Due Date: Mon Jan 24
Read the attached analysis piece from the Boston Globe Ideas section.
Do you agree with the proposal? What are the pros and cons? Which types of policy areas are most suitable? Least?
New ground rules for comments, in order to reduce repetition:
1st post: Say whether you agree/disagree, and give ONE pro or con which is most important to you, and ONE policy area most OR least suitable.
2nd post: read at least 5 comments of other students, then write in reaction to one or more.
I agree with this proposal, though it would definitely be an extremely difficult concept to get across to the public, especially now with the strength of the Tea Partiers who are staunchly against federal government oversight. However, I think it is necessary to bring science into politics and most importantly because there is so much emotion surrounding policy decisions that are in fact scientifically based, such as the economy. Testing policies on a small scale to see the effect would offer data to help form laws going forward. That being said, a con of this "labs of democracy" idea can be found in American political culture. It is known that Americans value equality and equal opportunity. The writer even said, "Americans expect to be treated equally under the law, and this approach, by definition, entails disparate treatment," which I think is totally true and would prove to be a big issue with this testing idea.
ReplyDeleteAs far as the policy issues that are most suitable for law labs I think that they would be areas that are not as much social issues, such as the economy. Becuase of the diverse nature of cultural and social beliefs in America I think areas such as abortion or school prayer would be less suitable for the law lab concept. However, something like tax hikes or cuts are less intangible and more focused on standards, which would make them better to test on a randomized sample for effectiveness.
AU
I would agree with the proposal for the most part. I think that our government right now has too much power and that they enact too many laws that keep extending their power, such as the new health care law. I think the biggest pro is that it could be a way to weed out bad legislation, or to improve proposed legislation. A problem a lot of people have with the government is that there is too much waste. It is very difficult to control the waste when you are starting a law on 300 million people that have never been seen before and are not really sure how it is going to go. It is much easier to work out the kinks or scrap the whole idea on a small scale than it is on the entire country. It is like in any sports game; if you have a new play you practice it as a team first. You cannot just try and use it in the middle of a big game without any practice. I think the policy area where it is the least suitable, however, is taxes simply because I think it would be unfair to tax one small group a certain way, but everyone else another. Since you would be dealing with people’s money it becomes more sensitive and I think their would be a lot of opposition to it.
ReplyDeleteExperimentation’s goal would be to compare cost and benefit of certain regulation matters. I think if we were to measure cost and benefit of experimentation, we would find that putting regulation in a laboratory simply is not worth it.
ReplyDeleteThe benefit is that we gain hard data about the effectiveness of regulation. Based on this data, legislators can try to improve laws. Still, these benefits are limited. As the article notes, experimental data on a small scale will not always ensure the same results on a national level if Congress were to enact a law. In addition, no matter what data is gleaned, opponents of some issues, like gun control and environmental protection [ahem, Tess], will still be devoted to their liberties.
The costs are incredibly high. Part of America’s political culture is that everyone is politically equal, and having “big government” make guinea pigs out of its citizens would be dehumanizing. I also see it as an abuse of the government’s power to give certain individuals different rights without them knowing. The idea that the federal government even has the capability to do this would appall many Americans.
Maybe we could do a test on testing to judge the cost-benefits properly. Just kidding.
While I agree with the proposed idea of conducting trials and tests to see if laws work, I do think that it would be very hard convince the public to do it and to do it without creating a lot of error or bias in the results. I think that testing out laws and or acts this way could, as the article stated, show what can work in our country and what can’t. I think one of the most important cons that would prevent this idea from actually happening is the fact that if Americans knew about these trials going on that they would create bias or untruthful results. For example, in the article, the reporter talked about if the people that were being tested knew about it, they could act on their own accord with their opinions to get what they want down, like less strict gun control laws or lower taxes. I think one area of policy that this idea would be the most helpful to is with trials and tests in small experiments like different safety measures, public transport, or environmental issues.
