What if the path toward a more equitable and resilient United States did not begin in Washington, but in the places where people actually live?
In “The Promise of a Million Utopias,” Michael Shuman argues for a more decentralized economic and political system: one in which communities have greater freedom to experiment with new models of economic life, social policy, environmental action, and democratic participation that best fit their own values and needs. Drawing inspiration from Switzerland’s decentralized political system, Shuman makes the case for subsidiarity—the idea that decisions should be made at the most local level capable of addressing them.
Shuman is clear that decentralization must remain bounded by strong civil rights protections and a sense of global responsibility, but he suggests that in a country as vast and divided as the United States, we might need to move beyond the idea of a single national utopia. Instead, he invites us to imagine a country of many local experiments: a “million utopias,” each imperfect, evolving, and accountable to the people closest to them.
The excerpt below, from the essay’s “Theory of Change” section, gets to the heart of that argument, explaining why national politics has become so dysfunctional, and why state and local experimentation may offer a more constructive path forward.
The full essay can be accessed here. You can find similar writings in the Schumacher Center’s Decentralism File collection.
Please enjoy.
Warm Wishes,
Staff of the Schumacher Center
Few would argue with the observation that Washington has become increasingly dysfunctional. Not only is the national government incapable of addressing major problems, but it is afflicted by shutdowns, credit defaults, endless lawsuits, and deepening cynicism. Two seasoned political observers, Thomas Mann and Norman Ornstein, argue that one almost has to go back to the Civil War to find a less functional federal government.
The larger the country gets, the more difficult it is to involve citizens in a meaningful democratic process.
Some reforms that could improve the functionality of Washington are plausible. A switch of one or two votes on the Supreme Court, for example, might rescind the Citizens United v FEC decision (allowing unlimited campaign donations as part of protected Free speech), reduce the role of money in politics, and increase the competitiveness of elections. But most of the judges on President Trump’s list of leading contenders for the Supreme Court would disfavor such reforms.
Even if the federal government functioned better, its inherent liability is that it just too big to succeed at very much—period. The larger the country gets, the more difficult it is to involve citizens in a meaningful democratic process. Engagement, participation, and creativity increasingly require local groups to work on local problems.
It’s not just a coincidence that most governors are less ideological and more pragmatic than their peers in Washington. They are expected by their populations not to bloviate ideologically but to get things done. The rationale for subsidiarity—that political action is quicker, smarter, and less polarized at the state and local level—is precisely what is driving greater interest in decentralization by conservatives and progressives alike.
Most decentralists detest any attempt to nationalize healthcare, even a milquetoast, insurance-based program like Obamacare. Personally, I viewed it as better than no reform at all, because a national consensus had formed that the previous reality, where patients with preexisting conditions were prevented from obtaining any insurance at all, was morally unacceptable. But that said, I believe the Obama Administration foolishly overreached with its healthcare reforms and paid a huge political price for it. It would have been smarter to have learned from our decentralist neighbor to the North.
The first socialized medical system in Canada was in the province of Saskatchewan, which is geographically and politically proximate to Montana. In 1946 that cowboy republic guaranteed free hospital care for most of its residents. Eleven years later, the national government passed the Hospital Insurance and Diagnostic Services Act, which agreed to pay for half of any provincial healthcare reform that met certain basic characteristics like comprehensiveness, universality, and portability. By 1961, ten provinces were participating, each experimenting with various reform ideas consistent with the national objectives. The learning from these programs brought about a Canadian consensus that the government should gradually expand its coverage into a national system that still allows substantial flexibility by the provinces. Today, this program is enthusiastically supported by all of Canada’s political parties (though each would enact different reforms to improve it).
A decentralist-minded Obama Administration might have reformed healthcare in the United States by setting broad goals for coverage and inclusion of the uninsured, offering states matching funds, and leaving it to governors and state legislatures to implement the details. Some states would have chosen, as Massachusetts had under Governor Mitt Romney, an Obamacare-like expansion of the private insurance system through subsidies. More progressive states might have created a statewide public insurance pool or perhaps even a state-run medical system. Conservative states might have created an expansive system of medical savings accounts. States choosing similar systems might have been encouraged to form interstate pools to achieve better economies of scale. This approach would have given every state a positive, creative incentive to construct a medical system that comported with its own values.
Interestingly, this is exactly the direction of reform recently proposed by former Senate leader Tom Daschle (a Democrat who was Obama’s first pick to oversee healthcare reform) and former Republican House speaker Newt Gingrich. In a remarkable op-ed, they argue that the way Congress could move ahead with healthcare reform is by allowing some states to bolt from Obamacare if they have a better plan for providing the same degree of universal coverage.
The Obamacare debate proves that whenever a national mega-plan is shoved down the throats of recalcitrant states, they will do everything in their power to block it. Devolution offers a more constructive theory of change, and the chance to channel the vast hot air that goes into blocking hostile national legislation into constructive state experimentation. Let a thousand flowers of innovation bloom in our fifty “laboratories of democracy.” I’m deeply skeptical of many conservative solutions—public education vouchers, flat taxes, cash-based welfare programs—but I’m really curious to see how these ideas might work when given a chance. Maybe my views are wrong. All of us should be more open to persuasion.
A decentralized United States could be a place of expanded learning. In this kind of world, social movements become more important, more powerful, and more responsible. The ability to test ideas at the state level, rather than hurling theoretical invectives at the national level, means that movements will be held more accountable.
Decentralization also better inoculates the country against crises. The growing discourse around resilience worldwide is really about how to help communities handle the unexpected, whether natural earthquakes, manmade climate disruptions, capital flights, or pandemics. A country of increasingly self-reliant communities is, by definition, better able to cope with unexpected catastrophes. When one community is overwhelmed, more self-reliant neighboring communities will have the capacity to help.