> Plain packaging — where you strip cigarette boxes of their attractive branding — seems like a no brainer, but in Australia, it looks like the policy caused smokers to switch to cheaper brands and to smoke more
This example provides an easily understood illustration of why so many social programs fail. Simply put, the people proposing and creating the programs have zero understanding of the people whose lives they are trying to influence and control. Like generals ensconced in their offices located not even on the same continent as the front line they study maps and tables and hear the advice of experts with even less direct experience than themselves and then dispatch orders that arrive too late and attempt to command a reality that does not exist. The reports they receive back show nothing has changed or the situation has got worse and yet they never adapt or see their own fault. Why should they? They've suffered no consequence.
If you read the report instead of a blog post with an agenda you will find out that the plain packaging accelerated decline in smoking by about 25% (p<0.01)
Was about to comment the same thing, even if they smoked more, the program was meant to reduce the trend of new smokers, period. And it was successful about that
But this policy has been very successful ... Every policy has some unwanted side effects but smoking overall has seen large reductions since its introduction.
Maybe we should save the anger for the rich and powerful people selling addictive cancer rather than the ones who need to find some way of reducing their harm without getting sued or voted out.
The thing that is missing from most of these government initiatives (in the US at least) is a mechanism and willingness to revisit and iterate. That's how we do software these days, but social programs are developed and shipped in a full waterfall cycle, then politicians just spend decades arguing about whether it should be cancelled due to some flaws or kept exactly as-is. What's missing are real data-driven attempts to close the feedback loop and fix the issues to achieve the stated objective.
Measuring success is good, but we also need to exercise the ability to make small updates and continue measuring, instead of just using that data to argue on the side of "throw it all out!" or "we can't touch it, it's essential!"
In most of the examples given the aim is to be seen to be doing something. It is cheaper and/or avoids unwanted change than doing something that actually works.
For example, lots of organisations will have diversity officers and training. Very few do things such as taking names, languages spoken (obviously you would leave any that are relevant to the job) and other clues to sex and race from job applications before shortlisting people for interview.
In the security realm we have security theater. In the social realm, we have compassion theater. "We are spending money on problem X" shows that the supporters of the spending care about people with problem X. Any proposed cut to that spending shows that the opponents to the spending hate people with with problem X and don't want to help them. Meanwhile, the money actually supports those in charge of the spending and various suppliers of goods and services.
Yes, I’m not disparaging the practice (though I personally think those who do it are deceived). I’m simply making the point that it’s not a real factor in societal change (which is along the lines of the point the article was trying to make).
This example provides an easily understood illustration of why so many social programs fail. Simply put, the people proposing and creating the programs have zero understanding of the people whose lives they are trying to influence and control. Like generals ensconced in their offices located not even on the same continent as the front line they study maps and tables and hear the advice of experts with even less direct experience than themselves and then dispatch orders that arrive too late and attempt to command a reality that does not exist. The reports they receive back show nothing has changed or the situation has got worse and yet they never adapt or see their own fault. Why should they? They've suffered no consequence.
https://www.health.gov.au/sites/default/files/study-of-the-i... (page 12)
They also tried quitting more often (p=0.013)
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC3710988/
You can still try and revert back if it fails.
But as software people we all know that turning a measure into a target yields problems.
Measuring success is good, but we also need to exercise the ability to make small updates and continue measuring, instead of just using that data to argue on the side of "throw it all out!" or "we can't touch it, it's essential!"
For example, lots of organisations will have diversity officers and training. Very few do things such as taking names, languages spoken (obviously you would leave any that are relevant to the job) and other clues to sex and race from job applications before shortlisting people for interview.
In the security realm we have security theater. In the social realm, we have compassion theater. "We are spending money on problem X" shows that the supporters of the spending care about people with problem X. Any proposed cut to that spending shows that the opponents to the spending hate people with with problem X and don't want to help them. Meanwhile, the money actually supports those in charge of the spending and various suppliers of goods and services.
A signal of an act. Not the act itself. Post l-modernisms ugly head rears itself once again.