[TKDietz]

I think that's a load of hooey. If you want to narrow the options you'll let the government shove one-sized fits all solutions down our throats. If you want true innovation, you'll allow free citizens to work things out themselves.

Believe in the human spirit, Rogerv. Don't count on government bureaucracies to fix all of our problems. History has shown that the thing they do best is grow bigger and bigger and screw things up.

[rogerv]

I am not a fan of Procrustes! I most certainly do not believe one size fits all. And I very much want to encourage just the innovation of which you speak.

But there are problems of coordination here, which is why government bureaucracies developed in the first place, and why they were an advance over what preceded. There is a reaon why Max Weber thought bureaucracy represented the rationalization of society, nd why the emphasis on explicit procedure was marked as an advance over the uncoordinated efforts of the past. In fact, modern industry, with job descriptions, explicit rules, performance reviews, would not be possible without these developments (that and Taylors studies of workplace efficiency).

But however much of an improvement that may have been, we now have more flexible models of rationality and more reliable ways of communicating information that can lead to greater efficiency. Bureaucracy is no longer the best we can do.

The issue of trust or mistrust however should not be reduced to questions of efficiency. There are also issues of equity. We don't want a winner take all society where people can press temporary advantages to the harm of others. We need government as an agent of countervailing power to keep the ground rules of fairness in force. Otherwise, we don't have markets, but something more like the war of all against all.

I do believe in the human spirit, as do you. I find anarchism tempting, and if I trusted human being to do the right thing in all circumstances, I would be an anarchist. But I do think there are circumstances under which even the best of us would be tempted to do the worst, and I think we need government to intervene in such situations and control the damage.