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'Government's Greatest Achievements'
With Paul Light
Douglas Dillon Senior Fellow, The Brookings Institution
Monday, Sept. 9, 2002; 1 p.m. ET
People love to gripe about the government -- taxes, spending and inefficient bureaucracies. But in fact, government solves problems on a grand scale. Government initiatives helped rebuild Europe after World War II, eradicated polio and other diseases, put people into space and reduced poverty and racial discrimination. Paul Light, Douglas Dillon Senior Fellow at The Brookings Institution, takes a look at these and other accomplishments in "Government's Greatest Achievements."
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Government's Greatest Achievements
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Light was online Monday, Sept. 9, to talk about what he learned in conversations with 230 historians and 220 political scientists.
The transcript follows.
Editor's Note: Washingtonpost.com moderators retain editorial control
over Live Online discussions and choose the most relevant questions for guests and hosts; guests and hosts can decline to answer questions.
Vashon, Wash.:
Given that most of the invectives against the "gu'mint" derive from unreflective anti-government ideologies, how successful do you think reasoned, evidentary-based arguments such as yours will be in changing the beliefs of the electorate? Is "big government is the problem" just a more appealing storyline than is "government has and can solve problems"?
Paul Light: Much of the responsibility rests with our elected and appointed leaders. They have to be willing to occasionally tell the electorate what government does well, alongside the nearly constant stories about what government does poorly. Too much of the recent debate about the department of homeland security has focused on how bad government and its employees are. The fact is that we need this department to be part of a future success, which should lead Congress and the president to be careful about using such harsh rhetoric about the need to fire employees quickly. That's not to say there won't be employees who'll need to go. But it is to say that the majority of "feds" are just as patriotic and committed as the rest of us.
Laurel, Md.:
This year my birthday (May 8) was also "Tax Freedom Day" as celebrated by that National Taxpayers Union as the day Americans stop working "for the government" and start working for themselves.
Funny thing, I don't recall "Social Security Month," "National Defense Weeks," "Schools Weeks," "National Parks Day," etc.
Why isn't there a better organized propaganda machine to point out all the good things government does for us?
Paul Light: Can you imagine the outrage on Capitol Hill if we started celebrating Social Security day? We want government to be efficient, inexpensive, yet effective. That means we've got to get others, such as the media, to occasionally tell a success story when one occurs. Interestingly, we're doing some work here at Brookings on how the media covers government success and failure. The failure stories are almost all about how government as an institution can't pound sand into a hole, while the success stories are mostly about why government somehow got it right almost by accident.
Vienna, Va.:
I can't agree that government in itself has really solved many of these problems as such. Most of the benefits that we have in our modern world that have made life so much better -- medicine, heating/air-conditioning, automobiles, aircraft, telecommunications, computers, clean water, abundant food, etc. -- have been the result of science and inventions, not government. Yes, government is necessary for somethings, like national self-defense, but this idea that "government has provided us with all of this modern convinence" is nonsense -- and an insult to one's intelligence. Taking a big chunk of someone's paycheck and putting it into a big bureaucratic redistribiution pool does nothing to further scientific progress, and can actually work against it by taking dollars out of the organizations that CAN make a difference. Yes, government does some research itself, but a drop in the bucket compared to privatre industry.
Paul Light: It's not just the research government does, Vienna. It is also the work of the Patents and Trademarks Office, which guarantees protection for intellectual property, and the Commerce and Treasury Departments, which promote markets abroad, and the regulatory bodies that assure (or at least try to) that firms market their products honestly, and so forth. The federal government has made a huge difference on medical research, for example, by funding scholarships, building research facilities, providing training, and so forth. The Veterans health system has been a leading source of research on aging, etc., etc.
Washington, D.C.:
Do you think the years of "can-do" government are behind us? We sent people into space, eradicated some diseases, passed civil rights legislation, etc. -- and that's incredible. But are competing special interests likely to wipe out those kinds of initiatives now?
Paul Light: Great question. I worry that the ingredients of great endeavor are in increasingly short supply around Washington. Think about it for a minute. A great endeavor demands patience, not overnight results; bipartisanship, not a constant demand for party credit; the courage to imagine a different future, not timidity; and a shared commitment to change at both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue, not a "go-it-alone" attitude at either. The special interests of which you speak often prefer the status quo over change, I'm afraid, and tend to reward all the wrong things--short-term success, incrementalism, protection.
All this said, I still think we've got some greatest left in us. The core of it comes from a resilience, I suppose, in times of trouble, and a readiness to move forward against doubts.
Washington, D.C.:
Do you count ending the Cold War as one of our greatest achievements? I can't help but thinking that if we hadn't outspent the Soviet Union they wouldn't be selling weapons to countries who are trying to attack us.
