Excerpt: From Ideas To Impact, A Playbook for Influencing and Implementing Change in a Divided World
Editor’s note: Michael Sheldrick is co-founder of Global Citizen, an international nonprofit dedicated to addressing global poverty, health, social justice, and climate change. Following Global Citizen’s advocacy work at this year’s Climate Week NYC and live-streamed concerts in Central Park, we’re publishing this excerpt from Sheldrick’s new book, “From Ideas to Impact: A Playbook for Influencing and Implementing Change in a Divided World.” – Barclay Palmer
The gap between the demands of the present moment and the commitments our leaders are willing to make is widening. An even more immense gulf exists between what our leaders have promised to do and what they have delivered. Instead of fostering “good politics,” many leaders amplify divisions, contributing to our profound implementation crisis.
In facing these challenges, effective policy entrepreneurship emerges as a crucial approach, offering the skills and tools to bridge these gaps and implement powerful solutions.
History is full of policy entrepreneurs who demonstrated the ability to ideate and change the status quo. From ancient Rome and beyond, elites and rulers of all types envisioned bold goals, harnessed strategic framing, leveraged diverse coalitions, and made unusual alliances. They translated theory into action to create real-world impact during times of crisis. Often, solutions were implemented, and even entire institutions were built at a breakneck pace.
The chaos created by bank runs in the early 1900s led to the creation of the Federal Reserve to establish economic stability in the U.S. The UN’s inception was negotiated in two months, and the World Bank’s in even less time — just three weeks — as the Second World War raged. Since then, it has transformed an initial $20 billion contribution from wealthy nations into $800 billion in investments, significantly improving the lives of millions worldwide.
Policy entrepreneurs from bygone eras were often profoundly unpopular in their times and accused of betraying their tribes. Despite this, the lasting impact of their ideas, whether perfectly or imperfectly implemented, continues to resonate today. Many of their stories, although frequently overlooked, bear a striking resemblance to contemporary debates.
Past Successes in Policy Entrepreneurship
Today, perspectives on the relationship between society and business diverge. Some insist enterprises should exclusively serve shareholder interests, deriding regulatory “woke” efforts focused on corporate sustainability. Others welcome greater government oversight of corporate supply chains, viewing them as necessary to provide investor certainty and accelerate sustainability efforts. While terms such as “woke capitalism” are relatively new, the underlying debate about the relationship between the state and the market is not. Each time it flares up, it is resolved by disruptive policy entrepreneurship, albeit not without controversy.
While terms such as “woke capitalism” are relatively new, the underlying debate about the relationship between the state and the market is not.
In the 1930s, facing the Great Depression, Franklin D. Roosevelt (FDR) sought a policy roadmap to prevent a future economic crisis. With the evident malfunctioning of the free enterprise system that had led to the 1929 stock market crash, FDR wanted businesses to be more responsive to the public interest. Convening his infamous “brains trust,” a small group of innovative advisors, FDR’s administration introduced tighter coordination over business activity. As part of its New Deal, massive social spending funds were disbursed to support local and state planning efforts. By 1936, all states, except one, had a state planning board dealing with everything from agriculture to conservation efforts, public housing, and water pollution. Often, they had the power to discipline exploitative behavior. These boards were crucial in implementing extensive social and economic policies that helped lift America from the Depression. But their coordination helped attract private investment as well.
Backlash nonetheless emerged after their creation; it intensified in the 1940s with the onset of the Cold War era. The term “planning,” sounding too much like something the Soviets would do, was derided as “socialist.” FDR’s visionary planning tsar and brain trust member, Rexford Tugwell, known as “Rex the Red” by his detractors, was criticized as un-American and Communist and hounded out of the administration. National planning boards were dissolved, and state boards appeared as if they would suffer the same fate.
The reality was far different. Planning boards were, over time, often simply rebranded as “economic development corporations” rather than abolished altogether. Their functions had become too essential. This shift in terminology represented a classic case of pulling the policy ropes sideways, where an issue is moved from one polarized dimension — free-market capitalism versus planned economy — into another less ideological contentious spectrum. Economic development, after all, was about “partnering” with the private sector and attracting investments for economic growth. This seemed “more American, something everyone could get behind.” The underlying work was often similar, leveraging the power of the state to direct private enterprise to achieve societal objectives.
Today, the legacy of FDR’s and Tugwell’s solutions lives on in the form of countless economic development corporations in towns and states across the U.S. They still play a crucial role in driving private investment to achieve public objectives. Companies invest billions of dollars in clean energy and electric vehicle manufacturing thanks to federal and state tax credits and economic development plans. The labeling of “wokeism” against companies investing in such green projects is less apparent than one might expect. Indeed, 60% of all investments connected with the Inflation Reduction Act have so far, as at the time of writing, been in Republican states. Perhaps for all the talk about “woke capitalism,” not much will change in the way of substance regarding private sector investment. Except, perhaps, for another rebranding exercise.
