Waste In Pittsburgh | A Causal Layer Analysis
Team Complexity | Bhakti Shah, Christianne Francovich, Christopher Costes, Donna Maione
Introduction
While examining the past and present are certainly the first steps in any investigation, to really see the full picture of any intervention, one must also cast their gaze to the future. To accomplish this for Pittsburgh’s wicked problem of waste, our team turned towards the Causal Layered Analysis (CLA) framework, as introduced by Sohail Inayatullah. The CLA is useful in this space because after establishing a present, the framing provides a space for pluralistic futures.
What is a Causal Analysis Framework
With the Causal Layered Analysis framework, there is also an acknowledgment of the different depth layers of a problem space. Within the analysis of the present and each future, our team established the CLA layers of litany, cause, world view, and myth/metaphor, moving from specific results to overarching themes. Litanies are the surface level results of a problem, often reflected in news headlines, informed via quantitative, data and developed from the popular opinions of the global zeitgeist. Causes are slightly deeper results and typically take the shape of things like policy initiatives, factors like economics, culture, politics, history, social dynamics, and qualitative data are especially relevant. World view is the next layer down and includes things the very dynamics that we use to understand or frame the problem through, on this level are the still very hidden, but direct ways from which we might solve the problem. Finally, myth and metaphor from the bottom-most layer and are the collective story around the issue, deeply ingrained ways of knowing, and the concept by which we frame our reality.
Guided by this framework, we moved forward in our understanding and analysis of Pittsburgh’s wicked problem of waste.
Early Process Decisions
Going Beyond the City Walls
For research into Pittsburgh’s waste, we developed a preferable future, one in which significant changes are made to the waste problems, and a non-preferred future in which the problem continues to grow. While new sources were collected and examined, much of the work for Pittsburgh present problems with waste was done through a previous analysis using a Multi-Layer Perspectives mapping. The projections of Pittsburgh’s problems into the future are based on the continuing trends examined in the MLP of both positive and negative interventions. With the CLA, the team specifically examined aspects of waste that extended well beyond the city borders of Pittsburgh. In order to acknowledge and present the full possibilities of the problem or interventions, our analysis required a much wider look at the wicked problem of waste than previous analysis. This change from previous studies was to account for waste as a global problem, not as something specific or unique to Pittsburgh. This widened gaze was also taken to prepare our research for a final step in which we could recommend and backcast to potential interventions for the wicked problem of waste in Pittsburgh.
Layered STEEP
Unique to our process was also the inclusion of vertical categories aligning closely with STEEP analysis. Within the four layers of the CLA, each contribution is also sorted into and between social, economic, governmental, technological, and environmental verticals. The decision to make these changes was made through vigorous independent research and group discussion around how to best present information and ensure a full breadth of examination. The final maps represent the collective work of four researchers and over three weeks. While they do not provide a full intervention, they do represent a final step towards the development of one.
Present CLA and The World of Today — 2020
Below we deconstruct the present view of waste management within the CLA framework sections: litany, causes, worldview, metaphors, and myths. Combined, they give a generalized overview of the current issue, which uncovers underlying values and causes not evident at first glance. We tried to represent as broad of viewpoints as possible, seeking those different from our own.
The litany level on waste management — 2020
Firstly, we looked at the problem of waste, starting from the highest level of the CLA, the litany. The litany describes the accepted public description of the problem based on the dominant perspective (Inayatullah, 1998).
Currently, our world is full of clashing opinions, evident in our federal government and the standpoint between Democrats and Republicans. We wanted to reflect this opposition in our description of the problem of waste. We looked at headlines from CNN and the New York Times and researched opposing sources from conservative sources such as Fox News.
Interestingly, these sources were in agreement that there is a problem around the waste problem. However, there was a stark difference we noticed on some key factors: the urgency of the problem, whose responsibility it is, and who will solve the problem of excessive waste generation. On the one hand, the issue is described as a problem that will affect everyone. Individuals, companies, and governments alike need to change their behavior to reduce the waste footprint. Facts such as “landfills reach capacity 25 years ahead of schedule” cannot be ignored (BBC & Jin, 2019).
Additionally, the rise of young climate activists such as Greta Thunberg draws the world’s attention toward the issues and crises yet to come. Companies are beginning to feel the pressure of many young activists (Malmqvist, 2020). Notably, the effects of plastics in our oceans are mentioned, with strong visuals from the great pacific garbage patch to turtles cinched in six-pack plastic rings remain fresh on our minds.
Conflicting media reports, which favor technological solutions over business responsibility, suggest we can continue our consumption habits as usual and that “Scientists are finding new ways to fight plastic waste” (Fox News & Burke, 2019). The burden of responsibility is reduced on business and consumers and further removes the problem to the field of science.
