Organizations and Markets

Bentham and Hume in the West Wing

6 October 2009 at 7:31 am Dick Langlois 2 comments

| Dick Langlois |

From a perhaps uncharacteristic source — David Brooks at the New York Times — comes a funny and spot-on column about Bentham and Hume as present-day DC policy advisors.

The people on Mr. Bentham’s side believe that government can get actively involved in organizing innovation. . . . The people on Mr. Hume’s side believe government should actively tilt the playing field to promote social goods and set off decentralized networks of reform, but they don’t think government knows enough to intimately organize dynamic innovation.

So let’s have the debate. But before we do, let’s understand that Mr. Bentham is going to win. The lobbyists love Bentham’s intricacies and his stacks of spending proposals, which they need in order to advance their agendas. If you want to pass anything through Congress, Bentham’s your man.

Entry filed under: - Langlois -, History of Economic and Management Thought, Innovation, Public Policy / Political Economy.