The labeling of “wokeism” against companies investing in such green projects is less apparent than one might expect.
Past Failures in Policy Implementation
Of course, those in power have not always succeeded at policy entrepreneurship. These failures range in severity. Long before he became president and took on robber barons and railway tycoons, a young Theodore Roosevelt served as New York City police commissioner in the 1890s. He responded to the plea of celebrated photojournalist Jacob Riis, who had exposed the pervasive poverty, congested living conditions, inadequate sanitation, surging crime, and police corruption in the Lower East Side. The pair stalked the streets undercover at night to enforce tenement safety codes and catch corrupt police officers. Roosevelt even set his sights on stopping saloons from selling beer on Sundays, a policy he was less successful at implementing! While the outcome of this implementation failure was likely minimal (other than on Roosevelt’s bruised ego), others have been far more consequential for humanity.
At the end of World War I, after negotiating the formation of the ill-fated League of Nations (the “League”) in Paris for six months, then – U.S. President Woodrow Wilson faced a challenge in securing Congressional approval for U.S. membership. A group of Republicans proposed a deal: they would support U.S. entry into the League on the condition that a crucial element, requiring Congressional approval for automatic military action when the territorial independence of a member is threatened, be amended. They felt such a condition would unacceptably infringe U.S. sovereignty. Faced with the option of compromise, Wilson insisted on an all-or-nothing approach. He refused to budge even when it became clear the alternative was the U.S. not being involved in the League at all. The vote failed, and without U.S. participation, the League never truly took off and was powerless to prevent geopolitical tensions from rising again.
Wilson’s righteousness, prioritizing the purity of his vision over impact, contrasts starkly with the birth of the UN. Two decades and one bloody war later, FDR was willing to compromise on the same crucial points Wilson was not. He even gained the support and endorsement of his former Republican opponent for the presidency, Wendell Willkie, who toured the U.S. advocating for America to join a new global international organization. They recognized that the U.S. being at the table of such an institution, notwithstanding any compromises needed to secure consensus in Congress, was fundamental to preventing another war.
Self-inflected policy failure
In other cases, those in power did not even attempt to deploy the levers of policy entrepreneurship to rectify policy failures. This is evident in events such as the Great Irish Famine, also known as the Potato Famine, which resulted in mass starvation and over a million deaths in the 19th century. While the potato blight was a natural disaster that destroyed the country’s primary food source, the British government’s response is often criticized for being inadequate and even exacerbating the disaster by continuing to export grain and cattle from Ireland while people starved. Former British Prime Minister Tony Blair would issue an apology a century and a half later.
The missing piece in this narrative is the tremendous potential for powerful action between now and 2030 that each of us can have.
Similarly, farmlands across the US Great Plains were afflicted by severe drought in the Dust Bowl of the 1930s, leading to social and economic upheaval. Today, it is widely regarded as a self-inflicted policy failure. The unsustainable farming practices and policies at the time, including extensive plowing and monoculture farming, contributed to severe soil erosion, producing a human-created environmental catastrophe. It wasn’t until Tugwell’s (yes, the same Rexford Tugwell mentioned previously) spearheading of the new Soil Conservation Service in 1933 that much of this damage was reversed.
From Elites to Everyday Citizens
Fortunately, we don’t need to wait solely for elites to “save” us today — some of whom might be more concerned with influencing and shaping policy change that benefits their ends over society. While the tools and levers of policy entrepreneurship were traditionally reserved for those in positions of power, often rendered invisible to most of society, today, they are accessible to all of us — in the sunlight, with the sunlight.
Today, anyone can play the role of a policy entrepreneur within their respective spheres of influence — be it in business, government, entertainment, philanthropy, nonprofits, or communities. This book, influenced by the experiences of countless individuals and organizations, aims to equip everyone to overcome society’s present implementation crisis in ways that foster trust and are less polarizing. It guides us in envisioning bold and audacious policies, identifying novel and creative ways to build connections, networks, and consensus, and implementing real-world impact.
In the face of the stark reality that we have achieved only 12% of the SDGs by the halfway mark to 2030, it is tempting to feel overwhelmed and question the possibility of meaningful change. However, the missing piece in this narrative is the tremendous potential for powerful action between now and 2030 that each of us can have. There is still a lot worth fighting for.
Featured photo: Global Citizen Festival 2022. Source: Amir Hamja for Global Citizen
