Sunday, June 17, 2012
Failure of institutions meme is picking up steam
It’s nice to see the whole broad failure of institutions idea picking up traction. It has to be a good thing.
Maureen Dowd must be one of the gang of journalists covering the Jerry Sandusky trial in Pennsylvania. She has a thoughtful column today in the NYTimes about doing the right thing, whistleblowing and more.
I’d probably pay good money to see a discussion of this by Dowd, Chris Hayes and David Simon. Though Dowd can be trivial. Maybe swap her out for Lawrence Lessig, who appeared on Chris Hayes’ Up with Chris show yesterday.
I’m reading Hayes’ new book now which discusses many of these ideas and wraps them around the notion of the American meritocracy. I’d enjoy hearing David Simon’s take on that particular spin.
Simon may have started it all with The Wire. He talks about institutions and how they will betray you in this 2009 interview with Bill Moyers. I think Moyers reduces the idea down too far when he tries to make it all about “juking the stats.” It’s way more than that.
Did you know Simon starting blogging a few weeks ago? I know, I know, my pals in the information-should-be-free world think his positions on paywalls and fair pay for trained and skills journalists make him a clueless fool. That’s one thing he’s definitely not. The funny thing is his motivation for blogging sounds very much like blogging pioneer Dave Winer‘s own tipping point. They both had been misunderstood when they gave interviews and wanted an unfiltered forum, a place to get all nuance-y for an audience that cares about the whole idea behind the soundbite. Do yourself a favor and dig into the posts and their comments. Simon invests himself in the comments.
