Outline and Schedule
Fall, 2000
12 units
Faculty-in-charge:
Dr. Richard D. Tabors
Professor Arthur Steinberg
With
Professor David Marks
Faculty and Industry Guests
Teaching Assistant Fleming Ray
Room: E25-111
Meeting Time: 10-11:30 Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays
A. Context
Introduction to Technology and Policy, ESD 11, and your TPP sequence choice for the spring, form a single course. They are coordinated with Dynamic Strategic Planning in the fall semester.
ESD 11 introduces the complexities of developing technological strategies through exercises that provide understanding of personal, professional and cultural contexts, and negotiation and constituency building skills that are essential for effective technology policy making. The Spring ProSeminars follow with a focus on formulating effective strategies for implementation structured around specific technical policy areas.
ESD 11 exposes you to a broad range of perspectives as well as decision and negotiation tools, whereas the Spring ProSeminars focus on reconciling differences in objectives. The two semesters of the TPP ProSeminar function to integrate the disciplines and analytical methods to which first year students are exposed through the other courses in their program. The emphasis is on process and method, not on specific facts. ESD 11 presents the problems and offers a range of methods for arriving at solutions. The Spring ProSeminars provide the opportunity to apply the lessons learned in the Fall in greater depth around a specific, directed technical policy issue.
B. Intellectual Agenda
During the ESD 11, students will be challenged to improve their understanding and ability to deal with differences in values -- and therefore in objectives -- associated with the range of individual and cultural differences, professional perceptions and occupational responsibilities.
Through the first block the student will be introduced to a set of analytic methods and policy paradigms of technology policy analysis. Students will be challenged in the first case to see that ?there is no right answer? through a resource allocation problem in which the scarce resource is human organs for transplantation. Here, and throughout the semester, students will develop, through application, the set of basic skills used in arriving at policy solutions. These skills include basic understanding of utility theory, trade-offs among complex alternatives, policy formulation, negotiation, constituency building, and organizational behavior. Given the complex issues studied, ESD 11 will provide the structure within which individuals will be able to:
Blocks two and three focus on case studies that will allow each student to develop an understanding of the following:
In each major block the readings, discussions and exercises concentrate on particular aspects of the complexity of values and perspectives. Many of these topics continue to surface in discussions throughout the semester. The spotlight will, however, shine on specific themes in each block.
Block 1 is an introduction to the analytic methods and the paradigms of Policy Analysis. It is an overview of methods that students will see in far greater detail in other courses at the Institute. Here our objective is to frame the alternatives not to teach the details. We will introduce the theme that, in policy decisions, there is "no one correct answer" for everyone, but an answer for each individual that she or he can describe and defend. People differ in their values and objectives. They generally can not wholly accept any single policy as correct, even if they agree on the technological facts.
Within the block we will introduce the concepts of structured negotiation and of organizational behavior. These concepts will be the focus of the weekend of leadership training that occurs on Thompson?s Island early in the semester.
Block 2 stresses the importance of process and profession in shaping personal perceptions for decision-making. Its message is "where you sit is where you stand." That is, the profession you choose, the level of responsibility you hold, and the sector, public or private, in which you work, influences your positions on any issue. The context for this block will be the difficult negotiation of water rights for the Colorado River, a case which brings together conflicting parties at the state, federal, and professional levels. Understanding of the process is provided through glimpses of the roles that a scarce resource, water, plays in the local and global economy, the roles of experts in technology debates, and the role and function of the US and international legal systems.
In this block we apply the theories and principles learned during the semester. This case depicts a situation in which the issues require greater understanding of the political processes and institutional structures within which complex technical and economic decisions are made.
The lessons of 1.) Alliance formation, 2.) States? rights and Federal authority, 3.) The diversity of perspectives on defining and solving global problems, and 4.) Techniques of searching for common interests and solutions, dominate this exercise. This case concludes with the presentation of a negotiated settlement for water rights before an Administrative Law Judge (ALJ) that represents an agreement that meets the physical and technical as well as the political realities of allocating what some would argue is a right not a resource.
Block 3:The context for the final block of the course will be the development of business policy -- the planning and introduction of a new technology into the context of a nation under rapid development. The case is based on the development of a plan to introduce / dramatically expand telecommunication technology to one or more African nations. The case will focus on the need to develop strategies for technology introduction that meet the economic and social requirements of a nation under rapid development while meeting the business development needs of a private corporation.
General: The emphasis throughout ESD 11 is on recognizing, appreciating, and working with differences in values and in working toward solutions that are based on the differences in values and positions held by individuals and groups of individuals. It also provides a foundation for understanding the role of structure and process in matters of technology, finance, politics, culture, and the role of risk. Students should carefully note that in each block, the case studies are vehicles for presenting and discussing issues. To make them more realistic, we will complement them with technical discussions and presentations by experts in the field. The ProSeminars are, however, not technical subjects; students in this class should not focus on detailed technical material and lose sight of the conceptual issues or the lessons in policy process.
C. Complementary Agendas
The case studies are designed to involve all students in increasingly challenging professional and organizational situations. Building upon the concepts presented in the leadership module work in the first case is individual. In the second, and subsequent cases, the work involves both individual and team assignments. This process provides the opportunity to work professionally in group efforts characteristic of inter-disciplinary policy exercises in the government and business environment, and to develop the confidence to succeed in such situations.
