You Won--Now What?: How Americans Can Make Democracy Work from City Hall to the White House - Softcover

Goddard, Taegan D.; Riback, Christopher

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0684852039 ISBN 13: 9780684852034

Publisher: Scribner, 1999

Synopsis

A COMMONSENSE ROAD MAP FOR MAKING OUR GOVERNMENT WORK
As public officials fail to deliver their campaign promises -- and voter cynicism skyrockets -- a simple explanation has become widely accepted: Government is broken. If only we could fix this system, voters hope, our democracy would work the way it was designed. But is government broken, or are the people we hire each Election Day not up to the job?
You Won -- Now What? turns the tables on the government-reform debate. The answer is not to reinvent government but to reinvent government officials.
Taegan D. Goddard and Christopher Riback use real-life stories to analyze the failures and successes of politicians from every level of government. Drawing on these examples, the authors identify the eight traits of effective public officials. These commonsense solutions prove that government is personal: good people can make a difficult system work. You Won -- Now What? explains to politicians and voters alike how government works -- and how it can work better.

About this title

Review

"Americans entrust their government to novices," Riback and Goddard remind us. "Every November they elect a bunch of people who have never done this before." You Won, Now What? offers practical tips on the task of governance, drawing upon real-life examples to illustrate how elected officials can do an effective job in their first--and in some ways most critical--days on the job. Their scope is broad--the authors consider state and local governments to be just as important as the federal government in maintaining quality of life for citizens--but the case studies keep the book from sliding into generalizations.

From the Back Cover

As public officials fail to deliver their campaign promises -- and voter cynicism skyrockets -- a simple explanation has become widely accepted: Government is broken. If only we could fix this system, voters hope, our democracy would work the way it was designed. But is government broken, or are the people we hire each Election Day not up to the job?

You Won -- Now What? turns the tables on the government-reform debate. The answer is not to reinvent government but to reinvent government officials.

Taegan D. Goddard and Christopher Riback use real-life stories to analyze the failures and successes of politicians from every level of government. Drawing on these examples, the authors identify the eight traits of effective public officials. These commonsense solutions prove that government is personal: good people can make a difficult system work. You Won -- Now What? explains to politicians and voters alike how government works -- and how it can work better.

Edition details

• Publisher: Scribner
• Publication date: 1999
• ISBN 10: 0684852039
• ISBN 13: 9780684852034
• Binding: Paperback
• Language: English
• Number of pages: 272