by Jay Lund

The awe-inspiring Phil Isenberg used to talk about differences in culture between science and policy as being akin to the two cultures of scholarship discussed by C.P. Snow – science and humanities. It is hard for one mind to deeply appreciate the variety and importance of many ways of thinking, and more difficult still to bring them together insightfully and effectively on our common problems.

The cartoon below depicts a different two cultures of thought in the organization of problems and solutions: administration versus science. These two cultures can be seen in many discussions of science or problems among administrators and scientists. Scientists in their activities and careers tend to see the expertise working on a problem and the development of solutions as a network of individuals (and sometimes groups), scattered across many organizations (even including retirees from organizations). Managers’ and administrators’ careers are usually (and necessarily) more concerned with administrative responsibilities, defined by the territorial boundaries and missions of their organizations.

While depicted below for science relevant to the problems of California’s Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta, this cultural divide certainly applies to universities (researchers, departments, colleges) and probably most other realms. Individual scientists tend to be pragmatic and wide-ranging for mustering expertise for a problem. But the administrators’ perspective is very important if those experts are to be paid (and be influential for management). Alas, when large amounts of money are involved, scientists also often think territorially.

Many problems in this world, such as the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta, span many agencies and interests. For such problems, it is challenging for science being administered across different organizations (or even different programs within a single organization) to become integrated. Effective scientific integration always takes considerable effort, strong organizations, planning, and administrative and scientific devotion, all usually focused on a particular problem. The effort and devotion from administrators and scientists must be enough to overcome and resist the normal accumulations of entropy and parochialism in human affairs.

In California water and environmental problems we have made only a little progress at scientific integration compared with what is needed. It is not clear that there is yet enough common vision or high-level administrative authority and discipline to overcome our entropy and parochialism.

Further reading

C.P. Snow’s Two Cultures https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Two_Cultures

Phil Isenberg: 1939-2023, obituary, https://capitolweekly.net/phil-isenberg-1929-20

Lund, J. 2022. The vortex of executive activity. https://californiawaterblog.com/2022/08/14/the-vortex-of-executive-activity/

Rypel, A.L. 2022. Two-way thinking in natural resource management. https://californiawaterblog.com/2022/08/07/two-way-thinking-in-natural-resource-management/

Jay Lund is a Professor Emeritus in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering and a Vice-Director of the Center for Watershed Sciences at the University of California – Davis.