Public Policy and the Public Interest: What If We Mattered More?

September 11, 2001: terrorism strikes the United States. Subsequent investigations reveal that the U.S. governments failure to detect and dismantle the 9/11 plot arose largely from failures of communication among agencies and a lack of willingness of agency leaders to heed warnings from workers closer to the ground. In response to these finds, U.S. government agencies associated with disaster functions such as infrastructure protection, border and transportation security, and emergency preparedness are subsequently restructured and centralized into a meta-agency, the Department of Homeland Security. Flash forward four years to August 27, 2005. Hurricane Katrina is about to hit New Orleans in the U.S. golf region. Two months later, Marty Bahamonde testifies to Congress that the leadership from top down in the agency is unprepared and out of touch. What if organization theorists had been part of the strategy team when Homeland Security was being structured?