[This excellent comment was made by John C. in response to one by Kevin (a.k.a. Manicbeancounter) on Mark’s To B or Not To B? thread. It deserves elevation to a head post so that more readers will see it. Thanks to John C. for agreeing to this — Scepticus]

Kevin (at 04 Jul 25 at 3:12 pm), when discussing the importance of narratives here on the Cliscep site we should probably first refer to our own Andy West’s work in his “The Grip of Culture” [Ref. 1].  In a work of well over 430 pages he mentions ‘narrative’ over 450 times.

Andy writes at page xii, “I was by then quite familiar with the power of cultures; given enough latitude they can overwhelm reality in the public consciousness, and their grip can subtly extend into organisations of all kinds before anyone notices their fundamental irrationality.”  At page xiv he continues, “Unless anyone can think of a better explanation, the measurements (now greatly expanded for this book) do indeed robustly confirm a culture of climate catastrophism across global publics.”

Thus Andy’s work shows the huge (and sometimes overwhelming ) influence that cultures and their associated narratives can have on societies.  It is notable that, in the context of climate, the narrative of catastrophism has overwhelmed large sections of the Western world (especially media and governments) but, fortunately for them, societies less closely linked to the West are largely free of such tunnel vision.

I propose to take what I think is a different but complementary view to Andy’s which will be based upon bureaucracies because so much of human activity is directed by organisations that have some form of internal structure (e.g. hierarchy) and which may reasonably be called bureaucracies.  Specifically, I am concerned with (i) how they may operate internally, and (ii) how they may interact with other actors in the public (especially political) arena.  I will start with the latter:-

The Iron Triangle of Bureaucratic Operation

I have previously mentioned this mechanism elsewhere on Cliscep but it bears repeating in this context where, in the UK, in addition to our continuing CCA/NZ challenges, we have just passed through the majority of the Covid event.

The Iron Triangle is a well-known phenomenon related to policy making.  It is shown in diagram form in [Ref. 2] and is described in written form by Endress in [Ref. 3].  It is worth quoting at length from the latter.  After describing the first- and second-best levels of policy making, Endress continues:-

“Third-best is the world of political economy, wherein costs and benefits directly influence the formation of coalitions that compete for political and economic advantage in society.  The pursuit of such advantage is called “rent-seeking” in economics and typically involves activities such as lobbying, public relations campaigns, political contributions, and, sometimes, outright bribery.  Unfortunately, the expansion of government that accompanies intervention on second-best grounds can facilitate rent-seeking at the third-best level … A particularly powerful type of rent-seeking coalition, long studied in political science, is termed “the iron triangle” because of the strength of the collaborative relationships among a triad of actors: politicians who seek campaign contributions, votes and reelection; government bureaucrats who aspire to expand fiefdoms and budgets; and private sector interest groups who seek special privileges in the form of political access, favourable legislation, subsidies, protection of monopoly positions, and lucrative government contracts.  The iron triangle is durable and impenetrable because it functions as a highly efficient, three-cornered, rent-seeking machine.

Nowhere (except perhaps in healthcare) do third-best politics sink first-best and second-best economic considerations as deeply as in the realm of energy policy.  In assessing energy policy in Europe and the United States, Helm (2012) is especially critical of policymakers’ obsession with current technology renewable energy, which is not yet commercially viable without government subsidies and mandates … Consequently, renewables have remained ineffective in lowering energy prices, creating green jobs, and reducing carbon emissions worldwide.  The result is high costs for little gain.  In a review of Helm’s book, “The Carbon Crunch,” The Economist … highlights Helm’s observation that the entire renewable sector has become an “orgy of rent-seeking.”  This outcome is not compatible with the sustainability criterion.” End of Endress quote.

I find it telling but not surprising (given the importance of these topics to humanity) that Endress is here describing (a) not the best approach to governance but the third best form, and (b) he has noted that energy and health policies are particularly susceptible to influence under the lower standards of governance.

The Iron Law of Oligarchy [Ref. 4]

Given that the Iron Law of Oligarchy was proposed by Robert Michels well over a hundred years ago I am somewhat surprised that it is not known much more widely given its potential for explaining much of the behaviour of some bureaucracies over the years, and in particular those behaviours that favour outcomes which are very different from those originally sought.

