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Experts in Government

The Deep State from Caligula to Trump and Beyond

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 December 2023

Donald F. Kettl
Affiliation:
University of Maryland, College Park

Summary

From Caligula and the time of ancient Rome to the present, governments have relied on experts to manage public programs. But with that expertise has come power, and that power has long proven difficult to hold accountable. The tension between experts in the bureaucracy and the policy goals of elected officials, however, remains a point of often bitter tension. President Donald Trump labeled these experts as a 'deep state' seeking to resist the policies he believed he was elected to pursue—and he developed a policy scheme to make it far easier to fire experts he deemed insufficiently loyal. The age-old battles between expertise and accountability have come to a sharp point, and resolving these tensions requires a fresh look at the rule of law to shape the role of experts in governance.
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Experts in Government
  • Donald F. Kettl, University of Maryland, College Park
  • Online ISBN: 9781009276085
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Experts in Government
  • Donald F. Kettl, University of Maryland, College Park
  • Online ISBN: 9781009276085
Available formats
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To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Experts in Government
  • Donald F. Kettl, University of Maryland, College Park
  • Online ISBN: 9781009276085
Available formats
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