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Dean Pete Peterson on Putting the Public Back into Public Policy | The Wall Street Journal


Trump, Sanders and the Populist Anti-Policy Surge

Washington ‘experts’ stir many Americans’ loathing. Time to put the public back into public policy.

By Pete Peterson |
If there's one thing that unites the populist campaigns of Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders, it's a desire to put the "public" back into "public policy." Many Americans apparently feel that policy is something done to them, rather than with them. They disdain the unknown "experts" in distant Washington, D.C., who devise everything from trade deals to overtime rules. As the dean of a graduate school in public policy, I've been thinking: Are programs like mine partly responsible for this state of affairs? How should graduates in the Class of 2016 react as they enter a world increasingly skeptical of their expertise? Read more.