Recoding America: Why Government Is Failing in the Digital Age and How We Can Do Better

by Jennifer Pahlka

When there are important human and societal outcomes on the line, we can’t afford to fail just because lawmakers didn’t understand the difference between a provision that would take five hours to implement and one that would take five years. There is no need to sign up members of Congress and their staffs for programming classes, although the tech in question is quite accessible. Much of what’s most useful in government today is not part of this brave new world of machine learning and artificial intelligence that many of us are understandably wary about. If you recall if-then statements from your freshman-year comp sci class, you can understand the basics of what the Clear My Record algorithm does. Writing policy with these considerations in mind isn’t a matter of staying on the cutting edge of computing, or even being able to question Mark Zuckerberg in a hearing without embarrassment. It’s just a matter of inviting different voices into the conversation and finding a common language with them. That common language is neither tech-speak nor legalese. It focuses on people—understanding their needs and testing our assumptions about them.