*Campaign 2012: Twelve Independent Ideas for Improving American Public Policy. Edited by Benjamin Wittes (senior fellow in Governance Studies, Brookings Institution).  Washington: Brookings Institution Press, April 2012, 250p, $26.95pb.  Governing the United States will be extremely difficult for whoever emerges in November 2012. Explores key questions facing the White House hopefuls: fiscal policy (Ron Haskins), policies in South Asia (Michael O’Hanlon) and the Middle East (Kenneth Pollack and Shadi Hamid), health care (Alice Rivlin), political and institutional reform (William Galston), housing, energy and climate, and rethinking Federalism.  (GOVERNMENT * U.S. PUBLIC POLICY: 12 IDEAS)

**Government at a Glance 2011.  Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.  Paris: OECD, June 2011, 264p (8x11”), $49; www.oecd-ilibrary.org.  The second edition notes in the Preface that “the recent crisis has been caused by major failures in regulation and supervision by public authorities, as well as by shortcomings in risk management and corporate governance by the private sector.”  It has shaken many long-held assumptions, and has led to calls for change in the global governance architecture.  The task is critical, because governments are major players in most nations, and have significantly expanded in the last 50 years since OECD was established in 1961 (at that time, general government outlays of member countries averaged <30% of GDP; the average now exceed 45%, up from 40% in 2007).  Efforts to restructure the state must reassess were and how government should and should not intervene.  “In short, it is about better and more effective governance, about sound institutions and efficie3nt rules and procedures.”  Chapters provide 58 data sets of member and partner countries, and discuss leveraged governance to get results, the need for evidence-based decision-making (most OECD countries are planning reforms to consolidate finances), evaluating the quality of reforms, general government expenditures and investment, strategic foresight and leadership (regarding fiscal sustainability, human resources management, e-government strategies), public workforce restructuring, compensation, human resources practices, transparency in governance (proactive disclosure of information, the budget process conflict-of-interest disclosure, public procurement), green procurement, regulatory governance, outsourcing, greater fairness through selected policies, and efficient tax administration.  (GOVERNMENT: OECD OVERVIEW * GOVERNANCE TRENDS *  TRANSPARENCY IN GOVERNANCE * FORESIGHT IN GOVERNANCE)

* Framed: America’s 51 Constitutions and the Crisis of Governance.  Sanford Levinson (Prof of Law and Pol Sci, U of Texas-Austin).  NY: Oxford UP, April 2012, 416p, $29.95.  The Constitution should be treated as a badly flawed document deserving revision.  Levinson explores the original assumptions underlying our institutions and shows that its fundamental procedures of governance – congressional bicameralism and the selection of the President by the Electoral College – contribute to the dysfunction  of today’s American politics.  The U.S. Constitution doesn’t uniquely exemplify the American constitutional tradition; the 50 state constitutions, often interestingly different – and perhaps better, have been updated by frequent amendments or by complete replacement by state constitutional conventions.  Basic law often reaches a point where it becomes obsolete.  The US Constitution merits its own updating.  [Also see The Living Constitution by David A. Strauss (Oxford UP, May 2010, 144p), on how the US Constitution can sensibly evolve, The Constitution in 2020 edited by Jack Balkin and Reva Siegel (Oxford UP, June 2009), A More Perfect Constitution: 23 Proposals by Larry J. Sabato (Walker & Co, 2007), and A Bill of Rights for 21^st Century America by Joseph F. Coates (Kanawha Institute, 2007).]  (GOVERNMENT * CONSTITUTION UPDATING: U.S)

* Taxes in America: What Everyone Needs to Know.  Leonard E. Burman (Prof of Public Administration and Economics, Syracuse U) and Joel Slemrod (Prof of Economics, U of Michigan).  NY: Oxford UP, August 2012, 224p, $16.95pb.  Explains how the US tax system works, how it affects people and businesses, and how it may be improved.  Uses a Q&A format to address questions as: How to recognize Fool’s Gold tax reform plans? How much more tax would the IRS collect with better enforcement?  How do tax burdens vary around the world?  Why do corporations pay so little tax?  What kind of tax system is most conducive to economic growth. (TAXES IN U.S. * GOVERNMENT * TAX REFORM)