Paul Light: Our historians and political scientists did put the Cold War near the top of government's greatest achievements. It's not altogether clear just what created the most momentum toward eventual success--could have been the Marshall Plan right after World War II. If we hadn't moved quickly to rebuild Europe and Japan, who knows what might have happened. But our willingness to spend the money to build the world's strongest defense was certainly a key.
Woodbridge, Conn.:
Mr. Paul Light,
First, I have just learned of your book (yet to read) through the Internet on washingtonpost.com's Web site. What role did the U.S. government have in the Internet, and what are the plans for the future?
Second, what are the chances and outlook for us as a nation to place a phyiscally living human on Mars? Yes, I am volunteering. I would like to bring my rollerblades, Ha Ha! Thanks for your time, and thank you for showing the positives of our government.
Paul Light: The federal government actually planned a very significant role in the Internet, although some years before Al Gore said he invented it. The first version of the internet was designed at the Defense Department in the 1960s, and the rest is history. It was the private sector that developed it as a profit center, but the educational sector that advanced it as an information highway.
I don't know when we'll get a human being to Mars, but it will happen, assuming, of course, that we maintain the peace on earth long enough to do so.
Arlington, Va.:
Back in the '60s when I was a very young student, I used to sit in the technology section of the Brooklyn Public Library and marvel at a huge set of books issued periodically by NASA which described the inventions that were developed as part of the space program. I can only recall now the transistor and the ballpoint that wrote under water, but this is certainly something that the government did well and which has had benefits beyond its supposedly limited misison.
Paul Light: Put velcro on your list, too? NASA is still producing spin-offs, but the new administrator, Sean O'Keefe, is right to be pushing the agency to focus its mission and rebuild its capacity. I marvel at how vulnerable that agency is to the loss of personnel as the baby boom retires. O'Keefe has a pretty well-designed plan for revitalizing the human capital over there, but it's not clear that Congress will give him the permission to implement the ideas. I hope they do.
Washington, D.C.:
Great book! Just wanted to ask about civil rights and one other thing. Do you think the government should take credit for the promotion and success of civil rights? The government only acted out of pressure is that considered an achievment? While the same is true for homeland security if Homeland Security was established before the Sept. 11 act and managed to thwart it before it happened. Yes it's an achievment but an after the fact establishment, I don't know. Otherwise great book.
Paul Light: You're right on civil rights only to a point, though. Yes, the courts moved early, and so did Harry Truman. His desegregation order was an essential step in moving civil rights forward. Obviously, so was the enormous moral pressure from the civil rights movement. But I do think the Voting Rights and Civil Rights acts were watershed moments in legislative time, and moved the endeavor to the next plateau. Interestingly, word is that Congress will not move ahead on a new election bill. Proves the point that none of the past successes are guaranteed. If nothing else, the 2000 election taught us that it is not enough to remove the barriers to registration and voting; citizens must have access to decent voting technology. The fact that the bill has been lost due to partisan bickering is the exception that proves the rule, I suppose. You've got to have bipartisanship to move ahead.
Arlington, Va.:
To your point about our leaders not telling us about the things government does well: Could Al Gore have won the election in 2000 had he talked more about the good government does? The economy, etc.?
Paul Light: Gore talked a lot about what government does well, but I think McCain was the real star on that score. McCain seemed to tap into a deep desire of Americans to be proud of their government again. Americans have a healthy cynicism toward big government, but I believe that they also want to be proud of what their government does. They don't always want to hear the smear.
Oakton, Va.:
Mr. Light,
Your response to the caller from Washington was misleading. It was not government that built the huge Cold War military force, it was corporations and factories. Unlike Europe (and to our credit) government does not own or operate factories here. It was companies like Grumman, Rockwell, General Dynamics, GE, Raytheon, etc., that gave us our modern military technology. Of course, there will always be the need for foot soldiers -- I don't deny that. But please don't give the government credit for what corporations actually did.
Paul Light: I understand your point. Many of these endeavors certainly involved public/private collaborations. Can we agree that the federal government raised the money, set the strategy, recruited/conscripted the soldiers, wrote the contracts, received the equipment, and deployed the hardware as a kind of compromise?
Baltimore, Md.:
Are we in danger of undoing many of the great things government has done? I read somewhere that the teeth have been taken out of most of the programs and legislation passed under Lyndon Johnson's Great Society, for example.
Paul Light: I worry that some of the great achievements are in jeopardy. Take the Interstate highway system, for example. Big achievement, huge investment. Certainly, we haven't wanted for highway spending over the years. But look at the number of bridges and roads in disrepair. We are facing a huge infrastructure crisis over the coming decades, and need to pay more attention. Same with investments in reducing disease, where government and the private sector appear to be spending less and less on core research.
Goes back to a question implied in an earlier exchange. Simply asked, can the U.S. afford to do all of these things well, or should we do some sorting? And if we sort and winnow, how should we do so? Does the fact that we've never been able to simplify the tax code mean we should abandon the effort? What about the space program? Or continued efforts to improve childhood nutrition? The problem, of course, is that nobody wants to talk about priorities or choices--our leaders say we can have it all, but pull teeth, under-fund key programs, reject needed improvements, etc. Sooner or later, we're going to have to confront these questions seriously--we just don't have the money to keep all the endeavors going unless we just stop dreaming.