ReplyDeleteI agree with the editorial's claim that testing laws before being enacted would provide data showing if the law worked or not. I think that this would be a very good idea as it has been used by pharmaceutical companies for decades, however there is a difference between testing laws and testing a medicine to cure headaches. Some legislation, such as education policy and environmental laws would be relatively easy to conduct a random study. With different schools and factories implementing the test laws to see if they work. However, it would be very challenging to test tax laws on a sample population. It would also make people very unhappy and people would feel like they are being treated unequally. So all in all, the government could definitely try to implement tests of some policies, but for others, the tests would most likely not show any conclusive data.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Ali's comment where she said people would not be okay with being treated unequally and with unequal opportunities. By testing the laws on a community or county, the members of the surrounding area would feel unequal to the people that are getting the benefit of a new law.
ReplyDeleteI also agree with Laura's analogy of practicing a play before implementing it in the middle of a big game. I also think that by testing it on the small scale, the excess waste and unnecessary portions of the law could be removed if they are deemed extraneous.
I think that generally, I agree with the idea that this article presents. That being able to propose policies and laws with evidential data rather than theoretical data, which would hopefully the benefits would outweigh the costs. However, I feel that this would be extremely tough to put into action. A con would be that by selecting a group and putting them under different rules than the rest of the country would cause a inequality that many would protest. I feel like one of the few things this method could work for would be things like educational standards and testing out what helps students the most, but even this would be hard because school systems are in very different conditions around the country. But other than that, there are so many hotly debated issues that people will continue to debate even if there were some data that supported one side or another.
ReplyDeleteI do agree with the proposal, in general. I think the argument about testing laws in order to figure out what the impact of them will be is important--after all, isn't it better to know what we are getting into at the beginning? One of the aspects of the "Law Lab" that I find most appealing is that different experiments can be done in different parts of the country to determine where the law is most effective. An area where I don't think it's very plausible is taxes. Clearly, as we can see from the contention surrounding the Bush Tax Cuts, Americans simply cannot agree on taxes. Making some people's taxes lower as a sort of experimental group would not go over well with those whose taxes were still at the regular rate.
ReplyDeleteI thought Ethan's comment was an important one--saying that we cannot warp, change, or take away Americans' rights, especially without their knowledge. The author made the point that because of the "Hawthorne Effect", it's important that the subjects of a study do not know their part in it. However, for this to work for the "law lab", it would mean stripping Americans of their rights, which is not something I'm in favor of.
ReplyDeleteI also agree with the proposal to "test" potential laws before they actually become law. Even though I think that the idea is really good and seem smart, I don't know if this could/would ever happen. I do think that one of the best aspects of this idea is the fact that laws would be tested out on a smaller group of people before it is forced upon the entire country. This would give more knowledge and time for the law to be thought about and fixed before it controls the lives of the entire country. I believe that an area where the policy would be least suitable would be something like gun control. As talked about in the last part of the article, there are large groups of people that believe it is their right by the second amendment to bear arms, even if it is proven that less guns reduce crime. In cases like this, I don't think that data and clear facts will sway people on what is right.
ReplyDeleteI think this is an incredibly stupid idea. The idea that we would randomly pick a group of people and just say, "Hey! We've got this idea we'd like to try on you. Not sure how it's going to work out, but you don't mind, right?" is ridiculous. The FDA doesn't pick random healthy people and give them drugs against their will; they pick people that have a disease and the medicine might treat or people that are willing. Testing out laws and regulations is completely different. It could seriously mess with people's homes and livelihoods. If statistical analysis isn't giving you an accurate enough picture, don't create laws and regulations based on it.
ReplyDeleteI don't think there are any suitable policy areas for this idea. It affects the lives of people too much. Even things like economic regulations and whatnot are just too intertwined with the way people live for this to be carried out safely.
I agree with Ali’s point about how many American have the belief of equal opportunity. If Americans see that someone else is getting a tax break or someone else is getting more lenient gun laws, they will protest or cause a problem in the results since they might not be getting the benefits from a trial or experiment. But again, for these trials to happen, not everyone will be able to participate in a trial since there are so many people. It’s just not possible. So the conflicts between American’s want of equal opportunity and the ability of trials to take place would just cause everything to fall apart.
