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23 March 2008

The deliberative presidency

Very interesting piece in NYT last week on the decision by the US to dissolve the Iraqi Army in 2003. An excerpt:

Colin L. Powell, the secretary of state and a former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said he was never asked for advice, and was in Paris when the May 22 meeting was held.

“I talked to Rice and said, ‘Condi, what happened?’ ” he recalled. “And her reaction was: ‘I was surprised too, but it is a decision that has been made and the president is standing behind Jerry’s decision. Jerry is the guy on the ground.’ And there was no further debate about it.”

In this election season, perhaps the hardest thing to evaluate about the candidates is one of the most important: how would she or he create a deliberative Presidency? We are in the midst of a paradigm shift in our policies at home and abroad, and the next Presidency will be built brick by brick through the myriad of decisions that need to be made in response to the particular challenges that arise on a daily basis. Those decisions must reflect the President's vision of the world, but through the prism of the information and options that exist at particular instances in time. What does it take for the Presidency to successfully navigate the uncertainties of the 21st century?

Extensive research on individual and organizational decision making, including my own work on networks, highlights one prerequisite to high quality decisions: diversity of perspectives and sources of information. The modern Presidency is made up of a mix of careerists and transient political appointees in the Executive Office of the President, connected to relatively slow changing agencies. The key challenge is one of how to manage the connections among these individuals, in order to balance the simultaneous needs for deliberation and decision. Disagreement offers Presidents a menu of choices, where dissent can keep options open, and forces others to critically examine their own perspectives.

The successful President is one who can manage this complex network, creating a pull of information and viewpoints upwards. Doris Kearns Goodwin, in her study of Lincoln, presents a compelling portrait of a President who filled his cabinet with individuals with strong personalities and often conflicting views. In a rather different fashion, Franklin Roosevelt also structured his network so as to receive multiple perspectives, through privately soliciting information from rivals within the White House.

Recent Presidents have developed more institutionalized mechanisms to funnel information upwards. My colleague, Roger Porter, has documented the collegial, if sometimes adversarial, process of soliciting input from agencies regarding economic policy in the Ford administration. I have studied how the regulatory review processes instituted in the Reagan administration has offered the White House a steady stream of signals about regulatory policy in the Reagan, Bush, and Clinton administrations. Both of these processes took advantage of the natural differences of perspective that are embedded within the bureaucracy. These differences can be used to provide illumination as well as heat.

The President also needs to admit some degree of uncertainty as to the best course of action. No President, of course, has begun a speech "I am 51% certainty that I have made the best choice." But internal discussion must begin with an assumption of uncertainty and a respect for alternative points of view. That deliberative foundation must come from the President.

The general set of issues to balance is how distribute involvement in various decisions. Who has information, perspective, and expertise to contribute to a decision? How does one not clog the decision making network with issues of secondary importance so that the key decisions get the collective attention they deserve?

The history book has not yet closed on the current administration, but insider portrayals suggest a systematic mismanagement of the decision-making network. The decision to dissolve the Iraqi army is an example par excellence. This was one of the fundamental strategic decisions post invasion, and one where different bureaucratic actors had different things to contribute to the decision. Clearly, Bremer was in a privileged position vis a vis some of the information, but that did not mean that he was even the best person to process that information. Nation building generally, and rebuilding Iraq specifically was a domain that no one in the US government could claim such unique expertise as to require such deference. This case, and others like it, suggest a fundamental mis-management of the inter-agency process in foreign policy in the Bush Administration.

There is a potential trade-off of decisiveness and discipline on the one hand, and deliberativeness on the other. Clearly, the costs of dithering sometimes exceed the benefits of discussion. However, we face long run existential threats at home and abroad: with radical changes in the distribution of power in the world, and a restructuring of our economy at home. This next Presidency may well prove to be a pivotal one in history, and, to be successful, will require a network that supplies information and perspectives with which to choose the future.

Posted by David Lazer at March 23, 2008 10:09 PM

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