It is more obvious than ever: there seems to exist a benefit to lying in politics. Looking at the current midterm rallies of US president Donald Trump, it looks like there is an actual strategy of lying as a means to more votes and more voter turnout. Here is one random example of an article about the issue.

Update on April 4, 2019: «The snap decision society» on Axios.
Update on July 16, 2019: «There’s a sobering truth to Trump’s racist tweets that we don’t like to admit» on CNN.
Update on November 15, 2019: A look of a CNN journalist at Fox News› coverage of the first public impeachment hearings on President Trump
Update on August 13, 2021: Online Outrage’s Feedback Loop

Let’s agree that Mr. Trump is not the only one going there, and the US is not the only country affected – I’ll just use him as an example to illustrate a general mental model.

Hier ist mein deutschsprachiger Artikel zum selben Thema.

Scary dynamics

I have lived and worked in the US and for US companies, and I am well connected to parts of the American mindset. Hence, I do occasionally follow US news and ponder its whys and hows.

As a lecturer and researcher in the field of systems thinking and system dynamics, I sometimes use those tools to try to make sense of what I hear and read.

Recently, I have discovered a very uncomfortable dynamic that I will share with you in this article.

Dynamics are obvious when causes have effects in a linear way. One thing leads to another, so more cause will lead to more effect. This is intuitive to the normal and reptile brain of «fast» thinking.

Dynamics become surprising and comforting or scary, when causes and effects chain up in loops which start reinforcing each other. One well known example is the vicious cycle where the effect of a cause leads to more of that cause and thus more effect – which leads to an escalation and ultimately, an explosion of some sort.

When I started considering lies (or «untruths») as employed by the current US president, I discovered a whole network of vicious cycles teaming up to something that got me way more worried than what I expected.

My hope in posting this article is for you to help me find a way out.

Stacking up the vicious cycles

Let me briefly build up the causal loop diagram for you.

Let us start with «Lying». If the lies are well constructed, they will lead to more «support by fans» – which will motivate more Lying. Hence – our first vicious cycle, or «positive feedback loop» as we call them.

Concurrently,the «Lying» will lead to more «outrage by opposition».Which, obviously in the case at hand, will motivate more Lying as well. This isthe second vicious cycle.[3]

If weexpand the picture to a simplified «filter bubble», let’s add mediaoutlets for both sides, the «fans» and the «opposition».More «support by fans» will be leveraged by the media outlets cateringto them and lead to more «fan media success» (eventually commercialsuccess). That amplification will in turn lead to more «support byfans». The same will happen with «opposition media success». Weare now already at four vicious cycles.[4]

We could even add the overall «media success» which motivates yet more Lying – and have two more vicious cycles.

Sadly, «debunking attempts» fueled by the opposition will only increase the «support by fans» – and we are at a whopping 7 vicious cycles.

Finally,let us make the problem obvious by adding a «conflict potential». Sinceit increases with both the «support by fans» and the «outrage byopposition», it is on a scary path: so far, it will only grow –dramatically.[6]

The challenge for you: where is the way out of this mess?

When I first drew this up, I was shocked. I started asking colleagues whether they could help me find the missing loops which would bring back decency, moderation, calm, and peace, reduce conflict potential. 

None of the ideas helped – so now is your turn:

Can you find the solution?

Install Vensim PLE (free for personal use), add your thoughts to my model (see below), and send it to me!

Note about the author: Luzi is a lecturer and researcher at the institute of Modelling and Simulation of the University of Applied Sciences St. Gallen in Switzerland. Systems thinking and system dynamics are his main subjects of teaching and research.