Government efforts often encounter limited success or outright failure. Serious problems are not easily solved in modern democracies, where the government must balance the conflicting interests of millions of people, including powerful elites, while facing intense scrutiny to produce short-term results before elections.
The Problem with Policy
At its best, policy-making is painfully slow—minimally more riveting than watching a turtle run a race—especially in a political landscape that is unwelcoming to genuine progress. Today’s toxic polarization makes bipartisan support for any policy seem like a practical fantasy.
Assuming a piece of policy manages to navigate the political gauntlet, policymakers must appear decisive and resolute, providing immediate solutions to complex problems. This environment stifles open, deliberate problem-solving and institutionalizes an adversarial trial-and-error process. Policies are often shaped by executive or legislative staff who are disconnected from the implementation details, yet are under pressure to deliver comprehensive solutions. Consequently, national policies frequently rely on assumptions that are only tested after they become law.
Inverted Process
Government initiatives typically begin with policy battles and end with programs implemented through agencies or contracted services. Public policies often lack a nuanced understanding of ground-level details, as rules and procedures limit flexibility and responsiveness. Modifications at the local level may involve lengthy approval processes.
Even when policies are deeply flawed, correcting them requires monumental effort. Once a program is established, with a budget and constituency to defend it, it tends to remain in place regardless of its effectiveness. The primary feedback mechanism for policymakers—press reports and elections—punishes failure and demands almost instantaneous results. This dynamic leads elected officials to prioritize the short-term appearance of success over meaningful, substantive change, distorting the policymaking process.
Weak Implementation
Many promising ideas falter during implementation. Agencies or institutions advancing these ideas may struggle to maintain quality, leading to deterioration. Alternatively, a fragile organization may collapse before it can establish itself.
Low Expectations
Governments—both liberal and conservative—are often perceived as impotent in the face of concentrated corporate power. A consensus has emerged that governments frequently fail in their core representative duties, while corporations exacerbate suffering, inequality, and environmental degradation for short-term gain. This dissatisfaction is reflected in declining voter turnout across nations with free elections.
In the 1980s and 90s, public attention shifted to the growing wealth gap. Frustration and anger mounted over conditions and abuses that had long gone unquestioned.
Corporations have gained immense power, while governments have failed to challenge business interests in safeguarding the environment, protecting human rights, ensuring access to healthcare, and regulating financial institutions. Changes that conflict with the interests of powerful groups—such as oil, pharmaceuticals, or firearms—are often brutally quashed before they receive a fair chance. Everyday Americans worry that their health, economic, education, and justice systems are inadequate to meet contemporary challenges. While there is widespread agreement on the need for reform, corporate constituents and their allies fiercely defend the status quo.
Many policies and projects have been explicitly designed to benefit the wealthy at the expense of the poor. Reform is urgently needed, especially within the institutions tasked with protecting the public interest.
However, it has become clear that change will not originate from within these institutions. To foster change, new spheres of influence must be created. People seeking solutions are no longer willing to wait for governments, corporations, churches, or universities to lead.
The Citizen Sector
The U.S. Constitution asserts that all powers not explicitly granted to the states or federal government belong to the people. This presumption of a robust citizen sector was revolutionary compared to the global norm, where similar laws were not enacted until the 1990s. The surge of citizen activity in America a century ago, during a period of profound transition, mirrors today's global changes.
This heralds a new stage of democracy—one energized by citizens actively engaged in building, shaping, and renewing solutions that enhance society for all. They are addressing problems overlooked, mishandled, or exploited by traditional institutions and are crafting their own solutions.
Citizenship can and should be understood differently. A good citizen can be defined as someone who actively and intentionally participates in shaping the well-being of society at all levels. The founding fathers not only safeguarded their economic interests but also established institutions to realize their vision for a new nation, exemplifying the power and responsibility of citizenship. Today, this example is most evident in social entrepreneurship, where hands-on problem-solving is becoming a more common expression of citizenship.
These shifts are driven by the failure of old institutions to meet contemporary needs. In a rapidly changing world, more people must engage in problem-solving. A thriving economy depends on the establishment of new businesses that serve society in various ways, while an adaptive society requires collaboration on solutions.
In the coming years, more individuals will view it as natural to lead the creation of solutions to social problems. A few decades ago, social entrepreneurship demanded unusual confidence and vision, with few role models. Today, the path is becoming clearer.
As John Gardner articulated in his book Self-Renewal: "Society is not like a machine that is created at some point in time and then maintained with a minimum of effort; it is being continuously re-created, for good or ill, by its members. This will strike some as burdensome, but it will summon others to greatness."
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