Aaron Wildavsky

Aaron Wildavsky (May 31, 1930 – September 4, 1993)[1] was an American political scientist known for his pioneering work in public policy, government budgeting, and risk management.

At Berkeley, he was chairman of the political science department (1966–1969) and founding dean of the Graduate School of Public Policy (1969–1977).

Precautionary approaches to approving new technology are irrational, he said, because they demand that we know whether something is safe before we can do the very tests that would demonstrate its safety or dangerousness.

Wildavsky was a prolific author, writing or co-writing thirty-nine books and numerous journal articles, including important works on the budgetary process, policy analysis, political culture, foreign affairs, public administration, and comparative government.

Wildavsky was the recipient of the 1996 University of Louisville Grawemeyer Award for Ideas Improving World Order, with Max Singer.

Anticipation is beneficial, but if employed as the sole strategy the law of diminishing returns makes it unattractive, impractical, impossible and even counter productive (it consumes resources better spent on resilience).

... Trial and error is a device for courting small dangers in order to avoid or lessen the damage from big ones.

Sequential trials by dispersed decision makers reduce the size of that unknown world to bite-sized, and hence manageable, chunks.