ReplyDeleteFrom the comments I read, it seems like a lot of people are in favor of this idea theoretically speaking. And I am too. I think that in an ideal world, we would be able to test laws and regulations and gather data and then know exactly which laws to implement on a larger scale and which laws to toss in the trash. Unfortunately, we don't live in an ideal world. Like Ethan said, the costs of doing this would far outweigh the benefits. People would feel they were being treated unfairly and if it turned out that the law was a bad one, what would happen to the people we were testing it on? So, yes, while this plan might offer some new information on taxes or environmental regulations, I think we should devote our time to finding alternative testing methods or, better yet, solutions to these problems that don't need to be tested.
ReplyDeleteI disagree with the proposal that the Federal government should test laws in a “laboratory setting”. I believe that if the Federal government used this approach they would risk applying laws and regulation inequitably to local citizens. However, I agree that local and state governments can test laws, as they do today. In the past, state governments have adopted laws from other states, once they have been tested and found to be effective. Policy areas where this would work may include voting and education reform. Areas where a law lab may be a concern would be in sensitive areas such as government benefits, taxes, gun control, and national security.
ReplyDeleteI agree with the proposal. I like the idea of being able to compare which ideas work better so that debates become more than republicans and democrats disagreeing with each other on principle alone. This way there would be concrete data that could be used to support or oppose legislation. I think the area best suited for this kind of "experiment" are taxes because, as the article shows, it would be easy to compare the results. However, I recognize that it would be difficult to get people to go along with this idea.
ReplyDeleteIn response to Tema/Ethan: Isn't it worse to pass legislation that could adversely effect the entire country than to test it first on a few citizens? I agree that there are people who wouldn't want to be the government's guinea pigs, but I also believe there are people who understand the importance of "taking one for the team" and who would be happy to participate in such an experiment for their country. While you see this as "dehumanizing", it think it is reassuring. I want to know that the government is doing what is best for the country, and the only way to do that is to test different approaches and see which works best. I also don't understand the argument that the government would be abusing its power under this proposal. Would you say that higher taxes for the wealthy are Unconstitutional? Because that creates unequal taxation as well. I understand people are uneasy about taking a risk like this, but some gambles are worth taking.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Rachel that one of the most appealing parts of this law lab is the fact that policies could be tested in numerous territories around the US to obtain a kind of sampling that would show how laws would impact different areas. I think that this is important to have especially in a country that is so diverse geographically and racially. Testing policies such as gun laws in liberal states such as Massachusetts and conservative states such as Texas would provide a wide range of data and evidence based upon whatever the law said. I also think that these tests in different parts of the country would allow legislators to get a better idea of what consensus would mean on a policy. If they were to implement a policy idea in two extreme parts of the country and then its possible they could better change the legislation to give both sides something they wanted.
ReplyDeleteI disagree with the proposal to test laws on a small randomized sample because I don’t think that you can grants rights or take away rights from a small group of people while everybody else has another set of rights and laws to abide by. There would be no way to keep society in order without a uniform set of laws and rights. Additionally as the article pointed out laws take dozens of years to really have an effect and usually when heavy laws are passed there is some catalysis event or growing popular sentiment that pushed the law through congress, and that the people want to see immediately in response, not after 30 years when the experiment is done. How can that even be legal to give or take away peoples rights as an experiment without first passing laws that do so.?
ReplyDeleteI agree with what Sean said and how he brought in the idea of Democrats versus Republicans and how testing laws would effect that. It would definitely be nice to have debates based on data and facts instead of partisanship and principle. I never thought of that until I read Sean's comment. Although, I do also agree with Ethan that by testing laws, the government would be taking away basic rights without people's knowledge if the system would be used effectively. This is something that definitely needs to be evaluated and somehow altered if testing laws were ever to happen.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Becca’s comments that typically key legislation is passed in response to major events, and that people will not want to wait for lab results before implementing legislation. For example, post 9/11 Congress could not afford to wait to pass more stringent laws for border security and anti-terrorism measures.
