Confusion

Confusion can downplay key issues by making them so complex, complicated, or vague that a receiver cannot understand, or comprehend them. Earlier, the term "composition" was used to refer to the purposeful "putting-together" process, the choice and arrangement of elements.

Confusion, as used here, refers primarily to the result of either (1) a poorly-composed message, unintentionally confusing the receiver, or (2) a well-composed message deliberately intended to confuse the receiver.

Confusion can be accidental. People can make errors, can ramble and be disorganized or ignorant, without malice. On the other hand, confusion can be deliberate: planned as a way of deceiving others, misleading people away from key issues, or hiding things. The con man, for example, uses confusion as a way of getting money from those who are being fleeced or gulled.

Political demagogues have used confusion as a way of gaining power. When people are confused, they have often turned to strong leaders offering simple solutions. Governments can use confusion as a way of hiding secret information from external enemies, or of hiding unfavorable information from internal critics.

When we are confused, we are more likely to be deceived. By reducing confusion, we reduce some of the risks of being deceived.

Omission, an important factor related to confusion, is probably the most common way people downplay their own "bad": unfavorable information is omitted, hidden, concealed. If receivers lack information, especially relating to harmful effects, they can be confused.

Confusion can also result from the absence of structure, organization, sub-divisions, boundaries and limits, links and transitions, directional cues and signals. Anything that is unplanned, unsorted, and unorganized is likely to be confusing.

Most crucial is the absence of goals or purpose: things literally become "senseless" and "meaningless." Confusion can also result from unclear goals (vague, unspecific), unfamiliar goals (new, strange, or foreign), variable goals (shifting priorities), and complex goals.

Consider, for example, large organizations, such as universities and democratic governments, with many, vague, and shifting goals resulting from the pressures of diverse interest groups. It's easy for a trade-school (or a private business) to have one, clear, specific goal; but universities, for example, are always involved in the shifting priorities among their multiple, abstract goals: "liberal education," "career preparation," "cultural enrichment," and "research."

Confusion is frequently caused by too many senders of messages: too many people talking at once, too many bosses, too many cooks. Sometimes confusion is caused by the unrelated quality of this experience: in committees or meetings, for example, often speakers go off on unrelated tangents. In other cases, multiple speakers may send contrary or contradictory messages: workers getting conflicting orders from different bosses; different government agencies issuing conflicting reports.

Conflicting and contradictory claims by different speakers (such as opposing political parties, economic ideologies, religious beliefs) are common in a free society. Free people must learn to cope with a multiplicity of conflicting views.

After recognizing the role of omission, and the importance of the efficient and the final causes (the senders and receivers, and their goals), the rest of this section will focus on confusion within the message itself, on the material and formal causes (the words and images, their patterns and arrangements).

From observation, here we stipulate that confusion is likely to occur when things are
(1) unclear, (2) unfamiliar, (3) too variable, (4) too complex.

(1) Unclear. Confusion can be caused by unclear messages. However, when people advise us to "be clear" or "write clearly" or "speak clearly," there are several different things they may mean; two of the most commonly suggested problem areas are carefulness / carelessness in the "basics" of encoding, and ambiguous / unambiguous elements.

Messages have to be understandable, that is: visible, audible, legible, readable, or recognizable. Confusion can be caused in the basic encoding/decoding process if there are such things as errors in speaking, penmanship, typing, spelling, grammar, punctuation, diction, translation, math, or technical and mechanical problems in transmission. Errors in "basics" can cause confusion. In addition, such errors are often seen (rightly or wrongly) as indicators that the speaker / writer lacks information, training, education, experience, practice, or discipline.

Many of the problems relating to errors are extensively discussed in Mina Shaughnessey's Errors and Expectations; her common sense approach focuses on trying to sort out errors and to establish priorities in dealing with them. Ignorance of words and of their connotations can cause errors leading to confusion; for example, a speaker with a limited vocabulary lacks precision in expressing meaning and feeling. Shaughnessey further argues that an inadequate vocabulary also leads to wordiness, circumlocution, and awkward sentences.

In ordinary conversation, if we make an error, we can frequently get feedback from our audience, so that we can clarify ourselves. In conversations, we often have a constant informal exchange of nonverbal cues (head nodding, etc.) and phatic communications ("uh-uh, uh-uh . . . you know what I mean?") to keep our words and meanings clear. In writing, we don't have such aids, Thus, to reduce misunderstandings when we write, we usually need to give more attention to our choice of words.

