What Do We Know About Wicked Problems After Nearly 52 Years? Tracing the DNA of Wicked Problems through A Bibliometric Study

Abstract

This bibliometric study maps 52 years of scholarship on “wicked problems,” tracing the field’s evolution from Rittel and Webber’s foundational framing to contemporary debates on super-wicked problems, clumsy solutions, and adaptive governance. We identify four dominant thematic clusters: collaborative governance, sustainability, policy implementation, and crisis management. Co-citation and co-word analyses reveal two emerging fault lines—one emphasizing networked, deliberative governance and another critiquing collaborative feasibility—and point to novel research frontiers, including joined-up government, pragmatic experimentation, and temporal governance for time-urgent challenges. We propose a typology of wicked problems and outline four governance paradigms to guide practitioners.