The articles on Fox News regarding the issue of waste were also far fewer than reported by CNN. Additionally, when Fox News mentions waste in an article, it points to responsibility elsewhere. In an article entitled, “Thanks to China, over 100 million metric tons of plastic waste will soon have nowhere to go” (Fox News & Carbone, 2018), perpetuates the idea that our trash goes somewhere far away. That it is someone else’s job to handle our discarded items.
When we zoom in and look at the waste issue specifically to Pittsburgh, we don’t necessarily see a city that is leading the effort towards sustainable waste practices. Pittsburgh’s current recycling rate is roughly 17 percent, well under the national average of 34 percent (Post-Gazette & Murray, 2018). In 2015, Mayor Bill Peduto introduced the Roadmap to Zero Waste, and Pittsburgh is part of the 100 resilient cities network, they are far from reaching the goals stated in that report (Regions of Climate Action, 2017). We will investigate this further in future assignments when we approach design interventions.
The cause level of waste management — 2020
We then moved a layer down towards causes, which is where the scientific and systems analysis of the problem is described.
Here we see that advertising and social media encourages the constant desire for new and better things. Globalization allows for cheap labor & increased production (Ortiz-Ospina, 2018). And the growing population compounds the problem, which may soon be out of control (Matsunaga, K. O., & Themelis, N. J., 2002).
Another leading cause is the way systems of waste are designed. The solid waste management system removes trash out of the public eye; they put consumer convenience above clean sorting. In Pittsburgh, the city uses a single-stream recycling process, taking the responsibility of sorting recyclables away from the public and into the hands of technology. The fragmented recycling programs rolled out in the city over multiple decades have caused a mindset amongst residents that whatever is placed by the curb will eventually be collected by the sanitation workers. This convenience makes it very easy for residents to disengage because the problem does not feel close to home for them. Additionally, the city can’t specify to the residents how much of the waste they pick up is recycled, a portion ends up in landfill, on a boat to China, or sitting in a resale warehouse waiting for prices to improve (Post-Gazette & Murray, 2018).
Designed obsolescence, continues to contribute to the problem of overconsumption. Repairing items may be unpopular, difficult, or impossible — encouraging consumers to keep consuming and buying new things.
The worldview level on waste management — 2020
The causes mentioned above are grounded in current worldviews. For example, the current system exists because people feel that improved or green waste management practices require too much time and money. The prevalent mindset: “technology will solve our waste issues” is also a great contributor to the choices people make regarding handling waste.
The advertising and the promotion of a consumerist lifestyle on social media tie into the belief that material things can bring happiness. Consumption as a pseudo-satisfier is made easy by social platforms. The dominant view looks at developing countries are resources and not as equal contributors to the global economy, based on global domestic products. In this mindset, an imbalance of power among the stakeholders suppresses those without power. The exploitation of cheap labor is what supports, low-cost products, and overproduction. Ironically, this is also partially why the steel industry in Pittsburgh crashed — production was more competitive elsewhere.
Like litany, worldviews also contain paradoxes because not everybody has the mindset described above. A tension is felt in describing the waste problem, one that waste should be hidden, and another that waste is a resource. Waste as a resource is the belief that, when managed responsibly, waste can be sustainable, enter a regenerative supply chain, and bring jobs and economic benefits to people. Luckily there is a small yet growing group of people that believe in the latter, which makes space for the reparation of products to be trending (The Guardian, 2013). In Pittsburgh, this mindset comes to the forefront in initiatives such as Reusefest and local organizations such as Protohaven, Construction Junction, and ZeroWaste Wrangler.
This slowly shifting mindset is also the enabler of the rise of sharing economies (The Economist, 2013), where people feel they don’t have to compromise on their consumption behavior, resulting in the reduction of individual waste generation.
The metaphors and myths level on waste management — 2020
Finally, the metaphors and myths which represent the emotional and more gut reactions society has concerning the waste issue.
Again, contradictions between metaphors exist, and we tried to make different views visible in this layer as well. Possibly the most substantial opposition is the one between climate change deniers — “climate change is a myth” and a climate-conscious mindset: “climate change is the biggest crisis humanity will ever face.”
We tried to keep the number of metaphors representative of what we believe the prevalent attitude is towards this issue. Three examples that we would like to highlight are; the idea of the ‘American Dream’ in combination with ‘out of sight out of mind’ and ‘not in my backyard, (NIMBY), not my problem.” All three contribute to the entrenched consumerist mindset of the present. In contrast with the under-represented metaphor: ‘one man’s waste is another man’s treasure,’ which alludes to the mindset of viewing waste as a resource.