Sometimes the call for "clarity" refers to specificity and seeks to restrict the meaning of a word or image to one single unambiguous meaning. Ambiguity exists whenever any word image, or signal can be interpreted in more than one way. Many words are intrinsically ambiguous because they are generalizations (covering broad categories) or abstractions (referring to intangible concepts, ideas, qualities) in contrast to words which are more specific and/or concrete.

Nonverbal ambiguity is common. Gestures and facial expressions are frequently misinterpreted or misunderstood because the "vocabulary" of nonverbal communication is often even more ambiguous and less defined than our verbal communication.

Specific language is often very useful, necessary, and appropriate, but it is not better than more generalized and abstract language. We need to abstract and to generalize as much as we need to be specific.

There's a great deal of criticism leveled at vagueness, as if it were wrong or "bad" in itself. But there are situations when the deliberate use of vague language is appropriate: for example, when a child asks "What am I getting for Christmas?" and the parent replies, deliberately evasive, "Something nice."

Diplomats often try to avoid forcing their opponents into a corner. Instead of using a specific threat ("If you do that, then we'll bomb Moscow"), it is often better to be vague and general: "We'll take appropriate actions."

This is not an endorsement of all vague, general statements by politicians and diplomats, or advertisers. There are times when firm, precise statements must be made. But some people seek certitude and demand precision all of the time, perhaps because such precision implies some kind of control.

If we wish to reduce ambiguity, senders can stipulate definitions, give examples, use specific concrete language, and use modifiers and cue words; receivers

(2)Unfamiliar. Confusion can be caused when the message, or parts of it (such as the words or images) are unfamiliar to the audience. The message may be clear, but still not understandable because the receiver lacks necessary background information. We need not confine ourselves to a Me-Tarzan-You-Jane vocabulary, nor restrict ourselves to the Dolch List of 900 Words of Basic English. But we should recognize that the potential for confusion increases with any unfamiliar, atypical, or uncommon words, including slang, jargon, euphemisms, or any "fancy" words. (Eschew Obfuscation!)

"Fancy words," as used here, describes those words which exist within the vocabulary of the language, but are uncommon or unfamiliar to most speakers. Many of these words have a marginal existence, living on precariously in only the largest of dictionaries and on Spelling Bee lists. Many of these words are polysyllabic "big" words, with Latin, Greek, or French roots (in contrast to curt Anglo-Saxon words); many have precise meanings, being the accumulated bits and pieces of various specialized jargons in the past.

There's a great amount of criticism and mockery of such inflated language (as being strained, artificial, ornate, pompous, exaggerated, extravagant, pretentious, affected, high-faluting, ostentatious, flowery, grandiloquent, showy, bombastic, exotic, esoteric, obscure, obsolete, archaic, and pedantic); yet, this human foible of using big words to "impress" people has always been with us, and despite all the practical advice given by those who warn us away from polysyllabic claptrap, it's likely to remain.

Jargon, in its narrow sense, refers to the language peculiar to a group or a class. Every trade and profession has its jargon: a specialized vocabulary, a shop-talk, or in-language of commonly used words, often shortened to abbreviations, acronyms, and nicknames. (By adding the -ese formation to a root, writers have coined a whole variety of words to suggest the jargon of specific groups, Bureaucratese, Pentagonese, State Departmentese, Legalese, Educatorese, Journalese.)

Jargon is very useful, perhaps essential, within a group: we need a "shorthand" for practical purposes. Among equals, where everyone knows what the words mean, jargon is appropriate. However, jargon used with "outsiders" leads to confusion.

Discussions of jargon (slang, "fancy words" and euphemisms) eventually have to focus on the intent of the sender and the result to the receiver. Vanity is one reason people use jargon with outsiders. It's a form of showing off, a "badge" to show others that the speaker belongs, is a member of some elite or special group.

Jargon is so used to intensify our own "good. " However, jargon can also be used to downplay the "bad," to hide or conceal things by using words unfamiliar to the receiver. It's this use of jargon that receives the most attention from critics because it can confuse or deceive. It's difficult to judge another's intent in using jargon or other unfamiliar words with outsiders: conscious or unconscious, deliberate or accidental, vain or malicious? It's more useful to focus on the possible result or consequences of such language.

Euphemisms are words which downplay the "bad." A euphemism can be a new word (slang), a technical term or specialized word (jargon), an obscure word ("fancy word"), or an ambiguous word; many euphemisms are simply words which are more abstract or more generalized than the concrete specifics they replace.

