Learning from Policy: Navigating Complexity and Failure
In this deeply reflective session on public policy, speakers with decades of experience unpack how success and failure are not binaries but co-travelers in India’s development journey. From the nuanced missteps of large-scale rural-urban integration efforts like PURA, to the unintended consequences of financial inclusion policies and microfinance regulation, the conversation reveals the layered nature of policy making.
Whether through lapses in governance, lack of continuity, or misaligned incentives, the speakers examine the deep, middle, and shallow roots of failure. Each failure whether in implementation, design, or institutional alignment is not the end, but a call for course correction.
They also spotlight global dynamics in climate policy, showing how politics can overpower science in international negotiations. The panel calls for an honest embrace of adaptive learning, local ownership, and the importance of designing for complexity not control.
