works
The modern work in systems thinking was pioneered by two MIT professors: Jay Forrester (also a pioneer in digital computing) and John Sterman, beginning in the 1950's. Sterman's classic textbook Business Dynamics (2000) focuses on quantitative analysis and computer simulations of complex systems.
Applications of Sterman and Forrester's work originally centered around engineering and business management problems. Donella Meadows, a professor at Dartmouth College, applied systems thinking to environmental issues in her 1972 book, The Limits to Growth.
In recent years, applications of systems thinking have proliferated. Peter Senge's Fifth Discipline (1990) applies its concepts to organizations. The website The Systems Thinker, founded by Daniel Kim and Colleen Lanno, consists of numerous articles on various aspects of systems thinking.
To the best of our knowledge, David Peter Stroh's Systems Thinking for Social Change (2015) is the only book explicitly focused on the public policy topics of this course.
