Ask Americans What They Want

To the Editor:

Though we disagree on a great many policy issues, I find myself in agreement with virtually everything in William A. Schambra’s February 9 opinion article, “7 (Bad) Habits of (In)effective Foundations.”

We should indeed prefer “the messy, unpredictable, genuinely democratic politics of an earlier era” to rule by experts and professionals. (Except, of course, that it should be truly democratic this time; in those alleged halcyon days, women and minorities didn’t have a voice or a vote.)

Where I part company with Mr. Schambra, who has a strong distaste for government and publicly supported social services, is that very often, in my experience, when citizens become active at the community level in fighting poverty or seeking a better education for their children, they are led to want more, not less, from government, both in terms of accountability and services.

Both the left and the right need to do a better job of listening to communities, even when what we hear is not what we expect or what fits our pre-ordained political stance.

Gara LaMarche
Vice President and Director of U.S. Programs
Open Society Institute
New York