Examples of euphemisms in the Vietnam war, for example, include both the soldier's common slang ("waste a gook," "barbecue party,") and the Pentagon's official jargon (protective reaction strike, selective ordinance, collateral damage). Many critiques about the American military manipulation of language during that war have used George Orwell's 1945 essay on "Politics and the English Language" as a starting point for their analyses. In that, Orwell wrote:

In our time, political speech and writing are largely the defense of the indefensible. Things like the continuance of British rule in India, the Russian purges and deportations, the dropping of the atom bombs on Japan, can indeed be defended, but only by arguments which are too brutal for most people to face, and which do not square with the professed aims of political parties. Thus political language has to consist largely of euphemism, question- begging and sheer cloudy vagueness. Defenseless villages are bombarded from the air, the inhabitants driven out into the countryside, the cattle machine-gunned, the huts set on fire with incendiary bullets: this is called pacification. Millions of peasants are robbed of their farms and sent trudging along the roads with no more than they can carry: this is called transfer of population or rectification of frontiers. People are imprisoned for years without trial, or shot in the back of the neck or sent to die of scurvy in Arctic lumber camps: this is called elimination of unreliable elements. Such phraseology is needed if one wants to name things without calling up mental pictures of them.

Orwell was accurate in describing the use of euphemisms by contemporary warmakers, but it would be inaccurate to restrict this to a modern practice (the "decay of language" bit), or to one side ("good guys/bad guys"), or to make an absolute condemnation of euphemisms.

Familiarity/unfamiliarity is the crucial issue. Euphemisms per se are not bad; it's whether the audience understands the message being sent.

Many common euphemisms are familiar and common social conventions within a language community. For example, our standard euphemisms for death and dying (passed away, eternal reward) and bodily functions (going to the bathroom, the washroom) are well understood within our society.

It's only when the meaning is obscured that euphemisms cause problems. When the Pentagon uses euphemisms, technical jargon such as "low yield, clean thermonuclear device," most people do not get an accurate mental picture of the reality because the words sound rather pleasant: it's low yield, clean, and only a device. By words, the military has downplayed the reality that these bombs are more powerful, more devastating, more catastrophic than any weapon ever used before in human history.

In the 1990s, a new cluster of euphemisms appeared as the US government began to become "more efficient" and to privitize and to outsource its military activities to PMFs (private military firms). Now, skilled hired men with guns -- who used to be called mercenaries and "soldiers of fortune" -- are called "security contractors." Such euphemisms not only obscure the reality of what they are doing, but also obscure the whole funding, budgeting, accountability, and ethics of a military in a democratic society.

Unfamiliar patterns, procedures. Confusion can be caused by any kind of unfamiliar pattern whether it's an atypical sentence pattern, or configuration of images, or a new procedure.

Anything that isn't part of a long established routine has the potential to be confusing; anytime a new product, a new service, a new form is introduced, there is the need for instructions, directions, rules, or guidelines. Most people adapt quickly and are flexible enough to handle change, but still the possibility for confusion increases when we are dealing with any unfamiliar situation, process, or procedure.

The most costly error in financial history, for example, occurred (Oct. 5, 1979), when a person at Hanover Manufacturers Bank made an error on a new reporting form providing data to the Federal Reserve Board. Because of that erroneous report, the Fed increased the interest rate by a full point, triggering the worst stock market panic since 1929, and investors lost over $200 billion dollars in a few days.

Confusion is likely to occur anytime people deal in mathematical systems, whether "simple" math, algebra, statistics or computer languages, because these are very sophisticated systems which relatively few people understand. Familiarity may breed contempt, but unfamiliarity breeds confusion.

(3)Too variable. If things are "too variable," that is, if there are frequent changes, variations or irregularities, then confusion is likely to occur.

Any changes or shifts, any inconsistencies or incongruities, within a message (including contradictions, paradoxes, double messages, and qualifiers) increase the possibility of confusion.

The potential for confusion exists anytime things are unstable (irregular, erratic, unpredictable, uneven, unsteady, transient, ephemeral, spasmodic, inconstant, random, fluctuating, or different) in contrast to things which are stable (steady, lasting, permanent, uniform, constant, even, regular, unchanging, fixed, standard, predictable, unvariable, the same).

Changes may appear under many different labels: revisions, amendments, updates, corrections, emendations, exceptions, substitutions, changes, alterations, modifications, and variations.

In terms of motion or movement, for example, variability may be thought of in terms of continuity / discontinuity using the analogies of "traffic flow" in a complex highway system or in computer flowcharting. The risks of confusion are low as long as there's no delays, slowdowns, interruptions, breakdowns, stoppages; but the potential for confusion increases with intermittent, erratic, sporadic, jerky, stop-and-go irregularities.