*Health Reform:  Meeting the Challenge of Ageing and Multiple Morbidities.  Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development.  Paris: OECD, Nov 2011, 221p.  “The ageing of our societies is at the same time one of our greatest achievements and one of our biggest challenges.”  The professional organization of health provision no longer reflects the changing patient and population health needs caused by the growing number of complex illnesses. In 1961, when the OECD was founded, health systems were gearing themselves up to deliver acute care interventions.  Sick people were to be cured in hospitals, then sent on their way again. Medical training was focused on hospitals; innovation was to develop new interventions; payment systems were centered around single episodes of care.  Health systems have delivered big improvements in health since then, but they can be slow to adapt to new challenges. In particular, these days, the overwhelming burden of disease is chronic, for which ‘cure’ is out of our reach. Health policies have changed to some extent in response, though perhaps not enough.  But the challenge of the future is that the typical recipient of health care will be aged and will have multiple morbidities.  Examines how payment systems, innovation policies, and human resource policies need to be modernized so that OECD health systems will continue to generate improved health outcomes in the future at a sustainable cost.  Today’s health care is at a crossroads in thinking about financing care for older people with multiple morbidites and multiple needs, with a choice of two paths: 1) one path leads to detailed care plans, bundling payments, transferring risk, and traditional market competition; 2) the other path leads to whole system targets with minimum specification, pooled budgets, and innovative market models. “Demographic and epidemiological realities will force governments to choose, and they need to think carefully about which direction to go.” 

* Regulatory Policy and Governance: Supporting Economic Growth and Serving the Public Interest . Organization for Co-operation and Development, Paris: OECD, Oct 2011, 120p, $37.  Regulations are indispensable to the proper functioning of economies and societies.  They underpin markets, protect the rights and safety of citizens and ensure the delivery of public goods and services.  At the same time, regulations are rarely costless.  Businesses complain that red tape holds back competitiveness, while citizens complain about the time that it takes to fill out government paperwork.  More worrying still, regulations can be inconsistent with the achievement of policy objectives.  They can have unintended consequences and they can become less effective or even redundant over time. The 2008 financial crisis, and the ensuing and ongoing economic downturn, are stark reminders of the consequence of regulatory failure.  The report encourages governments to "think big" about the relevance of regulatory policy; assesses recent efforts of OECD countries to develop and deepen regulatory policy and governance; evaluates the comprehensive policy cycle by which regulations are designed, assessed and evaluated, revised, and enforced at all levels of government; and provides ideas on developing a robust regulatory environment as key to returning to a stronger, fairer and more sustainable growth path.  “Many OECD countries did not have a regulatory policy ten years ago; nearly all do now.  There is growing interest in using regulatory policy to address broad societal concerns such as distributional equity and sustainable developments.  

 

* The Price of Civilization: Reawakening American Virtue and Prosperity.   Jeffrey Sachs (Director, Earth Institute, Columbia U).  NY: Random House, Oct 2011, 336p, $27.  A global macroeconomist argues that both political parties and many economists have missed the big picture, offering shortsighted solutions to address complex problems.  They “profoundly underestimate” globalization’s long-term effects on the US. Meanwhile, the political system has lost its ethical moorings, with ever-rising campaign contributions and lobbying outlays overpowering the voice of citizens.  And our culture is over-stimulated and consumer-driven.  Policies of both parties have systematically favored capital over labor, and kept tax rates low on footloose multinationals, while starving government programs that benefit the poor and unemployed.  Urges creation of a third political party to the left of the Democrats (the Alliance for the Radical Center), spending an additional 1% of GDP on worker training and early childhood development, raising the top tax rate to 39.6% (which would raise 0.5% of GDP), and reclaiming the virtues of good citizenship and mindfulness toward the economy and one another.  Most important, we must accept the price of civilization so we can restore America to its great promise.                                                              (GOVERNMENT * GLOBALIZATION)