As a part of the ProSeminars, students will be called upon to prepare and deliver increasingly complex presentations. These progress from short individual discussions of readings, through short formal presentations, to a major group presentation. Students will also be called upon to prepare frequent, professional quality reports of different lengths aimed at different audiences. These will be commented upon and returned promptly.
During the first block of ESD 11, formal attention will be paid to introducing students to presentation skills, writing skills and group dynamics skills. Our objective is to introduce these skills, not to provide in-depth, new or remedial skills. For those who need assistance, more instruction in these skills can be acquired through other formal programs and courses at MIT.
ESD 11 despite its size will be run as a seminar. Classes are organized to encourage student comment and group discussions of the daily readings and the topics at hand, which will challenge individual's values and opinions. Much of the learning in ESD 11 comes from working together. ESD 11 will initially seem large for a seminar but ample opportunity will be provided for smaller working sessions, some with faculty and others with fellow students. Your class has been assembled to represent a broad spectrum of interests, cultures and political perspectives. It is a primary and most immediate source of information about the realities of differences in values, and the exercises are intended to help each of you make extensive use of your resources from each other.
D. Texts
The vast majority of the readings for the Fall Semester are or will be available on the WWW. The internet address is http://web.mit.edu/tpp.11/www. This site will be updated throughout the semester as additional materials are made available for the individual cases. There will be individual readings provided for each of the cases. These readings represent materials that could not be placed on the WWW. Students may be assessed a charge for copying. In addition students should quickly purchase or acquire from other TPP students a copy of Fischer and Ury, Getting to Yes, Second Edition, Penguin Books, 1991. Individual case study readings will be drawn from Marc Reisner Cadillac Desert, Penguin USA, 1993 and Annabel Z. Dodd The Essential Guyide to Telecommunications, Second Edition, Prentice Hall, 1999. These can be purchased on the internet from www.amazon.com or www.barnesandnoble.com. It is also available in local bookstores.
E. Class Participation and Grading
ESD 11 is a seminar and as such students are expected to participate actively in class discussions. Participation in all class exercises is required. Class participation accounts for 10% of the course grade. The faculty will, whenever feasible, prepare and distribute study questions prior to each class discussion to assist students in preparing for class discussions. There will be a final examination. The format and the time will be announced. The final examination will count for 30% of the term grade. There are three major blocks. Assignments during the first block will count 10%, those for the second 15%, for the third 20% and for the fourth 15%. The weighting of the individual assignments will be announced at the beginning of each case.
F. Schedule (includes critical dates for ESD 801)
| Week | Day | Faculty | Topic |
| 1 Sept. | 6 | RDT/AS | Introduction to Technology and Policy |
| Block 1: Policy Analysis: Analytic Methods and Policy Paradigms | |||
| 8 | RDT | Cost Benefit Analysis and Trade-off Analysis | |
| 2 | 11 | AS | Frames |
| 13 | RDT/AS | The Value of Life and Intro to Case I | |
| 15 | No class meeting | ||
| Block 1b: Organizational Behavior and Leadership | |||
| 16 & 17 | Thompson's Island | ||
| 3 | 18 | RDT | Summary and Feedback: Organizational Behavior and Team Building |
| 20 | AS | Discussion: The Heart | |
| 22 | Presentations to the Board: Heart Transplants | ||
| 4 | 25 | Holiday | |
| 27 | RDT/AS | Getting to Yes | |
| 29 | RDT/AS | HarborCo Game EXTENDED CLASS TIME | |
| Block 2: Technology Policy Analysis: Where you sit is where you stand? | |||
| 5 Oct | 2 | AS | Introduction to Case: Water in the West |
| 4 | DM | Water: Technical solutions ? Where does it come from and can you get more? | |
| 6 | RDT | Political Paradigms | |
| 6 | 9 | HolidayColumbus Day Holiday | |
| 11 | RDT | American Political Realities: From Laws to Regulations | |
| 13 | DM | Water in an International Context | |
| 7 | 16 | RDT | Evaluation and Mitigation of Risk |
| 18 | In Class Negotiations | ||
| 20 | The Policy Process | ||
| 8 |
23
|
In Class Negotiation | |
| 25 | RDT/AS/DM | Hearings before the ALJ | |
| 27 | RDT/AS/DM | Hearings before the ALJ | |
| 9 | 30 | RDT/AS/DM | Debriefing on Water in the West |
| Nov | 1 | No Class | |
| Block 3: Business Policy | |||
| 3 | AS/Guest | Introduction to African Telecom | |
| 10 | 6 | AS/Guest | Business opportunities in African Telecommunciations |
| 8 | Schindall | Satellite Telecom Options | |
| 10 | Holiday | ||
| 11 |
13
|
|
Writing a Business Plan |
|
15
|
AS | The For-Profit Environment | |
| 17 | In Class work period | ||
| 12 | 20 | International Technical Policy | |
| 22 | Open | ||
| 24 | Holiday | Thanksgiving Holiday | |
| 13 | 27 | In Class work period | |
| 29 | Presentations (evening) | ||
| Dec | 1 | Presentations (evening) | |
| 14 | 4 | Debriefing on African Telecom Case | |
| 6 | RDT | Analytic Tools in the Policy Process: What Helps, What does not? | |
| 8 | RDT/AS | The Policy Process Revisited | |
| 15 | 11 | Open | |
| 13 | Last day of classes | ||
| Final Examination -- to be scheduled | |||