The recent riots in London have been an appalling spectacle. The last thing a nation in the grips of an economic downtrn needs is to have to spend extra wealth on policing and repairing damage. And the human cost is all the more nauseating. Reeves, a family furniture business some 150 years old, was torched. […]
Michael Lipsky, Street-Level Bureacracy
My retro-review of Michael Lipsky’s Street-Level Bureaucracy: Dilemmas of the Individual in Public Services, 30th Anniversary Edition (Russell Sage Foundation, 2010), appears in the March/April issue of Public Administration Review. Lipsky’s book remains a terrific study of government, particularly how agencies and their employees work with the public. As I note in my review, “Street-Level Bureaucracy […]
What the Tea Party Could Learn from the ...
In my nascent examinations of the Tea Party movement, I have been astounded by the frequency with which Tea Partyers speak of rebellion, secession, and striking out against the government. Thankfully, the data likely indicate only a minority of Tea Partyers hold such hostile sentiments. But, it is troubling to see some members of the […]
Collaborative Democracy on the Move
The July/August issue of Public Administration Review carries my lengthy review of Beth Simone Noveck’s Wiki Government: How Technology Can Make Government Better, Democracy Stronger, and Citizens More Powerful (Brookings Institution Press, 2009). Noveck is the U.S. Deputy Chief Technology Officer and Director—the person heading the Obama Administration’s Open Government Initiative. In my review, I […]
Explaining the Appearance of the Tea Par...
Mark Lilla has an article in the April 29, 2010 issue of the New York Review of Books titled “Tea Party Jacobins.” It is typical Lilla—very well written, philosophical, and witty. By Lilla’s take, the Tea Party movement is worth taking seriously. It is a manifestation of deeper social and psychological changes that the country […]
Research Note: Isaiah Berlin and the Pol...
The more difficult times are, the more intense the demand for simple solutions. This seems to be the case for both individuals and groups, be they corporations, religions, or nations. The February 25, 2010 issue of the New York Review of Books carried some short essays on Isaiah Berlin (1909-1997). Nicholas Kristof of the New […]