Wicked Problem Wednesday

I have spent the last couple of weeks on airplanes which — as sad it might sound — have become places where I catch up on professional reading. So I’ve filled my time with wicked problems, grimoires, Atlantis, and reflections on the discipline. Not only has this given me a bit of momentum, but also gave my monumental “to read” list a bit of a haircut (while at the same time adding new books to the end of it).

This past week, I finally finished John Schofield’s new book, Wicked Problems for Archaeologists: Heritage as Transformative Practice (2024). It’s a good book that explores one angle of how archaeologists can and have contributed to “wicked problems” facing society. Schofield spends a good bit of time defining what constitutes a wicked problem and this is moderately helpful for those curious about the definition of this term. To simplify, wicked problems are problems that are so socially, scientifically, culturally, economically, and politically complex as to defy clear solutions. The examples that Schofield provides range from global climate change to violent conflict, race, and social justice. 

Schofield’s book has two main thrusts. On the one hand, he sees the work of archaeologists as having the potential to shape policies that can mitigate the impact of wicked problems on society. In that regard, much of the book speaks to how archaeologists have and can influenced policy debates on issues such as climate change, resolving conflicts, and bringing economic and social justice to migrants, the unhoused, and other (so-called) marginalized communities. Schofield uses some of his work on the archaeology of plastics 

On the other hand, Schofield stresses the potential in small victories. These are projects that produce seemingly modest gains in the effort to address wicked problems. In some ways, small victories are not solutions and aren’t necessarily scaleable to resolve wicked problems, but they do demonstrate that it is possible to push back against even the most complicated problem. Schofield highlighted Rachael Kiddey’s brilliant work among the unhoused in Bristol as an example of how archaeology could function on an individual level to improve the quality of life among the unhoused.

The tension between little victories and big policies remains unresolved in the book and that is part of its appeal. Wicked problems do not beg for wicked solutions, but instead, provoke utterly banal and everyday (albeit disciplinary) work. Much of this work operates outside the realm of policy makers and falls loosely into what I have called “archaeology of care” which involves using archaeology as a way to show individuals and communities that their past, their present, their experiences, and their lives have real meaning to us as a society.

Schofield’s approach to archaeology is heavily inclined toward processualism. His work seems oddly distant from indigenous approaches, for example, which sometimes resist the empirical and even positivist roots of archaeological epistemology. Schofield acknowledges that these exist, but perhaps out of an awareness that some might see engagement with indigenous thought worlds as a kind of appropriation, leaves them aside in both his discussion of small and policy driven archaeological work. 

Moreover, he seems pretty confident that existing systems — capitalism, democracy, the nation state, and so on — and epistemologies can resolve the very problems that they are complicit in creating. The book for all its strengths, especially as a survey of Schofield’s estimable contributions to the field, seems to do as much to reinforce the wickedness of the problems as offer alternatives to this ways of thinking. As a result, there’s a sense of inevitability in the problems that the book studies and perhaps that reflects the deep historic investment of archaeology in the systems that produced the problems from the start.

That all said, I get the sense that the audience for this book is people who want to think about archaeology as a kind of activist science rather than those seeking to use archaeology to produce social change. In other words, this book is a rearguard action designed to demonstrate the viability of the discipline to skeptics within and without. Students seem to be a key component of Schofield’s prospective audience. And this is to his credit. He recognizes that the next generation of students — those born in the 21st century — are only too eager to embrace disciplinary, professional, intellectual, and creative practices that make a difference. By presenting them with an easily digestible statement on how archaeology CAN matter, it bridges the gap between what these students may be learning in their archaeology course and field work and the problems that dominate their social conscience. Whether this is enough to transform this generation of students in activist archaeologist or not is difficult to know. The growing cynicism of students in general toward the desiccated remains of disciplinary practices is only one of the challenge facing archaeology.

At the same time, this book seems to offer a way for embattled faculty to address concerns from their administrations who often seem to recognize that archaeology is neither commercial enough to peddle to students eager to see ROI on their investment in higher education nor relevant enough to wrap into the institution’s social mission. So perhaps the odd tension created by offering a narrowly disciplinary approach to problems that by definition resist the organization of knowledge essential to the modern world makes sense.

The unspoken truth of Schofield’s book is that the wicked problem is archaeology itself.