* Republic, Lost: How Money Corrupts Congress—and a Plan to Stop It.  Lawrence Lessig (Prof of Law and Director, Center for Ethics, Harvard U).  NY: Twelve (Hachette Book Group), Oct 2011, 320p, $26.99.  In an era when special interests funnel huge amounts of money into our government, driven by shifts in campaign finance rules and the recent Supreme Court “Citizens United” decision, trust in American government has reached an all-time low.  “Government is an embarrassment.  It has lost the capacity to make essential decisions.”  Corruption is wrecking our democracy, and “a ship that can’t be steered is a ship that will sink.” Good people with good intentions have allowed our democracy to be co-opted by outside interests, and this exploitation has become entrenched in the system.  The great threat today is “the economy of influence, now transparent to all, which has normalized a process that draws our democracy away from the will of the people…an engine of influence that seeks simply to make those most connected rich.”  Describes the problems of campaign financing and corporate lobbying, calls for a new Constitutional Convention, and offers solutions for gaining control of our corrupted representational system.  (GOVERNMENT * CORRUPTION * CONGRESS CORRUPTED * DEMOCRACY CORRUPTED)

* Governing for the Long Term: Democracy and the Politics of Investment.  Alan M. Jacobs (U of British Columbia, Vancouver).  NY: Cambridge U Press, March 2011, 324p, $90pb.  Policymaking is not a single distributive event, but a stream of government actions whose effects are felt over long spans of time.  Jacobs makes a case for bringing trade-offs over time to the center of the study of policymaking, investigating conditions under which elected governments invest in long-term social benefits at short-term social cost.  If governments want to reduce public debt, slow climate change, or shore up pension systems, they must typically inflict immediate pain on citizens for gains that will only arrive over the long run.  Investment-oriented policies must surmount three distinct hurdles to future-oriented state action: 1) a problem of electoral risk, rooted in the scarcity of voter attention; 2) a problem of prediction, deriving from the complexity of long-term policy effects; and 3) a problem of institutional capacity, arising from interest groups' preferences for distributive gains over intertemporal bargains.

* Asset Declarations for Public Officials: A Tool to Prevent Corruption.  Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development.  Paris: OECD, March 2011, 135p, $ 40pb (pdf available at www.oecd-ilibrary.org based on subscription).  Provides a systemic analysis of the existing practice in Eastern Europe and Central Asia, and in some OECD member states in Western Europe and North America, and discusses the cost-effectiveness and the overall usefulness of declaration systems.  Examines key elements of asset declaration systems (such as policy objectives, legal frameworks and institutional arrangements), categories of public officials required to submit declarations, types of required information, procedures for verifying information, sanctions for violations, and public disclosure.  Case studies feature Lithuania, Romania, Spain, and Ukraine, with many additional country examples.                     (GOVERNMENT * ASSET DECLARATION FOR OFFICIALS * CORRUPTION)

 

* Collaborative Governance: Private Roles for Public Goals in Turbulent Times.  John D. Donahue and Richard J. Zeckhauser (both, Harvard Kennedy School).  Princeton NJ: Princeton U Press, April 2011, 296p, $27.95.  Demonstrates how government at every level can engage the private sector to overcome seemingly insurmountable problems and achieve public goals more effectively.  Private engagement in public missions –rightly structured and skillfully managed –is the way smart government ought to operate.  Covers how, when, and why collaboration works, and also under what circumstances it doesn’t.               (GOVERNMENT AND PRIVATE SECTOR * COLLABORATIVE GOVERNANCE)

* Cultivating Conscience: How Good Laws Make Good People.  Lynn A. Stout (Prof of Corporate and Securities Law, UCLA).  Princeton NJ: Princeton U Press, Nov 2010, 296p, $27.95.  Rather than lean on the power of greed to shape laws and human behavior, we should rely on conscience, which is a vital force in our lives.  Drawing from social psychology, behavioral economics, and evolutionary biology, Stout demonstrates how social cues trigger unselfish behavior and argues that the legal system should use these cues.  Current emphasis on self-interest may have contributed to the recent catastrophic political missteps and financial scandals by encouraging corrupt and selfish actions, and undermining society’s moral compass. (GOVERNMENT * LEGAL SYSTEM * LAW AND UNSELFISH BEHAVIOR)

