Effects of information cascades on collaborative decision-making in river engineering projects on the Rio Grande

ABSTRACT

Conventional wisdom is that early involvement of stakeholders leads to better results in engineering decision-making processes. A commonly documented advantage of early stakeholder involvement is increased acceptance and ownership of the project by everyone involved, resulting in fewer disputes throughout the planning and decision-making process. However, information cascade theory suggests that early involvement and development of close working relationships among stakeholders may decrease a group's ability to objectively and effectively evaluate engineering alternatives, as group members substitute the consensus of the group for their personal judgements. Additionally, innovation in design may be inversely correlated with the extent of group interaction prior to the selection of a preferred alternative. Experience in river engineering projects of the US Bureau of Reclamation on the Rio Grande in New Mexico supports the idea that early stakeholder involvement, while effective in reducing disputes, has a suppressive effect on design innovation.

Keywords:

• Information cascades
• river engineering
• decision-making
• collaboration
• New Mexico
• Rio Grande