Diagnosing individual barriers to collective learning: how governance contexts shape cognitive biases

ABSTRACT

A growing body of public policy and governance scholars recognise the importance of learning in supporting adaptive and responsive governance systems. Fostering learning within policy processes and governance systems, however, can be challenging. Collectively, we often ignore or misinterpret relevant policy information, or we may be incapable of translating new information into policy. Despite significant scholarly attention to learning, knowledge of the barriers to learning remains underdeveloped. To advance theoretical insights, this article integrates research on individual cognitive biases with literature on learning to identify barriers that can block learning or lead to non-learning in policy and governance processes. It also explores how these barriers can be mitigated or exacerbated by different governance contexts. Based on these insights, this paper provides guidance for researchers on how to empirically assess learning barriers across different governance contexts.

KEYWORDS:

• Policy learning
• collective learning
• public policy
• governance
• cognitive biases

Acknowledgements

We are grateful for our colleagues who participated in the IWPP3 Workshop on Policy Learning in Budapest in 2022 and provided constructive suggestions on an earlier version of this manuscript. We also thank the anonymous reviewers for their excellent suggestions for improving this paper.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

No external funding was received for the research on this manuscript.

Notes on contributors

Tanya Heikkila

Tanya Heikkila is a professor in the School of Public Affairs and co-directs the Center for Policy and Democracy at the University of Colorado Denver.

Andrea K. Gerlak

Andrea K. Gerlak is a professor in the School of Geography, Development and Environment and the directs the Udall Center for Studies in Public Policy at the University of Arizona.

Betsy Smith

Betsy Smith is a Ph.D. student in public affairs at the University of Colorado Denver.