Updates
Is America’s governing framework hindering our ability to make simple choices in daily life? American Law Institute President David F. Levi sits down with Philip Howard to discuss his new book. They’re joined by Judge Edith Jones and Nicholas Bagley for a lively conversation that explores Howard’s critique of complex legal structures and their impact on our sense of agency.
Francis Fukuyama talks with Philip Howard about Everyday Freedom, and how the law has weakened the authority of government in ways that make us less free.
"The Rule of Nobody" author Philip K. Howard describes the unexpected paralysis that has afflicted the American government.
“The land of the free has become a legal minefield, says Philip K. Howard -- especially for teachers and doctors, whose work has been paralyzed by fear of suits. What's the answer? A lawyer himself, Howard has four propositions for simplifying US law.”
Essays & Reports
Federal agencies need more discretion, not less. Many of the rules they follow are not statutory, and one useful function that DOGE could perform is to identify and eliminate the most outdated and inefficient of them. As Philip Howard, the author of many books on simplifying government and founder of the nonpartisan group Common Good, has pointed out over the years, bureaucrats need more freedom to use their own good judgment regarding the implementation of policy, rather than being forced to follow rules.
The litmus test for a good school is its culture—its caring, energy, mutual trust, and commitment to a common mission. Good cultures require teachers to feel ownership of the classroom and principals to enforce standards and values, while red tape and entitlements undermine the authority and human spirit that are essential. Fixing K–12 education requires stripping away bureaucratic and union controls and empowering educators to build good school cultures.
Most Americans know that Washington is overdue for a Department of Government Efficiency. But what should such a commission fix?
The civil service certainly needs an overhaul to establish accountability from top to bottom. The point, however, isn’t to inject a sense of terror in government employees but to instill trust that everyone is held to the same standards.
They also should give a prominent spot on their team to the lawyer and longtime government-reform advocate Philip K. Howard, author of The Death of Common Sense and numerous other books outlining a new vision for how government agencies should operate. Nobody has thought longer and harder about how to instill a culture of responsiveness and responsibility to government and civil society.
Everyone should read, or re-read, Michael Lewis’s splendid and infuriating book The Fifth Risk, which told the story of the violence done by the first Trump Administration to the government’s necessary experts in places you don’t think of, like the weather service. If there’s anything I’m really fearful about in Trump II—and there are a lot of things—it’s that the regulatory guardrails will be removed by Trump’s circle of oligarchs. But we should also recognize that the regulatory apparatus, and the civil service system, are badly in need of reform. Instead of Elon Musk, Trump’s Efficiency campaign should be led by Philip K. Howard, who has written a slew of books on the subject. You can start with The Death of Common Sense and move on from there.
A fourth thing: Establish an Office of Common Sense Reform, working directly from the White House, with a statutory limit of no more than 30 employees to prevent it from becoming yet another permanent and oversize bureaucracy. Appoint either Philip K. Howard, author of “The Death of Common Sense,” or Cass Sunstein, who worked on regulatory reform for Obama, as its first director. Give it the mandate to cut through all the permitting requirements, duplicative regulations and other bureaucratic haggles that keep even modest infrastructure projects from ever being completed on time or on budget.
The lynchpin of Donald Trump’s “plan to dismantle the deep state” is to assert authority to dismiss senior civil servants at will: “First, I will immediately re-issue my 2020 executive order restoring the president’s authority to remove rogue bureaucrats. And I will wield that power very aggressively.”
Trump’s diagnosis is correct in part but his reform proposal badly misses the target.
Elon Musk’s offer to run a “government efficiency commission” for Donald Trump has triggered enthusiasm in some circles. It raises the question of why Democrats, who say they’re the party of good government, shouldn’t propose their own vision of an efficiency commission.
What would such an efficiency commission do? Trump conceives of it as “a complete financial and performance audit” to “fully eliminate fraud and improper payments within six months….sav[ing] trillions.” Washington is long overdue for a spring cleaning, but improper payments, totaling about $230 billion, are only a start.
