Political Order and Political Decay - Part 1 and 2

The Hoover Institution, joined by co-sponsors The Administrative Conference of the United States and the Stanford Law School, hosted a presentation by Francis Fukuyama at its new Washington, D.C. office on January 15, 2015, followed by two panels to react to two specific themes from the book.

[@michaelwilliams7404]

Too many checks and balances in the sense that it creates grid lock. Read or listen to the book and he explains how other governments, like the english parliament can act more swiftly and therefore more efficiently. In the US we need to appease factions and wind up with convoluted bills, amendments and laws. The Chinese have the power to dismantle laws they don't like in short order. The down side is the assurance of stability for operators inside the nation. Make an investment, and then rules change you lose your equity etc. A FABULOUS rag DR. Fukuyama puts out with others is "The American Interest" That is how I got into his work. Amazing pieces bi monthly, 6 times per year.

[@LukeAdachi]

at 30:50 Mr. Fukuyama says he believes there are too many checks and balances. Why did nobody laugh at his awesome joke?

[@CharlesWT-TX]

A lot of long-winded talk about how to rearrange the deck chairs on the ship of state.

[@Biggnuncio]

These guys are clearly insane with no actual comprehension of why there are so many failures in government and no ability to put the "successes" in any realistic context. I mean how can you say that the air traffic control situation is a "success" simply because it stopped screwing up quite as bad as it has in the past? It couldn't very well have gotten much worse, they couldn't have replaced their computers that were 20 years out of date with ones that were 40 years out of date could they? How is it that finally approaching a modicum of competency is hailed as such a grand success when the only thing you have to compare it to is the tragedy that they created in the past? This other guy keeps bringing up how many employees there are relative to the number of dollars going through the government which is also simpleminded and amazingly ignorant of reality. In 1950 you probably had a guy handling every check being mailed out, putting a stamp on it and so forth, these days we have big machines and computers that do things a million times faster so why on earth would you expect to have the same relative number of employees? The ignorance continues with the FEMA discussion where the conversation was only about when it worked well and when it worked poorly and again no analysis other than relative to FEMA itself. Nowhere on these guys minds are the facts that FEMA stops private companies and individuals from functioning properly, it wasn't just that it was working poorly, it was actually stopping other resources from alleviating the problems which it does to some extent even when it is working "well". They can't seem to fathom that without it in many cases things would have been better and that likely means that we could do better without it existing at all. When you pay people to discuss solutions to government programs they become part of the vested interests who's only real concern is continuing the programs rather than making any real attempt to evaluate whether they should exist or not. In practically one breath this guy was saying yes it is a good idea to be able to fire bad employees and also that being able to more easily fire people was a terrible idea. No better example of talking out of both sides of ones mouth could be provided by me.

[@LukeAdachi]

i was gearing up to rebuke your commentary, but on a second listen: Somewhere around 27 minutes or so - Mr. Fukuyama says that there is fundamentally no political overlap between parties... that the most liberal republican is more conservative than the most conservative Democrat. For that alone: I am ready to call him at the very least "fooled", and at the most, "Stupid" . I must say that they look at things differently than I.

[@CharlesWT-TX]

Canada privatized its air traffic control service a decade or so ago. Now, it's often rated as the world's best air traffic control service.

[@michaelwilliams7404]

The reason I like Dr Fukuyama is that he brings a certain neutrality to issues and roots his perspective in historical context. Then explains it in a way that allows his listener to understand and form an opinion. That may seem like he is "talking out of both sides" because he is. He presents the two extremes and the pitfalls of each. I listened to the book twice and am now on Origins of Political Order. Can't seem to find The last Man on audible.