Ref. 4 states that the Iron Law of Oligarchy “asserts that rule by an elite, or oligarchy, is inevitable as an “iron law” within any democratic organization as part of the “tactical and technical necessities” of the organization … [A]ll complex organizations, regardless of how democratic they are when started, eventually develop into oligarchies. Michels observed that since no sufficiently large and complex organization can function purely as a direct democracy, power within an organization will always get delegated to individuals within that group, elected or otherwise. As he put it in Political Parties, “It is organization which gives dominion of the elected over the electors. […] Who says organization, says oligarchy.” … Far from being servants of the masses, Michels argues, this leadership class, rather than the organization’s membership, will inevitably grow to dominate the organization’s power structures.”.

Ref. 4 also describes the possible implications of the Iron Law in these terms, “The “iron law of oligarchy” states that all forms of organization, regardless of how democratic they may be at the start, will eventually and inevitably develop oligarchic tendencies, thus making true democracy practically and theoretically impossible, especially in large groups and complex organizations. The relative structural fluidity in a small-scale democracy succumbs to “social viscosity” in a large-scale organization. According to the “iron law”, democracy and large-scale organization are incompatible.”

Taken together, the Iron Triangle and the Iron Law form a potentially very powerful disruption to the correct operation of bureaucracies as conceived by their creators.  In the extreme, those bureaucracies could, in principle, be completely redirected from their original purposes.  To what extent has complete redirection or misdirection taken place in reality?

Effects in the Real World?

It is interesting, but somewhat depressing, to speculate as to what effects the Iron Triangle and the Iron Law may have had – and may still be having – on our lives today.  For example, if catastrophist narratives influenced the oligarchies operating within large swathes of Western governments and their quangos, plus within major media organisations, major businesses and charities then, to consider just two thought experiments, some of the following perverse outcomes might occur:-

Suppose a major bird protection charity starts to believe that current renewables technology must be adopted in order “to save the planet” then perhaps the charity (i) would promote farms of solar panels where wildfowl would mistake them for water surfaces, and (ii) would advocate the erection of wind turbines in areas where these turbines could, throughout the life of the wind farm, mince up large numbers of birds, bats and insects.

Or suppose that governments, their public health agencies and large pharmaceutical companies collectively came to believe that a deadly pandemic was in progress and from which the only escape would be the rapid development of a “safe and effective” vaccine.  In such an instance perhaps the vaccine’s safety might be inadequately tested due to the rapid development timescale required in order to release the population from repeated pandemic lockdowns.  What then would be the medical effects of the premature application of a potentially unsafe vaccine?

Correcting Narratives and Improving Governance

The Iron Triangle model suggests that moving to a ‘first best’ model of governance would improve matters for the populace (i.e. moving away from a semi-failed state model back towards competent government), while the Iron Law suggests that continual vigilance (followed, where necessary, by corrective action) of major national and international organisations (and treaties with them!) would help to avoid countries being suborned internally and compromised internationally.  However, many vested interests will oppose such improvements; group-think, tunnel vision and motivated reasoning are the dependable allies of vested interests.

In an era of 24-hour news (which, in the absence of severe censorship, will likely continue indefinitely) then avoiding panicked, snap decisions at senior levels, although very difficult, may lead to better long-term outcomes.

However, looking back at British history over decades the list of state failures is long; the Establishment has protected (and is protecting) itself at every turn.  Thus the sine qua non of better governance in the British context is probably the election of a government that sees itself primarily as serving the electorate, probably through root and branch reform, rather than serving those unelected and anti-democratic forces which, for far too long, seem to have inhabited the corridors of power.

Causal Underdetermination

Thus far I have not addressed in this note the issue of the fundamental scientific causal underdetermination which you raised, Kevin.  As this note has been concerned primarily with the possible misdirection of the efforts of Western organisations (both within and without nation states) I will not here switch horses to discuss in detail the very different but very relevant issue of underdetermination.

For now it is sufficient to note that the narrative adopted by many Western states, namely that of dangerously rising temperatures driven mainly or exclusively by unabated CO2 emissions, gravely hobbles the economies of those nations which try, at all costs, to mitigate any such climate change, while harming not at all those nations which reject (and perhaps even laugh at) the catastrophist CO2 narrative.   

References

1. https://thegwpf.org/content/uploads/2023/07/West-Catastrophe-Culture6by9-v28.pdf
2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_triangle_(US_politics)#/media/File:Irontriangle.PNG where the interest group could be, for example, a university, an NGO, or a green organisation, etc.
3. Arsenio Balisacan et al. (editors), “Sustainable Economic Development: resources, environment and institutions”, Academic Press, 2014, especially section 3.4.2 by Lee H. Endress, ‘Public policy: prosustainability or not?’, pages 57 -58.
4. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_law_of_oligarchy