Washington, D.C.:
Do you have an equivalent list of "Government's Greatest Blunders"? Off the top of my head, the USA Patriot Act is a recent example.
Paul Light: Take a look at the list of endeavors that our historians and political scientists said were easy to solve, but a failure. I think that list could be called the top ten blunders. Government does some of its most noble work when it tackles tough, important problems, but fails, and some of its worst work when it tackles an easy, solvable problem such as building more low income housing, and fails.
Washington, D.C.:
How would you compare the U.S. government with foreign governments? Most do not have 3,000 political appointees -- just the number one and two.
Paul Light: Ah, the presidential appointee question. I think viewed through a long historical lens, we might have gotten some of these endeavors done a bit faster with fewer layers at the top of government, and more investment in giving our employees enough training, information, and other resources to do the job. NASA is a great example of an agency that always resisted politicization, and seemed to do fine. So, too, for the National Institutes of Health, CDC, and so on in the health arena.
New York, N.Y.:
Every time I hear people complain about the government, it also seems like there's a flip side -- that they want it to do things for them. Constituent services, for example -- likely demanded by people who don't even vote. Is it really that we don't like government, or is it that we just like to complain about it?
Paul Light: Americans love to hate government--or, as Charles Goodsell down at Virginia Tech once put it, government is a great hate object. They love virtually everything government does, yet complain constantly about waste, fraud, and abuse, and can't wait to read of the latest slip-up. In the end, however, our public opinion data suggest that there is virtually no political market for dismantling the current inventory of federal programs, but a robust market for improving the way programs run. Gore had the advantage on that one in 2000, but preferred to talk about cutting the size of the federal workforce, which voters traditionally see as Republican turf.
Fairfax, Va.:
Consider, Mr. Light, in your argument that government ended discrimination, that government, for much of our history, was the CAUSE of it and actively promoted it. In fact, the Republican Party, which so many view today as the "reactionary" party trying to preserve segregation, was in fact the first party in U.S. history to be formed SPECIFICALLY (in 1854) as an anti-slavery party. The party of Ronald Reagan and the Bushes is in fact the party of Abraham Lincoln. African-Americans have been really deceived by their one-sided support of the Democrats. It was DEMOCRATS who for years enforced segregation in the South.
Paul Light: Correct. But that doesn't refute the notion that expanding voting rights, attacking workplace discrimination, and opening public accomodations aren't great achievements of the past fifty years. You are right to ask why it took so long, and where these endeavors need to go. But I think we are much better positioned to advance today than fifty years ago. Of course, we are also well position to fall back, which is one of the lessons of endeavor. It's an ongoing struggle.
Virginia:
Did any of the 230 historians and 220 political scientists work for the federal government as civil servants for five-plus years? Lot of thoeritical talks.
Paul Light: I'd guess, and it's only a guess, that only a handful, if that, of the respondents had any federal experience.
Washington, D.C.:
The thing that makes our government so extraordinary is the role of the people in choosing it. I personally think that that's what makes us unique, and in theory is our greatest achievement -- transfer of power without bloodshed based on the will of the people. Now if we could only get the people to participate. Could government do more to increase participation?
Paul Light: The best way to increase participation in the short run is to make sure every voter who shows up believes their vote will be counted, no matter how they vote. I think Florida will have some consequences in the 2004 campaign, and we'll see how it cuts in the governor's race this year. I think longer-term that improving the quality of campaigns is the key. You can't dunk voters in slime and expect them to glide happily to the polling place. Vote by mail shows some promise, too. My colleague, Tom Mann, is the genius on this, though. He's written a couple of op-eds and a very important piece on internet voting that can be found on the Brookings website at www.brookings.edu.
Arlington, Va.:
Mr. Light, I appreciate what you do to make our government work better, however contradictory that sounds but normally, they say they can't promote people because there are people at higher levels taking up all the money but now that they're taking buyouts, dying off, etc., they're still not promoting the younger people, even when there is ample money. Isn't it possible they get bonuses based on how many people they don't promote? that's the only explanation I can think of. Anyway, thanks for listening.
Paul Light: We've got to figure out how to reshape the federal government to make it more attractive as we baby boomers move on. We often delude ourselves that we'll live and work forever--that's what winning the Grammies every year does to a generation, I suppose. I'm guessing Mick Jagger will win in 2020! But we have a real opportunity to do some real work preparing for the inevitable retirements right now. I'm increasingly drawn to some mechanism for making sure that we don't just automatically fill every opening with the next person in line. It might be better to collect the openings and reallocate them to the front lines where the new recruits are most needed.
washingtonpost.com:
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