Qualifiers. Words which express qualifications, in contrast to words which express absolute certainties, are related to "change": qualifying words allow for variations.

Several critics of advertising have damned such qualifiers as "weasel words. " In Paul Stevens' expose of advertising, I Can Sell You Anything, he elaborates on the use of such key words as helps . . . like . . . virtual, . . . virtually . . . acts like . . . works like ... can be . . . up to . . . as much as . . . the feel of . . . looks like . . . and a variety of commonplace puffery words (refreshes, comforts, smells, tastes) relating to taste and subjective opinions.

However, most of the qualifiers he notes are those words required by FTC and FDA regulations designed to reduce deceptive advertising claims. Drugstore remedies may no longer categorically claim, as they once did, that they can stop pain, cure or heal. If the drugs have some effects, they are permitted to advertise that they may help to reduce pain, or aid in healing, or some other qualified claims (such as "temporary relief") as specified by the regulators. Stevens is correct in his basic point that confusion can result from the use of such qualifiers. Certainly consumers do need to be aware of the meaning and implications of such qualifiers. But calling them "weasel words" suggests that qualifiers are "bad" in themselves.

However, qualifying words serve an extremely important function in our language and reasoning. Qualifiers help us to express the realities we perceive: sometimes we're unable to predict or estimate future results, unable to measure or to verify past facts, unable to have certitude, unable to make general or universal statements.

If we had to speak in absolutes all the time, firm assurances, unqualified and categorical, we would distort reality.

Yet, in a world of uncertitude, many people still seek certitude and highly value those speakers (the "strong leaders") who project such assurances and condemn those who lack such "certitude" as being wishy-washy, vacillating and wavering, hesitant and hedging.

Change. In one sense, change is simply natural and normal: all things change. Change can be accidental, unintentional. Wavering, uncertainty, and inconsistency in our everyday life can be caused by a subconscious shifting of goals or premises.

But, in another sense, change can be a deliberate strategy. For example, in most conflicts, whether in warfare or in sports, the elements of change and irregular movements are basic both in offense and in defense.

Combatants seek to deny predictability: to keep their opponents "off guard" or to avoid "telegraphing their punches." Armies avoid static positions; nuclear submarines and SAC bombers prowl in unpredictable routes. Boxers dance and weave; football and basketball players feint and shift; baseball pitchers mix their pitches -- all with the intent of gaining an advantage over the opposition. Thus, we commonly see change-shifts, movement, variations-used as an important part of such physical conflicts.

Change can also be used deliberately to create confusion in more subtle conflicts. A government, for example, that sends out a dozen different versions ("revisions" or 11 updates") of economic statistics or budget reports is apt to confuse most observers. The CIA's term "disinformation" refers not only to creating false cover stories, but also to producing multiple and contradictory news releases to create confusion.

Change without rationale, without rhyme or reason, disturbs many people. If change is arbitrary and capricious, it violates our sense of order. Accidents and catastrophes often cause sudden and violent changes; sometimes survivors of catastrophes are most shocked by this element of inexplicable disorder. We want to be able to predict, to foresee, to anticipate. We want regularity, predictability. In a world of change, we seek stability; in a world of complexity, simplicity.

(4) Too complex. Confusion can be caused if things are too complex, that is, if the quantity is too large (e.g., the amount of information, the number of parts) or the process is too complicated or too fast.

Complexity, quantity, and speed need not be confusing in themselves; a well-designed computer operation, for instance, demonstrates that a great quantity of information can be processed at great speed.

However, it's still a reasonable generalization to say that confusion commonly occurs in complex situations when people are confronted with too many things too quickly. Conversely, we are not likely to get confused when things are simple, slow, orderly, clear, familiar, and unchanging. (They may be dull, but not confusing.)

Confusion can be "accidental" in the sense that certain situations have inherent problems: large organizations (including governments, their bureaucracies, corporations), democratic systems (including committees), quickly changing conditions (including accidents and catastrophes), unorganized groups (including mobs), and organizations with multiple goals (including governments and universities).

However, confusion can also be a deliberate strategic maneuver. In politics and government, for example, confusion can be used as the smokescreen to cover up errors and mistakes, crimes and violations, aggressions, unpopular ideas and vote-losers.