ReplyDeleteI agree with the proposal in general, but i do have some reservations. I agree that a random controlled sample would be a fair way to test out new policies, but I can't see people agreeing with a "test" that could possibly put them at a disadvantage to others- would you agree to be part of a group that got reduced government funding or increased taxes while the rest of the country isn't even affected? Theoretically this method would work out well because it would be possible to test out new policies without having the same huge effect that the policy might if applied to the whole country. I do think it's very important to have some sort of trial for any new policy rather than implementing it and living with the effects. This "law lab" method would definitely work for some types of policy.
ReplyDeleteLike Becca said, you can't really give different rules to separate groups of people because its really against the American value of equality. I also liked the point that the process would end up taking many many years to enact a law that was being tested rather than being established right away. I agree with Matt that we should probably leave the testing to the jurisdiction of the local and state governments. They would be able to act as laboratories without stepping outside of the constitutional bounds of their authority.
ReplyDeleteIn response to Sean’s second comment I do not believe that anybody would want to ‘take one for the team’ when it means sacrificing their personal liberties. What if it was you who had to pay for healthcare while nobody else was required to do so, or what if it was your taxes that were hiked while others taxes stayed low. And now you had less spending money and it turned out to be damaging, and you were the one who could no longer make ends meet because suddenly you were the government’s guinea pig. Would you really willing subject yourself to that? I would not and I don’t think many other people would either.
ReplyDeleteI agree with the article on some points, and on others I don't. I guess I agree with the concept that it could be extremely beneficial to try out certain things on a smaller scale before bringing them on a national level. By doing this we could be able to see what has the potential to work, and what we really just shouldn't think twice about, but what if these "random" testings aren't so random? As we have seen, there are many different classes and types of people all across the map; just because one of these small populations reacts to something one way doesn't mean the rest of the United States will.
ReplyDeleteThe second thing I am concerned with is that not all policies would really work with this. I think that monetary-related policies would be a lot more difficult since the public would most likely not agree with this. Also, this seems like it would take a really long time to get things done.
So, like any other policy, there are the pros and cons. I think that it is a very interesting concept, but it really does interfere with the public as well as equality.
I agree with Katherine in that I am not sure if people would agree with a random controlled sample if it put them at a disadvantage to others. Especially if their personal liberties are at stake, I really can't see that happening. I mean, that would be messing with their lives, everything they worked for. One of the most important American values is the protection of these properties and rights, so I don't think that anyone would really be so willing to give that up just for the sake of experimentation.
ReplyDeleteIn response to Katherine's other point, although this does seem like a pretty good way to test out policies without the large effect that one would have on the national as a whole, I think there is still the question of when does government take its control too far? Is putting this kind of control over even the smallest group of people even just?
Though I completely agree with the sentiment that “our practices should be ‘evidence-based,’” and believe that, in theory, these randomized controlled trials sound like a great solution, I just don’t think that they are feasible. The con that stuck out the most to me as I was reading the article was the issue of fairness. I think that it would be very hard to get states, districts, and especially individual people to get on-board with these tests that would arbitrarily provide some people with great benefits and take away others’ fundamental rights. I think that it would be close to impossible to convince people to subject their “fundamental rights and benefits” to these trials for the supposed benefit of the entire nation because most would not be able/willing to look past the immediate effect that it would have on them.
ReplyDeleteThese trials are not like the randomized medical/clinical trials in which individuals who suffer from a specific disorder voluntarily opt into a specialized program which has usually been tested in mice and/or other animal models before being tested on humans. These policy trials they are testing programs/policies that in most cases would impact every single American; therefore, including only some people in the trial would raise a lot of concern regarding fairness. For example, tax cuts or raises would not work at all in a trial situation. Can you imagine how the public would respond if a certain group of people were randomly chosen to pay fewer taxes but the rest of the nation had to continue paying the regular rate? Those who got the break might be ecstatic, but those who did not would be outraged.