* Value for Money in Government: Public Administration after “New Public Management”.  Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development.  Paris: OECD, July 2010, 116p, free pdf.  In the 1980s, “less” government was the prevailing idea; in the 1990s and early 21C, the “New Public Management” theme dominated.  Reforms are now focusing on quality of services for citizens and businesses, and on efficacy of administration.  Examines four themes in nine OECD countries (Austria, Canada, Denmark, Finland, Ireland, Netherlands, New Zealand, Sweden, and the UK): development of shared service centers, steering and control of agencies, automatic productivity cuts, and spending review procedures.                         (GOVERNMENT * PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION: NEW THEMES)

* Improving the Governance of Risk.  Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development.  OECD Reviews of Regulatory Reform and Risk.  Paris: OECD Publishing, April 2010/251p. Governments are expected to protect citizens from adverse consequences of hazardous events, but it is not possible or necessary for all risks to be removed.  A risk-based approach to design of regulation can help insure that regulatory approaches are efficient, while accounting for tradeoffs across policy objectives.  Few OECD governments have taken steps to develop a coherent risk governance policy for regulation. Covers challenges in designing regulatory policy frameworks to manage risks, different cultural and legal dimensions of risk regulatory concepts across OECD, analytical models and principles for decision-making in uncertain situations, and key elements of risk regulation and governance institutions. Looks at five OECD countries (Australia, Ireland, Netherlands, Portugal, UK) and across four sectors (environment, food safety, financial markets, and health and safety).

  

* Constitutional Theocracy.  Ran Hirschl (Prof of Political Science and Law, U of Toronto).  Cambridge MA: Harvard U Press, Nov 2010/290p/$45.  A new legal order has emerged at the intersection of two sweeping global trends: rising popular support for theocratic governance and the spread of constitutionalism or judicial review.   Analyzes religion-and-state jurisprudence from dozens of countries and explores the evolving role of constitutional law and courts in a non-secularist world.  Argues that the constitutional enshrinement of religion is a rational, prudent strategy that allows opponents of theocratic governance to bring it under check  while protecting their societies against radical religion. 

  

*Engaging Civil Society: Emerging Trends in Democratic Governance.  Trends and Innovations in Governance Series.  Edited by G. Shabbir Cheema (director, Asia-Pacific Governance and Democracy Initiative; senior fellow, East-West Center; Honolulu) and Vesselin Popovski (Institute for Sustainability and Peace, UNU, Tokyo).  Tokyo & NY: United Nations U Press (dist by Brookings Institution Press), Aug 2010/308p/$36pb.  Looks at the changing role of civil society in global and national governance, as play an expanded role in increasing transparency, participation, access to services, and the rule of law.  Identifies factors that influence effectiveness of civil society in promoting democratic governance, and explores the extent to which global civil society has influenced global democratic governance. Also examines patterns of growth of civil society in Asia and Africa, and the importance of a related legal framework.                     (GOVERNANCE * DEMOCRATIC GOVERNANCE * CIVIL SOCIETY)

  

** Choosing the Nation’s Fiscal Future.  Committee on the Fiscal Future of the United States.  Washington DC: National Academies Press, Jan 2010/380p/$53.95pb.  The trajectory of the federal budget set by current policies cannot be sustained. Assesses options for a sustainable federal budget  that consider reduced spending (for Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security benefits), raised payroll taxes, and changing many other government spending programs and tax policies.  Also scrutinizes the federal budget process with a view to increase its accountability and responsibility, and explains how to assess budget proposals for their consistency with long-term fiscal stability. 

  

* Government at a Glance 2009.     Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. OECD, Oct 2009/163p. A new biennial publication providing 31 indicators of government performance compared across OECD countries, as concerns government revenues by level of government, expenditures by level and type of government, production costs in general government, public employment, the aging workforce, human resource management practices, budgeting practices, regulatory simplification and impact analysis, integrity (conflict-of-interest disclosure, whistle-blowing, preventing corruption in procurement), open government legislation, and e-government readiness. Initial chapter discusses governance challenges for the future.            (GOVERNMENT * INDICATORS: OECD GOVERNMENTS)

 