The "rule of law" sits high on the altar of American culture as a core national value. Law in America is as pure as law can be—impartial, precise, and therefore unquestioned, like the 10 Commandments. The mandarins of law debate fine points such as judicial deference but almost never ask doctors, teachers, employers, or civic leaders whether law supports or hinders them.
But Americans in their everyday activities see a different reality. Law is so dense that it is unknowable, and so complex that even large companies with huge legal staffs can't comply—more like the 10 Million Commandments.
American government is suffering a breakdown of authority. It is unable to give permits for transmission lines and housing, deal with homelessness, fix broken schools, or even fire a civil servant who doesn’t show up for work.
Red tape has supplanted official responsibility.
The accretion of detailed codes, procedures and regulations among numerous agencies at federal, state and local levels are like layers of sediment that have silted over a harbor. It’s hard to get anywhere because it’s basically unlawful to make sensible decisions.
Appearances
Philip Howard joins Michael J. Petrilli and David Griffith to discuss what it takes to create positive school environments, as outlined in his recent Hoover Institution essay, “The Human Authority Needed for Good Schools.”
On "Forbes Newsroom," Philip Howard spoke about Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy's proposed Department of Government Efficiency, and how President-elect Trump can use their cost-cutting recommendations—despite ‘DOGE’ operating outside of the federal government.
Does modern society have too many laws? Have we complicated legal codes to the point where we’re suffocating under them and grinding the government to a screeching halt?
Philip Howard and Greg LaBlanc discuss the balance between rigid rules and human discretion, the importance of human judgment in law, and how legal micromanagement and excessive regulation curtails individual agency and practical wisdom.
Is America’s governing framework hindering our ability to make simple choices in daily life? American Law Institute President David F. Levi sits down with Philip Howard to discuss his new book. They’re joined by Judge Edith Jones and Nicholas Bagley for a lively conversation that explores Howard’s critique of complex legal structures and their impact on our sense of agency.
Joe Klein and John Ellis talk to Philip Howard about broken government, and where to begin to fix it.
Newsletters
The prospect of overhauling government has near-universal appeal. But experts from all sides are dousing the dream with cold water. Changing regulations takes several years. De-regulation will often conflict with statutory mandates. Most of what government does is not controversial—say, Medicare, a standing army, and national parks. Experts such as Brookings' Elaine Kamarck have shown that the impacts of any plausible de-regulation will be at the margin.
Voters have revolted. But laws and institutions don't change just because people are angry. Appointing rebels to run agencies won't change their massive legal superstructures.
Real change in American democracy doesn't happen by diktat from the top. Change requires a vision for a better system, backed by broad support of public opinion.
What's the new vision? The best hope for a new vision might come from Elon Musk's efficiency commission.
Avoid talking about policy: That seems to be a theme of this presidential campaign. Voters now know that Harris was raised middle class, and that Trump has disavowed 900 pages of Heritage Foundation policy proposals.
But one policy issue is squarely on the table—civil service. Trump says he will designate 50,000 or more senior civil servants as employees at will. Civil servants in this new “Schedule F” will be like participants of Trump’s television show “The Apprentice,” where the punchline is “You’re fired!”
An idea! Policy debate has been largely absent from a campaign season pitting a theme of joy against eating pets.
The IDEA came, predictably, from Elon Musk, who offered to run a “government efficiency commission” for Donald Trump. Trump immediately embraced the idea.
But what would an “efficiency commission” actually do?
Polls are expecting a divided Congress. One sure bet is that the new president and new Congress will not fix how government works. Change is too hard. All those Washington lobbyists and lawyers are doing fine with thousand-page rulebooks and years-long bureaucratic processes.
Change requires outside pressure. Sometimes it’s a crisis, as in the Depression. Sometimes it’s a shift in public opinion, as in the Progressive Era. Sooner rather than later, pressures will likely require replacing the paralytic and wasteful red tape state. The world order is too perilous to perpetuate an inept governing framework.