Two Possible Futures
Futuring research method aims to scaffold a long-term vision, not to be confused with forecasting or predicting, (Inayatullah, 1998) futuring affords designers and others who plan or make decisions, a way to imagine what the future world may look like in particular scenarios, across scalar frameworks and multiple horizons. In this case using the CLA method, which does not address horizontal analysis across multiple horizons, we will look at a few causal pathways of two futures in the year 2070, fifty years in the future in two contrasting scenarios. First, we developed a long-term vision of the waste management system with a status-quo mindset, one that continues without consideration of solving the problem of the disposal and buildup of waste. The second long-term vision is of a preferred future fifty years ahead in the year 2070, a world waste, and its management would be solved. The ways in which these futures unfold will be discussed in our next article.
Future One, A Future of Unresolved Waste Problem — 2070
Highlights of the unresolved future — 2070
In a future where we don’t change our current course of action, our world is going to face much more than just pacific garbage patches. In this scenario of an unresolved future, we will continue plundering the earth’s resources to facilitate overdevelopment, overproduction, and overconsumption. The CLA map explores this future on levels of litany, cause, worldview & metaphors/myth. We have made attempts to show opposing views on each of these levels.
The litany in a future of unresolved waste management — 2070
In this negative transition of the future with the waste problem unresolved and worsening, we see the increasing load on the landfills continuing to be one of the major contributors to greenhouse gas emissions. This going unchecked leads to a drastic rise in temperatures. Increasing temperatures lead to extreme weather climate patterns and coastal states flooding and heatwaves in the midwest. The result of this is a mass migration of people from the population-dense coastal cities to inner cities like Pittsburgh, making it a refuge city.
Making the difficulties of mass migration even worse are the years of unmanaged waste built up in landfills, now leaching toxins into the water table. Agriculture falters as more of it becomes a garbage-strewn wasteland. With the strain on agriculture and climate refugees, food conflicts emerge in urban centers like Pittsburgh. With the displaced workers from agriculture sectors and climate refugees, production costs are at an all-time low due to low labor costs. Biodiversity and human health take a huge hit due to the drastic effects of climate change, water-borne diseases, and the exacerbated air quality of Pittsburgh.
Cause in a future of unresolved waste management— 2070
When we move to the next layer of systemic causes, waste continues to grow since there is no ownership or accountability around it. Is it the producer’s responsibility, is it the consumer’s responsibility or is it the responsibility of some government oversight committee? The buck is passed around endlessly with no sign of stopping, allowing people to do as they please with little to no consequences.
With most industries privatized to allow better operation and more funding, they function without any strict regulations to keep their practices in check. Lack of government oversight, coupled with poor enforcement of fines and revokement of manufacturing or mining permits, adds to an air of irresponsibility. Furthermore, with extensive power in the hands of lobbyists, new policies made by the government allow industries a lot of leeway without holding them accountable for the damage they have caused and are causing. A further side-effect of this has been the control of a lot of essential resources being in the hands of the major corporations, which has left small and some medium-sized businesses struggling to survive.
Large volumes of the displaced populations have provided cheap and readily available labor for a large number of industries to support the consumerist lifestyles of the majority of the population. This has led to the rise in squalor, and increased urban sprawl with no check on waste generation. Lessons could have been learned from the Kowloon Walled City back in the day, but it has been a case of not learning from humanity’s mistakes.
Worldview in a future of unresolved waste management — 2070
Waste management and “green practices” are widely viewed as too cost-intensive by people & businesses — and thought of as somebody else’s problem. Additionally, “how bad can just one plastic bag be” is a thought that often comes to millions of minds. At the same time, the time and effort required to reduce and manage waste deter people from adopting green practices in their daily lives. Corporations prioritize profitability over human and environmental safety as they have for many years.
Too much faith is placed in technology to solve the problems related to waste management while taking no responsibility for individual actions. While it is true that scientific advancements are being made in regards to better waste management, they cannot keep up with the rate at which people and businesses put it out daily. With bigger problems like hunger and unemployment, dealing with waste becomes a ‘luxury’ problem and is considered second to more ‘pressing’ issues. However, each problem is still being applied through the mindset of humans as the most important part of an ecosystem.
Myths & Metaphors in a future of unresolved waste management— 2070
When Darwin wrote “On the Origin of Species,” he would not have guessed that the concept of the “survival of the fittest” would be taken to its absolute extreme by the human species instead of allowing it to grow organically. Humans are well aware of their position on top of the food chain and disregard most other species’ survival and existence. Most other species of animals have become extinct or at best, endangered as a direct result of human actions. The fact that people cannot realize the benefits and importance of collectivism when trying to tackle issues has become a significant hurdle leading to nuclear living being the norm.
