System under stress: the challenge to 21st century governance

One of the themes that echoes most in American politics is why big problems recur. Something important will happen-a terrorist attack, a major hurricane, a financial crisis. Citizens, reporters, and elected officials alike will demand an investigation about what happened and call for action to ensure it won't happen again. Top government officials pledge a firm response and launch new programs. Then, despite bold promises, the big problems happen again. Citizens, reporters, and elected officials alike are outraged. Public cynicism about government's ability to govern grows, and the big problems bounce onto the agenda yet again.
In some ways, this book is deeply personal. Like all Americans, I was shaken by the horrific events of September 11, 2001. Not long after the towers fell, my wife and I visited Ground Zero in New York, where workers were painstakingly removing the debris, where the damp odor of the pulverized buildings was overpowering, and where recovery experts were still finding human remains. That experience led me to probe the attacks in the first edition of this book-to investigate how heroic first responders saved countless lives at the cost of their own and how "homeland security came into regular parlance Everyone seemed determined to learn the lessons of September 11, to

avoid repeating that awful day. Four years later, a new crisis occurred a major hurricane that assaulted the Gulf Coast-and the strategies put in place to ensure we could respond far better to crises failed at their first test. Despite years of warnings that a big storm could inflict terrible dam age on New Orleans, and despite the creation of a new federal depart ment to ensure we could respond far better to the next attack, Hurricane Katrina caught all levels of government flatfooted. The devastation and the government's failure were captured live on international television. When my wife and I explored the city just a few months after the levees collapsed, I began to see parallels between the lessons of September 11 and the lessons taught again, painfully, in New Orleans. That story became the second edition of the book, which focused on two puzzles: why, despite repeated crises, it's so hard for the system to learn; and how seemingly different crises can underline the same lessons.