One
of the most peculiar, and least understood, features of the American policy
process is the extraordinary dependence of policymakers on the work of think
tanks.
Most
Americans — even most of those who follow politics closely — would probably
struggle to name a think tank or to explain precisely what a think tank does.
Yet over the past half-century, think tanks have come to play a central role in
policy development — and even in the surrounding political combat.
Over
that period, however, the balance between those two functions — policy
development and political combat — has been steadily shifting. And with that
shift, the work of think tanks has undergone a transformation.
Today,
while most think tanks continue to serve as homes for some academic-style
scholarship regarding public policy, many have also come to play more active
(if informal) roles in politics. Some serve as governments-in-waiting for the
party out of power, providing professional perches for former officials who
hope to be back in office when their party next takes control of the State
House. Some serve as training grounds
for young activists.
Some
new think tanks have even been created as direct responses to particular,
narrow political exigencies. As each party has drawn lessons from various
electoral failures over recent decades, their conclusions have frequently
pointed to the need for new think tanks (often modeled on counterparts on the
opposite side of the political aisle).
Today,
think tanks are highly influential in our politics; their research and scholars
are heavily consulted and relied on by our elected leaders. And in a time of
both daunting policy challenges and highly polarized political debates, there
is every reason to expect that think tanks will grow only more important in
Washington.
As
they become more political, however, think tanks — especially the newer and
more advocacy-oriented institutions founded in the past decade or so — risk
becoming both more conventional and less valuable.
At
a moment when we have too much noise in politics and too few constructive
ideas, these institutions may simply become part of the intellectual echo
chamber of our politics, rather than providing alternative sources of policy
analysis and intellectual innovation.
Given
these concerns, it is worth reflecting on the evolution of the Washington think
tank and its consequences for the nation.
It
is important not to overstate the independence and the value of the original
think-tank model. Because it informs the political system, policy research has
always been political. The Brookings Institution, the Council on Foreign
Relations, and the other first-generation think tanks drew upon a certain set
of political presumptions, and were able to sustain a patina of objectivity
only because those presumptions were shared by an extended elite.
The
value of that original model, therefore, was not that it was objective; it very
often was nothing of the sort. Its value, rather, came from its ability to
bring serious, original, expert research to the task of analyzing policy
problems and proposing solutions. It sought to expand the range of options
under debate and to ground that debate in hard facts and figures.
Some
new think tanks, by contrast, are less likely to expand the range of options
under debate. Rather, these institutions are helping politicians avoid the
difficult task of pursuing creative policy solutions by giving them more ways
to persist in failed courses. There are still great exceptions in the
think-tank world, on all sides of our politics, but they increasingly have
trouble being heard over the din.
It
is not easy to see a way out of this problem. Every incentive — political,
financial, and professional — points toward the further politicization of think
tanks. The countervailing force would probably need to come from policymakers
themselves. Guest editorial
“Think
tanks do have points of view, and they are absolutely entitled to defend them”
David
Frum