While it is true that we cannot make an omelet without breaking a few eggs, the rate at which the eggs are breaking has left the world with no eggs and no chicken to lay more either. Mindless and unrestricted consumption has long been a way of life in the USA — with less than 5% of the world’s population, the country has consumed over more than a third of the world’s paper and more than a quarter of the world’s oil. This comes from the need to conquer nature and extractive relationship with the earth’s resource with no responsibility to restore what is taken.
Future Two: A Prefered Future without Waste — 2070
A world in which we solve our waste problem requires much more than recycling regulations and new technological solutions. The CLA framework allowed our team to explore both current and historical events to create this preferred vision of the future. Ideally, this vision would involve multiple stakeholders with opposing views at all levels of agency. In this respect, this proposed vision promotes a heightened level of sensitivity to the Earth’s system and logic. The deconstruction of dominant powers is a central theme in this future. Below are some highlights presented on a horizontal STEEP perspective within the four levels of litany, cause, worldview, and metaphors/myths.
The litany in the preferred wasteless world — 2070
At the litany level, in this preferred future, we identified a few issues as future headlines, even exaggerations in some cases. In this society, we see scenarios that illustrate normative behavior, where good citizenship is valued and praised, or conversely shamed. Elimination of waste through recycling in one example that straddles the social with the economic framework, and provides an opposing view to zero waste as a circular economy. In this future headlines such as “Recycle Bank Expands to the Education Sector” by paying for collected plastic bottles as payment for tuition. This type of program, while it appears to be good for the environment, may continue to promote the use of single-use plastic items. Tensions between true circularity and recycling as a solution still exists in this future and represents the varied perspectives of stakeholders.
In the area of governance and policy, we looked at the future of the Green New Deal (GND) policies and its influence on technological innovations that address processing or recirculating waste as a carbon sink business. As the government buys back landfills, remediation work would create an industry referred to as ‘retractive’ and surpasses the extractive industries as more and more reclaimed materials enter the value chain.
The media would boast headlines of carbon neutrality and saving the planet. The reduction in greenhouse gas emissions as a result of waste remediation and circularity would be a significant contributing factor in reversing two of the nine planetary boundaries, specifically biodiversity and nitrogen cycles.
The cause level supports waste elimination — 2070
On a cause level, the areas we identified could easily be headlines in the media, creating public buzz around a new social structure, policy, or technology. Inayatullah (1998) warns that debating where each idea fits, a litany, or a cause, in this case, is not a productive effort. If we look horizontally across the causes which support a waste-resolution, we see the emergence of shared spaces, particularly maker spaces that promote local making, perhaps of reclaimed materials that we mentioned on a litany level. Plastic would faze out based on peer pressure and is linked to the devaluation of oil prices. Currently, what we currently call waste-pickers to become Resource Steward in a self-organized co-op. Technology and ecosystems become blurred as biomimicry becomes a core tenet to solve the complex problems of waste. The earth heals within this new infrastructure and infusion of funding for the New Civilian Conservation Corps (NCCC). The cause level we see as a helpful level to deepen our analysis when building scenarios for interventions specific to Pittsburgh. We will address this further in our next post on ecologies of interventions.
The worldview of a preferred future — 2070
At the worldview level, there exist tensions between different perspectives. Here the dominant values shift perceptions of benefits in waste or byproducts. Waste is considered a commodity. Waste management is looked at as a repurpose management system; intimately interconnected are the socio-technical solutions. Government power flattens as local communities become valued for knowledge relating to place-based solutions specific to climate change. The value of nature as a living asset toward our survival on the planet replaces Gross Domestic Products (GDP) as a snapshot of a region’s worth. The ability to care for the planet becomes a dominant culture over consumerism.
Metaphors in a preferred future — 2070
In the preferred future, the metaphors we envision are circular, taking into account a holistic approach where governing bodies empower local communities in decisions that impact everyday life. The symbol of a circle emerges from a triangle shape currently associated with recycling. The intertwining circles that are fluid represent interconnected flow in economics, benefiting both the earth and all inhabitants fairly and equally. Humanity is seen as a subset of the world’s ecology. Technological metaphors include networks or ecologies of disciplines, which collectively work together in both social and hard sciences to continue to evolve pathways of planetary harmony. The color pink evokes a sense of calm and harmony with all living beings on earth — a heightened sense of caring. These speculative metaphors, if generated together with stakeholders in a workshop, would help to create dialogue toward a shared vision with alternative ways of understanding.
