Global Futures Initiative

Behavioral economists have shown that our mental processes are anchored in preconceived models and social settings. While these anchors help us to think fast and effectively, they at times also constitute substantial mental hindrances preventing us from innovating and pushing our predefined boundaries [1].

Dr. Kim demonstrated how the global responses to multidrug-resistant TB, HIV, and Ebola suffered from this mental rigidity. Development practitioners were quick to identify tangible obstacles such as high financial and logistical hurdles, but their overall analytical conclusions rested in predefined mental boxes. Instead of distilling and questioning the root causes of the perceived obstacles, they were taken as givens that could not be overcome. 

These analyses based on rigid mental assumptions hindered innovative problem-solving. Dr. Kim demonstrated how thinking “outside the box” yielded tangible approaches to overcome an impasse: Innovation in production, deployment, and logistics as well as strategic partnerships dramatically lowered the cost of treatments while significantly increasing their effectiveness. Thus demonstrated results eventually changed the mindset of decision makers from exclusively focusing on the alleged burden of treatment to embracing the immense opportunities of taking action. They persuasively showed how beyond the ethical dimension, the return on investments in public health also constitutes an economic imperative. For instance, the projected benefits of eradicating HIV in Africa amount to the economic output of the entire continent. 

Thanks to these efforts, millions of people have profited from treatment. The number of HIV patients in antiretroviral therapy, for instance, rose from approximately 300,000 in 2003 to more than 12.9 million in 2013, with the annual number of people dying from HIV-related causes decreasing by as much as 22 percent [2]. It was changes in the mindsets of patients, development practitioners, and decision makers that made this possible; considerable mental makeovers constituted the precondition to leap forward.

Instead of relying on hoary wisdoms, skillful decision makers need to question how specific challenges evolve and how they could be altered in order to establish a more promising setting. We remain behind our mental veils too easily, and rarely take the step from preconceived intuitions to innovative analysis and persuasive changes. We need to thoroughly revise our mental models and steer them towards “compassion, optimism, and possibility”, as Dr. Kim argued. Only thus can we make full use of the potential of innovation to meet peoples’ needs, as the above examples teach us.

Jonas Bergmann is a Fulbright fellow in the MSFS program at Georgetown University. A passionate scholar of International Development, Bergmann is particularly dedicated to Human Rights and Migration.

[1]  World Bank (2015): World development report 2015: Mind, society, and behavior. Washington, DC.
[2]  WHO (2014): Global Update on the health sector response to HIV, 2014. Geneva.