Two Recent Recommendations of Books by Philip K. Howard
November 11, 2009
In a post today on her blog Free-Range Kids, columnist Lenore Iskenazy writes that a recent article on zero tolerance has reminded her to “recommend, again, the mindblowing book, Life Without Lawyers, by Philip Howard, head of Common Good.” She goes on:
[Howard’s] plea is for leaders to boldly re-assert their ability to make judgments. After all, that is what they are supposed to do — that’s why they are in positions of leadership! To constantly defer to one-size-fits-all rules is an abdication of their responsibility, which is to THINK and yes, to JUDGE situations using their rusting hearts and minds.
Why is it so radical to ask that humans act like humans instead of droids?
Meanwhile, Dennis Wyatt, Managing Editor of the Manteca Bulletin, had glowing things to say yesterday about another book by Howard. “The intimidation of staff that prompts them to retreat into the safety of codes and procedures that further stymie businesses and economic health,” Wyatt notes, “is well documented in the book The Death of Common Sense by Philip K. Howard. Howard’s book delineates how laws – and the hammering of bureaucrats by individual politicians with personal agendas – can have expensive consequences that defy common sense.”
[Manteca Bulletin - Online Edition]
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