Process, Discussion & Challenges
This section reflects our process as a team, the areas we discussed, the tools we used, and the challenges we faced in completing this assignment.
Process & relevant discussions
Initially, we began by brainstorming the present layers of litany, causes, worldviews, and metaphors and began mapping our ideas using Miro. Questions such as when is a world view widely adopted and thus should it be included, popped up several times. We quickly became aware that our worldviews skewed what was represented on our map in this first session. We put our attention next to researching opposing views to widen the gap on our subjectivity. This was most accessible in the litany level, using media sources that we do not frequent. If we were to explore the benefits of CLA, to “expand the range and richness of scenarios” (Inayatullah, p.816), then we needed to stretch our viewpoints.
Discussions around the importance of remaining as objective as possible came up; is it okay if our personal opinions shine through? We finally concluded that it would be challenging and not necessary to remain 100% objective, primarily because the CLA framework promotes a wide range of viewpoints. Including the perspective of others not present in the room was challenging. In visioning a preferred future, we acknowledge it would look very different if conducted with stakeholders across a broad spectrum, for example, a community member who grew up next to a landfill in China, and a CEO of a waste management firm would see things very differently.
While we worked on the level of metaphors, we had some interesting challenges for our team, one that would also be present in a workshop setting. The team’s diverse background and culture helped illustrate this point. For example, a US citizen associates objects and metaphors very differently than someone from India or the Netherlands. While working on the fourth level, we spend a considerable amount of time explaining what particular objects and sayings meant, which often had a local, historical, and cultural context. The metaphors in this analysis are US-focused since our project scope is centered in Pittsburgh.
After our initial brainstorming and discussion, we chose STEEP to help us to organize our findings. While we recognized that the CLA second level of causes includes aspects of social, economic, political, and the historical (Inayatullah, p.820), using the layered STEEP framework helped us to connect to our previous work in wicked mapping. If this were an actual engagement within a community of stakeholders, in a workshop setting, then facilitation would be needed to probe for deeper meaning among all present.
Challenges
We struggled at times on deciding at which level to place some ideas. As mentioned earlier, Inayatullah (1998) writes about this common issue and how this could derail some critical issues, particularly in a workshop setting, keeping participants from proceeding into more profound discussions and understanding. When we caught ourselves doing this, we quickly moved on to more productive conversations.
When mapping our two futures, we struggled most with how far we should take it. Meaning, how idealistic or realistic should it be? We decided on a preferred future over probable future, especially if this were to be used for backcasting and seeking leverage points for design interventions. The unresolved future is a combination of different doomsday scenarios stitched together by looking at a historic mapping from the Multi-Level Perspective map and looking at culture, film, media, technology, and the current mindset of the government. In doing this, we aimed to broaden our futures beyond the perspectives of the design team.
Conclusion and Insights
Insight from Structure
The chief goal of employing the CLA was to further our examination of Pittsburgh’s wicked problem of waste and to begin considering the future of the problem. Within both the individual sections and the collection as a whole, CLA proved an invaluable tool for this research. Addressing the multiple layers of a problem was done in previous work (like the MLP), but the CLA offered a different insight and a framing that was more focused on specific moments. In particular, the inclusion of metaphor/myth in our analysis as the root causal layers of the moment provided many potentialities for change.
Insight from Futures
By far the most successful aspect of the CLA mapping was its ability to provide for a multitude of futures. Bounding from our collective knowledge about the present problem and shifting this information forward was a new exercise and created a space for imagining exactly what changes would be needed or the result of them being left untouched. Considering the stark differences created by our futures, we also provide a comfortable middle ground from which to aim and examine any of our interventions for the future.
Limitations of CLA
The CLA is a fantastic tool, and its flexibility and tendency to reveal deep-rooted factors can not be overlooked when researching wicked problems. Perhaps one of its flaws is that it must be accompanied by further research for action. On its own, the CLA only represents the research’s best guess at a future and not a path towards that future. The CLA also doesn’t easily allow minority voices or counter-movements to be shown within the context of the problem. This limitation made it more difficult to explain the relationships of minority voices as they grow (or are extinguished) in a given future.
Insight from Process as a Whole
In summary, the use of CLA combined with STEEP categorization provided a way to organize the material, which in itself creates limitations. For example, in the social category, a further deconstruction of alternate views could be further developed, in particular, gender, race, and alternative perspectives from other countries and cultures outside of the United States. Additionally, speculating future metaphors may limit understanding of a future, and in this case, are hard to imagine what will evoke emotion and project a new reality. This process was a valuable exercise in better understanding of how the framework of CLA may be used to deepen discourse between a stakeholder group of diverse views.
Link to full list of sources:
