Recoding America: Pontification Book Discussion

Exploring the Challenge of "Government Efficiency" in the Digital Age

This blog is coming out of a few months of inactivity to announce the return of a tradition that is (hopefully) enjoyed: the annual pontification book club! This year, I chose to evolve the tradition by making the pontification book club more of a serial endeavor—with multiple discussions throughout the year that folks can partake in as they are interested. Look out for another post to describe the following book discussion in the coming weeks!

But for today, I want to let you all know that the first discussion will be Recoding America by Jennifer Palkha:

Palkha has an excellent Substack, which you can read here:

Palkha’s substack was recommended to me by a contact in the local politics world late last year. I found the book to be a remarkably prescient look at many of the challenges of governing in the 21st century. The discussion is planned around one month from today, on Saturday, May 3rd @ 9 am Pacific on Zoom; please join if you can!

Palkha is now a fellow at the oft-excellent Niskanen Center but joined the federal administrative workforce in the 2010s as a part of the US Digital Service. This previously low-key governmental unit was recently transformed into a VERY prominent effort known as DOGE (you may have heard about it).

Whatever you think of that effort, the broader subject of government efficiency is worth discussing the concept of government efficiency more broadly. The book is an excellent look at the real problems that undergird how government agencies operate in the 21st century. At the same time, it also details how attempts to reform through simple fixes, like upgrading and modernization of the technical infrastructure, often fail, if not make the problems worse.

Palkha saw this up close multiple times, including being part of the effort to mop up in the wake of the disastrous launch of the healthcare.gov website in 2013. She also was part of an effort to address the numerous problems that California’s Unemployment Insurance was experiencing in the summer of 2020 as millions of people suddenly were applying for benefits simultaneously (including folks I was doing my best to help on the ground here in Los Angeles). The issues were far more profound in both cases than a malfunctioning website or a government benefits system running on outdated code. The dysfunction spoke to deeper issues of “state capacity,” or the ability of governments to accomplish the policy goals they set out for themselves.

Palkha identifies several deep problems of state capacity widespread in the modern state. She argues that there is a fundamental disconnect between “policymaking” and “administrative” work in many parts of government, which will undermine key reforms if not fixed. Public policy is seen as heady intellectual work, with the assumption that the administration side of government will “figure it out.” Politicians celebrate new laws or funding streams but pay little attention to whether those actually drive positive results. While you could argue this division exists in the private sector (strategy is a more prestigious field than operations) - even the most chauvinistic strategist will recognize that their best-laid plans will fail without the buy-in of the people in the company who get things done. Unfortunately, that is not always the case in the public sector. Due to how both federal and state governments separate powers in different branches, policymakers will often assume that poor implementation is a sign of bureaucratic maleficence or incompetence and grandstand about the failures of their counterparts. While incompetence certainly exists, lousy implementation is just as often downstream of policymakers’ failure: their failure to do their job and tackle complex problems, the failure to collaborate with administrators, or even the result of well-intentioned or poorly drafted laws.

Palkha also argues that governments often hamstring themselves by writing rules and processes that are far too complex to work in the real world. Circumstances and technology change quickly, and there is a constant need to reinvent and adapt. However, government projects often expect to set out a plan and stick to the original goal, even if it quickly becomes apparent the project was ill-conceived. This frequently intersects with layers of poorly conceived processes to turn a project into boondoggles. Here in California, the high-speed rail approved in 2008 only finally finished its last leg of environmental review last year, 16 years later. When it takes 16 years to finish your self-imposed paperwork requirements simply, it's no surprise that government capacity is not functioning as intended.

I highly recommend you join the discussion! If you want to get a taste of the book without reading the whole thing, I recommend this recently published report on state capacity. I hope to write on this soon, so stay tuned!