By those in power, confusion can be used as a defense measure: if critics are confused about the processes and procedures, if critics get the run around" or a "wild goose chase" or get "lost in the maze" or snarled in red tape," then it's hard to change a system. As one reformer noted: "You can't fight City Hall if you can't find it."

Advertising offers many examples of calculated confusion. Consider, for example, the non-standardized jumble of sizes and shapes of packaging grocery items. Together with the verbal confusion of names and labels (GIANT, LARGE, SUPER, ECONOMY SIZE, FAMILY SIZE), the overall effect of such confusion makes it almost impossible for a consumer to compare items.

Comparisons are also difficult in any product or service in which there are massive or complex listings of all of the possible variations. Airline fares, for example, have so many different possible combinations of services that one literally needs to be an expert in order to figure out the cheapest fare. Even using the most sophisticated online search engines, it's difficult because of quantity of variables and changes.

Sellers of cell phones (and calling plans), home computers, stereo components, automobiles and also use a mass of statistical information so that it is almost impossible to make an accurate comparison of prices. The number of models, plus accessories available, is so confusing that a buyer has great difficulty in comparing prices or shopping around for value. Sellers know this and are there to offer a simple solution ("buy this one") usually after some flattery about the buyer's wisdom.

A large number of items, a great quantity of information, in itself is likely to contribute to confusion. Humans have varying limits to the amount of material they can handle, but, for everyone, there's a saturation point.

Our most common problems in dealing with information is the sorting and re-sorting process as we impose structure and organization, as we put things together, as we compose. In rhetorical terms, the criteria usually applied here are unity (the relation of parts to the whole), coherence (the relation of parts to each other), proportion (the relative amount, or degree, of the parts appropriate to the purpose).

Not only could a structure be too complex, because there are too many parts, but also a process could be too complex, too difficult, too hard for a person to achieve. Daniel Bell, in The Coming of Post-Industrial Society, in speaking about the new "information society," listed four problems new to contemporary society: the sheer amount of information; the increasing technical nature of such information; the need for mediation or journalistic interpretation of it; and, finally, the human limits: "There is an outer limit to the span of control of the bits of information an individual can process at one time. There is equally an outer limit to the amount of information about events one can absorb (or the fields or interests one can pursue)."

Whether we're talking about a political procedure, or a how-to-do-it assembly plan, a process can be too complicated if it has: (1) too many steps; (2) too many decisions (that is, options, alternatives, possibilities, branching points); (3) too many simultaneous sequences going on; (4) too many intersections, points at which simultaneous sequences must be in "sync. "

None of these factors necessarily creates confusion, but the potential for confusion increases as the number of these factors increase. In addition, relating to the sequence of a process, there are such commonplace errors as: non sequiturs, wrong cues, circular reasoning, false choice (either/or), and circumlocution.

Two recent political examples illustrate the confusion caused by too many choices: when President Bush's "prescription drugs" private insurance plan for Medicare recipients started in late 2005, each of the 50 states had different programs. Alaska, for example, had 55 different plans offered by private companies. Confused by the sheer number of competing claims, less than 20% of eligible people enrolled. Another confusing choice occured in the November, 2005 special election in California: political observers there pointed out the "sly tactic" of several "prescription drug reform" initiatives being so confusing similiar that voters rejected all of them.

Closely related to the amount of items involved in an overload situation is the speed at which they appear. Confusion is more likely to occur when people are rushed, in a huffy, in a crisis situation. Haste makes waste.

Many laws, often hundred of pages long, are written by special interest group lobbyists and are passed by legislators who don't look at the details, the fine print. In 2003, a good example of corruption related to Omission (Secrecy; Lack of Accountability --- omission of names of writer, sponsors responsible and Confusion: Somewhere (vaguely) in the confusion of the last-minute, overnight tax writing process, someone (who?) slipped in a phrase which benefitted some foreign corporations. Four years later, in 2007, no one knows who is responsible because "most of the policy makers who worked on the legislation are no longer in the administration."

The urgency plea in "the pitch" is designed to encourage fast action, quick response, without contemplation, or second-thoughts. But the greater the speed, the more probable the error.

To reduce confusion caused by such urgency, prior planning is necessary. Hospitals and military organizations, for example, routinely practice disaster plans or emergency plans already laid out in preparation for a crisis.

People have to anticipate the possible scenarios of what will occur, and prepare appropriate structures and sequences to respond to the various options. Then, such advance plans have to be rehearsed, tried out at a slow speed in a non-crisis situation.

