The Clumsy War against the “Administrative State”

• Author: Donald F. Kettl
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/puar.12834
• Published date: 01 September 2017
• Date: 01 September 2017

The Clumsy War against the “Administrative State” 639

Public Administration Review,

Vol. 77, Iss. 5, pp. 639–640. © 2017 by

The American Society for Public Administration.

DOI: 10.1111/puar.12834.

The Clumsy War against the “Administrative State”

Donald F. Kettl is professor and former

dean in the School of Public Policy at

the University of Maryland. He is also a

nonresident senior fellow at the Partnership

for Public Service, the Volcker Alliance, and

the Brookings Institution. Kettl is author,

most recently, of

Little Bites of Big Data

for Public Policy

(CQ Press, 2017);

Can

Governments Earn Our Trust?

(Polity Press,

2017); and

The Politics of the Administrative

Process

, 7th edition (CQ Press, 2017).

Email: kettl@umd.edu

Guest Editorial

P residential strategist Steve Bannon shook

official Washington with his pledge in February

2017 to work for the “deconstruction of the

administrative state.” It was going to be a battle, he

told his audience at the Conservative Political Action

Conference. “Every day,” he said, “it is going to be a

fight.” But it was a battle he pledged to win.

In response, I have only two words: “too late.” The

administrative state, as the Progressives knew it,

evaporated years ago.

The “administrative state” label actually comes from a

doctoral dissertation published by a promising young

scholar, Dwight Waldo ( 1948 ), who went on to become

one of public administration ’ s superstars, including

a remarkable 11-year term as editor-in-chief of this

journal. Bureaucrats have power, he argued, because they

do what we need for them to do: bring professionalism

and expertise to tough jobs. In exercising that power,

Waldo contended, bureaucrats need to be responsive to

citizens and accountable to elected officials.

But despite government ’ s many manifest successes—

the air-traffic control system is a miraculous hidden

ballet, and the error rate in monthly Social Security

payments is too low to count—it would be hard

to argue that today ’ s bureaucracy is as competent

or responsive or effective as we deserve. In fact, the

Trump administration proposes to privatize air-traffic

control to improve its effectiveness. Too often,

bureaucracy seems to suffer from big performance

problems, as it marches to the beat of its own

drummer—or a thousand drummers playing different

beats and buffeted by stakeholders on all sides.

Waldo ’ s twin ideals of competence and responsiveness

have faded because of neglect from the left and

assault from the right. Liberals have developed a

disconcerting habit of launching big ideas without

paying much attention to how to make them work.

Nothing captures this better than the failed launch of

the Obamacare website in October 2013, when the

administration took its eye off the ball in rolling out

its signature program.

But conservatives have been complicit as well. Instead of

repealing policies they disagreed with, they have savaged

the bureaucracies charged with administering them.

Through hiring freezes, political attack, and ultimately

“starving the beast,” they have undermined the agencies

charged with the responsibility for administering the

law. In the process, both liberals and conservatives have

eroded confidence in government ’ s ability to work.

As a result, the administrative state, as Waldo

imagined it, is dead. Liberals pay far too little

attention to translating their ideas into action.

Conservatives have captured the rhetorical high

ground, arguing that “an employee is more likely

Donald F. Kettl

University of Maryland

Editor’s Note:  is issue begins with three lead essays on a common theme, deconstruction of the

administrative state.  e theme emanates from remarks by Stephen Bannon, President Donald Trump’s

Chief Strategist, about the new President’s agenda. In a guest editorial, “ e Clumsy War against the

‘Administrative State’,” Donald F. Kettl of‌f ers a provocative assessment of Bannon’s strategy. In “Subjecting

Donald Trump’s War against the Administrative State to Management Science,” Stephen Heidari-

Robinson holds the Trump administrative agenda up to the mirror of lessons from 1700 reorganizations.

Keith B. Belton, Kerry Krutilla, and John D. Graham provide insights about what many view as the heart

of the deconstruction agenda, that is, regulation, in “Regulatory Reform in the Trump Era.” I hope you

enjoy reading these three timely essays.

JLP