Withering Branches?

In class we said the best we can do – the most rational course – is to take the political structure as given and to work at the margins, to incrementally change the branches. Many of us with backgrounds in complicated, fast-paced worlds of various kinds have felt how painfully true this is. The speed of information, the ever-rising expectations of stakeholders, and the interconnectedness of the world don’t provide the luxury to massage the roots.

Contrast this with Founding Parental-Figure George Mason, who said that to ensure the “blessings of liberty” we must commit ourselves to a “frequent recurrence to fundamental principles.” Steeping themselves in the historical lessons of Jerusalem, Athens, Rome, London/Edinburgh and Paris, Mason and crew reflected on America's own future. They knew the U.S. would evolve; to keep perspective they believed its leaders must thoughtfully and regularly consider the fundamental ideals that birthed the nation. Or else, they argued, the country would fall into the quagmire of great nations of the past. It was a very rooty perspective.

The global economic crisis was fundamentally a problem of increments. At most every step, actors like the Fed, finance corporations and home-buyers acted in very rational ways. With a handful of reprehensible exceptions, the increments weren’t horrible, unethical decisions; they were small, gray-area choices easily justified in their short-sighted contexts. Fast-forward several years and incremental change amounted to enormous ethical deviations and suffering around the world, even for many who made those decisions.

Is the political realm insulated from such problems? The article Kate sent around for the Gridlock initiative describes Washington's systemic problems that forestall real progress. Its author writes:

“Like many changes that are revolutionary, none of Washington’s problems happened overnight. But slow and steady change over many decades—at a rate barely noticeable while it’s happening—produces change that is transformative. In this instance, it’s the kind of evolution that happens inevitably to rich and powerful states, from imperial Rome to Victorian England. The neural network of money, politics, bureaucracy, and values becomes so tautly interconnected that no individual part can be touched or fixed without affecting the whole organism, which reacts defensively.”

The author implies that, contrary to the hopes of our founders, we are incrementally tiptoeing down the roads of Rome and London. He asks the reader to consider whether or not we're past the point of no hope in Washington.

How do we balance the rational with the circumspect, or is that even possible in our world today? Living in the roots would be political suicide for an individual, but might living in the branches result in a slower but equally harmful and much broader disease?

Dean Kuniholm’s talk highlighted the importance of looking to the past to understand the present and shape the future. I wonder what a generation of political leaders steeped in a practical yet historical perspective would look like. It shaped the Constitution. Does it still apply today?

-Jake T.