After reading Tema’s comment contrasting these tests to the FDA’s and Sean’s comment about “taking one for the team,” I think that perhaps a modified version of these trials could be effective. What if instead of randomized tests, these trials were run more like incentive programs in which the Federal government could suggest a trial which states could opt into if they thought that the new policy would provide them with benefits? The data collected could be compared with data from the states that did not participate to see if the policy should be implemented nation-wide. If no states were interested, then the policy obviously did not have public support and would not be tested, and if every state was interested, every state could try the policy for a certain period and then evaluate (though this would eliminate the control group…). The conditions for these tests would not be perfect as there are different situations in each state so a policy that was successful in one state might still not be great for another state, but hopefully a model like this would allow for some progress while alleviating most of the unfairness factors. This model would use Brandeis’ idea of states as “laboratories of democracy” but it would eliminate the concern that these “laboratories” were letting “the rats design the experiments” by putting “experimental design” in the hands of the Federal government. This form of trial probably still would not work for policies such as tax cuts, but I think that they could be effective with some of the regulation policies that were discussed in this article including gun control.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Rebecca's idea that the "lab" testing could be partially voluntary; she made a good point that if nobody offers to try out a new policy, there clearly is no public support. With such diverse ideologies, I bet that the US has at least one group who would be willing to try out almost any new policy. I also agree with Sean int hat whatever policies we do implement should be what's best for the country, but as Ali said its difficult to judge what's best for the whole country seeing as we are so racially and politically diverse. If we were to base what's best for the country on the results of a specific geographic area, this wouldn't be any more beneficial than just implementing the policy for the whole country in the first place.
ReplyDeleteWhile I agree with the proposal, I doubt that it will come to fruition any time soon. People are generally too concerned with their own rights and what they have the right to do, so preventing them from certain things may become an issue. The pros to this proposal are that it could help out the nation in the long run by realizing the effects of taking away whichever right or taxes is chosen, as well as testing different approaches to see what works best for the people. However, the people could be the problem. The proposal might limit those involved in the trial's rights, which interferes with their basic rights as citizens of the U.S. People will most likely not allow their personal rights to be reduced for an amount of time to possibly benefit the country. The most beneficial policy area is gun control. Especially with the recent shooting in Arizona, gun control is a hot topic that should be experimented with over the long run, and the government should attempt to dismiss the NRA's fight to keep their guns. The least likely and least suitable area is taxes. If a certain number of people are given tax breaks, this might benefit the economy, potentially as well as unemployment, but people would not allow for a part of the population to go with lower taxes while they have to pay more. Americans love their money and want don't want others to have to pay less than they do.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Rachel's comment in that the same subject should be addressed and tested in different parts of the country to observe the differences in the effects it has. I also agree with her comment that Americans can't agree on taxes and that this is a very unlikely area for this proposal to be put into action.
ReplyDeleteI agree wholeheartedly that the effectiveness of certain laws should be evaluated, but my enthusiasm for this quickly dissipates when I envision these tests actually being carried out. There is nothing more important to a society than the laws that govern it, so logically, legislation should undergo the toughest possible scrutiny prior to becoming law. I consider myself to be very progressive, yet thinking back to the first example in this article, I don’t even think I’d be able to stomach this sort of randomized trial with the Bush tax cuts—let alone the rest of America. Assuming I’m able to retain my liberalism once I start making my billions, I’d be okay with paying more taxes because meaningful chunks need to be taken out of the deficit. If I was one of 10,000 selected to have money taken out of my salary for the sake of experimental data, suffice it to say the Tea Party would have its newest member. From another perspective, if I learned a nearby factory was subjected to increased emissions regulation as part of one of these tests, I’d be thrilled! Yet my excitement would end there, as regardless of what the experiment found, I’d still believe that releasing toxins into the air is harmful to the planet. The article also proposes randomly assigning prison sentences—an idea I find quite disturbing. Experimenting with someone’s taxes is one thing, their freedom another.