The accelerating speed of change is the theme of Alvin Toffler 's Future Shock: "For education the lesson is clear," Toffler says, "its prime objective must be to increase the individual's 'copeability' -- the speed and economy with which he can adapt to continual change. "

Overload. Extreme confusion can cause a kind of mental paralysis, a stasis, an inability to act or to decide. Such a feeling of overload has a debilitating effect on people; commonly we describe our feelings in terms of being stalled, stuck, stranded, bogged down, frozen, mired, hung up.

Complexity of thought leading to a mental paralysis is not a new problem (e.g., Shakespeare's Hamlet, Dostoevsky's "underground man"); yet, such overload in some respects is a uniquely modern problem because, before television, never have so many people been exposed to so much information and so many conflicting views.

In the past, literacy and education were necessary for anyone to encounter uncommon ideas or a large body of information. Today, the "information explosion" doesn't simply mean that more information is being produced, but that it is also being distributed to new audiences of millions of people.

"Red Tape" "deserves special attention because the term has become the symbol of confusion in the modern world, suggesting any kind of delay or confusion involving the processes or procedures in governmental bureaucracies or large organizations. Usually the term implies two characteristics, quantity and obliqueness: too much of something (paperwork, forms, copies, steps, procedures, revisions, waiting periods, people involved, etc.) done too indirectly (runaround, wild goose chase).

"Red tape" is an easy target to criticize, a scapegoat. Not only do cartoonists have a heyday (paperwork piles, maze diagrams, etc.), but any outsider can criticize the current administration as having "too much" paperwork. In addition, some corporations (e.g. Mobil Oil) affected by regulations keep up a steady stream of anti-regulatory advertisements stressing the horror stories of "red tape" and bureaucratic bungling.

Waste and inefficiency are almost universally condemned by business leaders and politicians who plead for the elimination of "red tape. But it's not that easy. Because, as Howard Kaufman points out, in Red Tape: Its Origin, Uses and Abuses, much of the paperwork that the federal government generates is not an abnormal growth, which can be cured or pruned away, but is a direct result of some of the ideals of our society: compassion and representativeness.

Compassion leads government to prevent people from hurting each other. In the marketplace situation, a mass of regulations seeks to assure the purity of food, the safety of drugs, the honesty of advertising, the safety of toys, cars, railroads, airplanes, and so on. Compassion also spawns programs to help the poor, the aged, the blind, the disabled, the old, the unemployed, the victims of storms and droughts, and so on.

Once the mandate is given, the "red tape" will follow, as Kaufman says: "The moment a government program for a specified group gets started, legislation and administrative directives and court battles proliferate. It is essential to define who is in the group and who is not. The amounts of benefits and the criteria for determining who in the group is eligible for which amount must be established. Procedures for requesting benefits, for processing such applications, for distributing the benefits, and for settling disputes with applicants over their entitlements have to be set up. Preparations must be made to defend actions in court and to justify them to legislators representing disappointed constituents."

Representativeness leads government to be responsible. Procedures for due process (e.g., Affirmative Action, Equal Opportunity) create a great deal of paperwork and red tape to insure equity. Disclosure regulations and public access rules make up another major body of regulations. Finally, the needed controls against dishonesty (theft, bribery, payoffs, embezzlement) account for many rules. Kaufman emphasizes: "Much of the oft-satirized clumsiness, slowness, and complexity of government procedures is merely the consequence of all these precautions."

Confusion will exist in any democratic group (committee or nation) in which the various elements are free, and vying for power.

In such situations, the compromises and tradeoffs among the various groups will result in: (1) multiple goals, (2) ambiguously-stated goals (vague enough to please everyone); or (3) shifting goals and priorities as different factions stress differently; (4) procedures and laws with multiple exceptions, changes, amendments, and revisions.

Democracy by its nature produces such confusion, waste and inefficiency as "red tape." One answer to such confusion is simply to abolish choice and freedom, impose order. To eliminate "red tape," get a dictator, get a government which doesn't have to account to anyone where the money goes, or if its plans are fair to all groups involved, or doesn't have to justify anything. Dictators can cut through "red tape" by fiat.

But another response can be to recognize the problem, tolerate the trade-offs, and work to decrease the degree of confusion: operational definitions can be agreed upon, routine processes can be standardized, jargon can be discouraged.

The real challenge today is to learn how to cope with the reality of a growing amount of paperwork and "red tape. " Without expecting miracles, quick cures, or easy solutions, people need to keep trying to reduce waste, inefficiency, and confusion in such large organizations. Maintenance and housekeeping tasks like this are not very glamorous, but are essential to sustaining any system.