* The Political Economy of Reform: Lessons from Pensions, Product Markets and Labour Markets in Ten OECD Countries. Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development. OECD, Aug 2009/501p. Examines why some policy reforms get implemented and others languish by looking at 20 case studies in 10 OECD countries over the past two decades (e.g., pension reform in France, US reform of welfare and Social Security, power-sector and water reform in Australia, labor law reform in Mexico); main findings: the importance of an electoral mandate, effective communication, solid research and analysis, taking time, persistence, and leadership.                        (GOVERNANCE * METHODS)

 

* The People Factor: Strengthening America by Investing in Public Service. Linda J. Bilmes (Lecturer in Public Policy, JFK School, Harvard U) and W. Scott Gould (VP, IBM Global Business Services). Washington: Brookings Institution Press, April 2009/359p/$19.95pb. The US requires a new and revitalized federal government, yet nearly half the federal workforce will be eligible for retirement in the next five years—retirements that could serious impair America’s ability to function—and the federal government turns away talent by its cumbersome hiring process; proposes investing $10 billion in the next five years, leading to $300-600 billion in productivity gains and cost savings.

 (GOVERNANCE * PUBLIC SERVICE)

 

* Strengthening Congress. Lee H. Hamilton (Director, Center on Congress, Indiana U; President, Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars). Indiana U Press, Oct 2009/128p/$14.95pb. Distinguished Indiana Congressman (1965-1999) explains how Congress has drifted away from the role envisioned for it in the Constitution, and argues that America needs a stronger Congress and a more engaged citizenry in order to ensure responsive and effective democracy. Calls for reinforcing congressional oversight, restoring the deliberative process, curbing the influence of lobbyists, and reducing excessive partisanship.                                            (GOVERNANCE: U.S. * CONGRESS)

 

When the People Speak: Deliberative Democracy and Public Consultation. James S. Fishkin (Director, Center for Deliberative Democracy, Stanford U). NY: Oxford UP, Sept 2009/256p/$29.95. Co-author with Bruce Ackerman of Deliberation Day (Yale UP, 2004), which proposes a new two-day national holiday before major national elections, outlines deliberative democracy projects that he has conducted with various collaborators in the US, China, Australia, and EU so as to revive our modern democracies.                                                                             (GOVERNANCE * DEMOCRACY)

 

* The Constitution in 2020. Edited by Jack Balkin and Reva Siegel (both Profs of Law, Yale U). NY: Oxford UP, June 2009/336p/$19.95pb. Offers a blueprint for implementing a more progressive vision of constitutional law in the years ahead, considering the challenge of new technologies, presidential power, international human rights, religious liberty, freedom of speech, voting, reproductive rights, and economic rights. [Also seeA More Perfect Constitution: 23 Proposals by Larry J. Sabato (Walker & Co, 2007) and A Bill of Rights for 21^st Century America by Joseph F. Coates (Kanawha Institute, 2007).]

 

* Investing in the Disadvantaged: Assessing the Benefits and Costs of Social Policies. Edited by David L. Weimer (Prof of Public Affairs, U of Wisconsin-Madison) and Aidan R. Vining (Prof of Business and Govt Relations, Simon Fraser U). Washington: Georgetown U Press, April 2009/288p/$29.95pb. With budgets squeezed at every level of government, cost-benefit analysis holds great potential for assessing efficiency of many programs. CBA is applied to 10 areas of social policy: early childhood development, elementary and secondary schools, health care for the disadvantaged, mental illness, substance abuse and addiction, juvenile crime, prisoner reentry programs, housing assistance, work-incentive programs for the unemployed and employers, and welfare-to-work interventions. (GOVERNMENT * SOCIAL POLICY: COST-BENEFIT ANALYSIS * COST-BENEFIT ANALYSIS AND SOCIAL POLICY)

 

* Wiki Government: How Technology Can Make Government Better, Democracy Stronger, and Citizens More Powerful. Beth Simone Noveck (Prof of Law, NYU). Washington: Brookings Institution Press, June 2009/224p/$28.95. Shows how collaborative democracy can be designed, and how it opens policymaking to greater participation; includes a case study of inviting the public to join in examining patent applications, radically transforming the process, and proposes policy wikis and civic juries.