ReplyDeleteIn what is at first a very compelling argument for legislative testing, Donald Green says, “We test pharmaceuticals because there are billions of dollars at stake, and lives.” Yes testing medication saves money in the long run. Yes it absolutely saves lives. But what Green forgets is that before anyone ever thinks of having a person try a pharmaceutical, it is first tested on rats. There is usually evidence that there will be some benefit to the test subject—or at the very least substantiated promises of no harm. For Green’s argument to be valid, pharmaceutical companies, unaware of possible side effects, would randomly select groups of people to ingest their newly synthesized chemical, and cross their fingers that no one drops dead. Until the day comes when we learn to give lab rats a tax break and based off changes in their spending habits predict the long term impacts on the American economy, I don’t envision legislative experimentation ever becoming common practice.
I don't think Ali could've been more right when she said that there's too much emotion involved in politics and not enough science, but I just don't see these types of tests working in America. Maybe the U.S. Public Health Service was onto something by taking their STD experiments abroad. If we can inject Guatemalan mental patients with gonorrhea and syphilis, why not force Canada into legalizing heroin to see if the war on drugs is really worth it? Or give everyone in Israel a high powered automatic rifle? That'd really shut those crazy liberals up about an assault weapons ban.
ReplyDeleteIn response to Sean’s response to me, while it is idealistic to believe that the United States is a “team,” I think most citizens see the US as an individualistic nation. Nothing is more prevalent in our political culture than protecting the powers of the individual, which is part of the reason Americans hate communism and clash with Chinese culture. I do not believe anyone will want to “take one for the team” for the same reason that wealthy folk want to avoid high taxes that would be spent on welfare for the poor.
ReplyDeleteAs I said, there are certainly some benefits to testing, but the article agreed that even tests have their flaws and limitations. If we weigh out cost and benefit, I think the benefits fall short. In response to the confusion about my belief that it would be an “abuse of government power,” individuals and corporations that pay taxes are aware of the taxes they pay. With this new testing system, it seems like citizens will unknowingly receive unequal treatment, a concept I do not see as justifiable.
While I think that the idea of testing out our laws and think that the goal of taking "the politics out of policymaking, to replace dogma with data" is nice in theory I do not agree with the proposal in reality and personally I do not even believe that the results of a these tests would accurately depict American politics at large. Our economy and the American people are too complex to really be “tested”. Even if the group of 10,000 does statistically represent American’s at large there are so many other factors that would not be incorporated into the test and connections that are not there, that the results would not be accurate. Also people have such strong opinions on issues like taxes that the opinions of officials would most likely not be swayed by the data collected! It’s like our first blog talked about, sometimes data and fact does not really do much to change people’s minds.
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ReplyDeleteIn response to Becca, I agree with your point that making laws for small groups of people is kind of“a slipper slope” as I would say and would result in major issues keeping society in order. Uniform laws for everyone maintains equality and I do not feel that the founding fathers would like the idea of equality being tampered with. And who is going to have their rights taken away! Deciding who is going to be subjected to these tests would be a major issue in itself and could cause just as many issues as the laws that are being tested. So Becca I think that would point about maintain a uniform set of laws is totally correct.
ReplyDeleteIn response to Jayme, your comment about the random grouping not really being random is a thought that I had as well! America is such a large country with so many different types of people and so so many different ideas and opinions. I feel like it would be almost impossible to group all these people from so many different walks of life into one test! So then some groups are left out of the test, and even if they are not major groups of people everything is really connected in our country. Because of these connections leaving out some groups could effect and make the results of these tests totally inaccurate.
ReplyDeleteI agree with this idea, but I think that it would definitely be an extremely difficult concept to get across to the public. Messing with the publics money could also be tricky. Also, testing policies on a small scale to see the effect would offer good imformation for the public to help form laws going forward but there could possibly be a negative effect. The nation as a whole could benefit from this idea but it also has the potential to back fire. And if it dose back fire it could bring the economy to an all time low.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Jayme when she says that "it could be extremely beneficial to try out certain things on a smaller scale before bringing them on a national level. By doing this we could be able to see what has the potential to work, and what we really just shouldn't think twice about, but what if these "random" testings aren't so random?" I also agree that in a perfect world that this might work but knowing or nation it might not work.
