David Lind wrote:
> Goverment can't, by itself, effect change. It can inspire, direct, request change - but with what
> does goverment "effect" the change? Through the people. Bottom's up.
With what does government "effect" change? Well, take Social Security.
Government leaders established a program that provides government
checks, administered by government employees. It seems a stretch to
argue that this is primarily a "bottom up" initiative. And it's hard to
argue that the program didn't make a real change -- for one thing, it
significantly reduced poverty among the elderly.
I suppose you can argue that Social Security effects change "through the
people" to the extent that the Social Security Administration is made up
of, well, people. But, to me, that just highlights one of the problems
in claiming that all change is "bottom up" -- the ambiguity of what is
the top and what is the bottom.
More fundamentally, even to the extent that we can agree on what is the
"top" and what is the "bottom", in most cases the top affects the bottom
and the bottom affects the top. There's no way to isolate the impact of
one without the other, and it's not especially useful to claim that one
is primary. They're just two sides of the same coin.
All this seems roughly analagous to ZAMM's discussion about the
importance of transcending the dichotomy between subjects and objects.
Just as reality in general only emerges through the relationship between
subjects and objects, social reality emerges, in part, through the
dynamic relationship between leaders and followers.
I think there's a tendency, especially in the US, to be skeptical about
what social leaders/government can accomplish. Such skepticism may have
a lot of value, but it also can go too far. And when Walter claimed so
emphatically that all real change is bottom up, I think he went too
far. Which is why I wrote my earlier note. Sometimes, quality
leadership, and quality government, is important, too.
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