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A review by jwsg
The Fifth Risk by Michael Lewis
5.0
The Prologue opens with the impending train wreck that is Trump’s election and transition. Trump is furious that Chris Christie is fundraising to pay for a transition team, seeing it as theft of monies that Trump could be using. That having a transition team is a legal requirement cuts no ice with Trump. Steve Bannon gets Christie a (temporary) reprieve when he asks Trump: “What do you think Morning Joe will say – if you shut down your transition?”, hinting that Morning Joe might think Trump was closing his presidential transition office because he didn’t think he had a chance of being president.
But this isn’t a book about Trump (thank goodness). It’s a book about the poorly understood role and work of the US government, the fact that even though “dysfunction is baked into the structure of the thing: the subordinates know that their bosses will be replaced every four or eight years, and that the direction of their enterprises might change overnight – with an election or a war or some other political event”, it continues to do vital, important work. Its work is not only poorly understood; the government is taken for granted, if not “imagined…as a pernicious force”. Unsurprisingly then that those who admire it and are drawn to it are “first-generation Americans who had come from places without well-functioning governments. People who had lived without government [and therefore] more likely to find meaning in it.”
There are some two million federal employees in the US who take orders from four thousand political appointees. The upheaval created by each change in administration is immense. Asked to describe what the biggest risks facing the Department of Energy (whose portfolio includes nuclear waste and nuclear weapons), former DOE Chief Risk Officer John MacWilliams listed among them “project management”. Lewis interprets this as “the risk a society runs when it falls into the habit of responding to long-term risks with short-term solutions…delaying repairs to a tunnel filled with lethal waste until, one day, it collapses…the aging workforce of the DOE…the innovation that never occurs, and the knowledge that it is never created, because you have ceased to lay the groundwork for it”. The functioning of the complex ecosystem that is the US government relies on the political leadership being “predisposed to listen to [its professionals and technical experts] and [being] equipped to understand what they said”. But when you get a political leader like Trump, whose agenda is to undermine science and expertise in order to push his agenda and worldview, to advance his personal and business interests (and reward his cronies), this “fifth risk” increases exponentially.
Lewis is an amazing writer, managing to make a book about the workings of government a real page turner. We learn about how funds from the USDA’s Rural Development section effectively keeps rural America alive and afloat, about the work of the Weather Bureau (part of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administrated in the Commerce Department!) and the troves of data it amasses in the name of improving weather forecasting, and yes, how the Department of Energy does so much more than just ensuring US access to energy supplies but also tracks its nuclear arsenal, manages its nuclear waste and enables nuclear disarmament.
If you’re interested in the business of government, the excerpts from the interviews alone will be well worth the read, reminding one about the purpose and intent of public service. Like this quote from Kevin Concannon, who used to run Food, Nutrition and Consumer Services for USDA (i.e. school lunches and food stamps):
“I used to tell the people that worked for me: You may not ever meet a single person it benefits. You might never see the infants who are fed, or that family that lost a job. To the extent you can keep in mind that they are out there, it will motivate you to do your job better.”
Or this quote from Kathy Sullivan, who used to run USDA’s Rural Development section;
“ The sense of identity as Citizen has been replaced by Consumer. The idea that government should serve the citizens like a waiter or concierge, rather than in a ‘collective good’ sense.”
Or when she described working with the spouses of the astronauts who died in the Challenger explosion to create a science education programme in memory of the astronauts, and how “uncomfortable it would be to create an entirely new thing when they didn’t know exactly what it would be…[not to mention needing] to invite many odd groups into the room and giv[ing] them the power to influence the project”:
“ you need to create a network of people who feel they can shape it. The conversation really matters. It does not mean transmit at. That’s how you get new thinking…The only thing any of us can do completely on our own is have the start of a good idea.” (Sullivan also described working for government as being “tied down, Gulliver-style. And if you want to even wiggle your big toe, first you need to ask permission. And if you can imagine that and still imagine getting things done, you’ll get things done.”)
But even if you’re not really a public policy kind of person, Lewis is a great storyteller who can take a subject (baseball, trading, football etc), pull out the most fascinating bits and pull them together into a narrative.
But this isn’t a book about Trump (thank goodness). It’s a book about the poorly understood role and work of the US government, the fact that even though “dysfunction is baked into the structure of the thing: the subordinates know that their bosses will be replaced every four or eight years, and that the direction of their enterprises might change overnight – with an election or a war or some other political event”, it continues to do vital, important work. Its work is not only poorly understood; the government is taken for granted, if not “imagined…as a pernicious force”. Unsurprisingly then that those who admire it and are drawn to it are “first-generation Americans who had come from places without well-functioning governments. People who had lived without government [and therefore] more likely to find meaning in it.”
There are some two million federal employees in the US who take orders from four thousand political appointees. The upheaval created by each change in administration is immense. Asked to describe what the biggest risks facing the Department of Energy (whose portfolio includes nuclear waste and nuclear weapons), former DOE Chief Risk Officer John MacWilliams listed among them “project management”. Lewis interprets this as “the risk a society runs when it falls into the habit of responding to long-term risks with short-term solutions…delaying repairs to a tunnel filled with lethal waste until, one day, it collapses…the aging workforce of the DOE…the innovation that never occurs, and the knowledge that it is never created, because you have ceased to lay the groundwork for it”. The functioning of the complex ecosystem that is the US government relies on the political leadership being “predisposed to listen to [its professionals and technical experts] and [being] equipped to understand what they said”. But when you get a political leader like Trump, whose agenda is to undermine science and expertise in order to push his agenda and worldview, to advance his personal and business interests (and reward his cronies), this “fifth risk” increases exponentially.
Lewis is an amazing writer, managing to make a book about the workings of government a real page turner. We learn about how funds from the USDA’s Rural Development section effectively keeps rural America alive and afloat, about the work of the Weather Bureau (part of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administrated in the Commerce Department!) and the troves of data it amasses in the name of improving weather forecasting, and yes, how the Department of Energy does so much more than just ensuring US access to energy supplies but also tracks its nuclear arsenal, manages its nuclear waste and enables nuclear disarmament.
If you’re interested in the business of government, the excerpts from the interviews alone will be well worth the read, reminding one about the purpose and intent of public service. Like this quote from Kevin Concannon, who used to run Food, Nutrition and Consumer Services for USDA (i.e. school lunches and food stamps):
“I used to tell the people that worked for me: You may not ever meet a single person it benefits. You might never see the infants who are fed, or that family that lost a job. To the extent you can keep in mind that they are out there, it will motivate you to do your job better.”
Or this quote from Kathy Sullivan, who used to run USDA’s Rural Development section;
“ The sense of identity as Citizen has been replaced by Consumer. The idea that government should serve the citizens like a waiter or concierge, rather than in a ‘collective good’ sense.”
Or when she described working with the spouses of the astronauts who died in the Challenger explosion to create a science education programme in memory of the astronauts, and how “uncomfortable it would be to create an entirely new thing when they didn’t know exactly what it would be…[not to mention needing] to invite many odd groups into the room and giv[ing] them the power to influence the project”:
“ you need to create a network of people who feel they can shape it. The conversation really matters. It does not mean transmit at. That’s how you get new thinking…The only thing any of us can do completely on our own is have the start of a good idea.” (Sullivan also described working for government as being “tied down, Gulliver-style. And if you want to even wiggle your big toe, first you need to ask permission. And if you can imagine that and still imagine getting things done, you’ll get things done.”)
But even if you’re not really a public policy kind of person, Lewis is a great storyteller who can take a subject (baseball, trading, football etc), pull out the most fascinating bits and pull them together into a narrative.