ReplyDeleteFrom the first paragraph of this article, I was plagued by two main issues that made me fundamentally agree with the theory of political experimentation it presented. While I, like many others, saw the solution of an experimental society on the federal level as unpopular and therefore unfeasible due to lack of general support, I found its fundamentally unconstitutional premise even more disturbing.
ReplyDeleteAs mentioned by others earlier, Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis referred to the individual states as "laboratories of democracy". This view of states as the prime instigators of political experimentation, however, can be found within the strict powers set up for the government in the Constitution. The limited powers of the legislative and executive branches are laid out in the first articles of the constitution. The rest, the Constitution says, are to be relayed to the states for individual scrutiny.
If we are to remain a democratic nation dedicated to opportunity for all and, at the same time, free speech and individualism, we must allow people to make decisions and approach opportunities with the relatively same odds. If the federal government steps into state power in such a way as experimentation ensures, not only does the federal government deeply encroach onto states' rights, engendering even more virulent anti-government stances from the public, but it will do so at the expense of constitutionality.
In response to Ben,
ReplyDeleteWhile I find testing of STDs in foreign countries an undeniably horrendous practice, I believe that the policies of foreign countries, along with experimentation in the states, is a possible way to get results and speculation about the way policy and legislation will effect American citizens. Foreign countries (particularly in the modern first-world West), like states, may provide areas with similar demographics and wealth to areas in the United States. This is not a new practice- overseas speculation is something that has been done for nearly s long as politics itself.
However, if we were to use foreign countries as "laboratories of democracy" similar to how Brandeis interprets the states, then policymakers must make one fact clearly distinct - political culture. Political culture clearly defines why one piece of legislation will work for one country, but not for another. If public support is to come for policy, then it must be in tune with public ideas and interests. But until we can find a way to separate political cultural identity from the effectiveness of overseas legislation, watching politics from afar will only have the same impact on the federal government as watching experimentation in the states.
Thus, I think that the current path to legislative effectiveness - education speculation and state experimentation - is the most logical and effective way to measure impact. Not only does it fit in line with American individualistic and equality-driven political culture, but it also allows the federal government to view closer-at-hand the workings of laws on a smaller scale before large-scale implementation.
Having read this article, I have to say it seems a bizarre proposal. I never thought of laws as "testable" like some science lab, and the logistics seem pretty crazy; how would you pick people for this? Wouldn't some citizens be mad that only some peoples taxes went down/up? While theoretically, it would be a super idea to test run laws before instating them, I don't know how possible that would actually be. Like the article said, it's not quite the same as testing laundry detergents; these are people lives. Additionally, I don't know how applicable the collected data would end up being; you'd have to take a pretty wide random sample to be able to generalize how legislature or taxes will affect everyone in our very diverse nation.
ReplyDeleteIn response to Ethan, I would gladly sign up to be a guinea pig for any law helping out oil-covered pelicans.
ReplyDeleteI'm very much with Ethan and Tema's comments that the downsides of this "law lab" outweigh the benefits. In response to Sean's comment that "isn't it worse to pass legislation that could adversely affect the whole country," yeah, that would be a bad thing... if it ever really happened. It takes so much effort for a bipartisan Congress to pass a law, and it has to have significant support to go anywhere. The notion that a piece of legislature is going to "adversely affect the whole country" is a pretty extreme assertion. If you're really worried about how the public will react, ask them. Don't treat them like lab rats.
Also, in response to Pam's comment about using foreign countries as laboratories for democracy similar to the states, referencing Brandeis, I respectfully disagree. I don't think it is right or decent for the United States to exploit other countries to test laws we plan to pass for ourselves; I think, as Ben's examples showed, that practice is pretty despicable and borderline imperialistic. Just because we are the most powerful and arguably successful democracy in the world doesn't give us the right to test the laws we aren't ready to pass for ourselves out on other nations. That's immoral, in my opinion; it's one thing to learn from the actions of other countries, but it is quite another to impose some legislative experimentation on them.
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