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Most Americans think government is broken, but the prospects for reform are bleak—no matter which party is in control.
The Economist this week hosted an episode of its “Checks and Balance” podcast on what’s needed for America to break out of this doom loop. The format was unique, at least for the Economist: executive editor Charlotte Howard interviewed her father (me), and then discussed the interview with U.S. editor John Prideaux and Washington columnist James Bennet. For the record, this was not my idea and Charlotte reluctantly was pushed into it by her colleagues. I wish we did it all the time.
Fixing what’s broken doesn’t happen because the political dynamic is aimed at beating the other side—not making government work better.
Philip K. Howard, a graduate of Taft prep school, Yale and the University of Virginia School of Law, says he never wore “white bucks.” This 1950s campus fashion waned before he matriculated. Those buckskin shoes were popular among young blades destined to become “white-shoe lawyers” at prestigious “white-shoe law firms,” such as Covington & Burling, where Howard, 76, is senior counsel.
He also is a genteel inveigher against the coagulation of American society, which is saturated with law. In his new book “Saving Can-Do: How to Revive the Spirit of America,” he argues that law’s proper role is preventing transgressions by authorities, not micromanaging choices so minutely that red tape extinguishes individual responsibility and the social trust that individualism engenders.
Common Good Chair Philip K. Howard’s new book, Not Accountable: Rethinking the Constitutionality of Public Employee Unions, will be published by Rodin Books on January 24. In the book, he argues that public employee unions have undermined democratic governance and should be unconstitutional. Constitutional government can’t work when elected leaders lose control over public operating machinery.