To answer questions about
The Fifth Risk: Undoing Democracy,
please sign up.
Bleuz00m
Paraphrasing from Joe Klein's NYT review of "Fifth Risk,"
"..Lewis asks MacWilliams [ MacWilliams is John J. MacWilliams, a Fellow at the Center on Global Energy Policy. Prior to joining CGEP, MacWilliams served as Associate Deputy Secretary of the U.S. Department of Energy after being appointed in August 2015. He also served as DOE's Chief Risk Officer. Link: https://energypolicy.columbia.edu/joh... ] to list the top five risks.
The first four are predictable:
Broken Arrows [missing or damaged nuclear weapons.]
North Korea.
Iran (that is, maintaining the agreement that prevents Iran from building a nuclear bomb).
Protecting the electric grid from cyberterrorism.
But the fifth, most important risk is a stunner: “program management.” Hence, the title of this book. ".. Link: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/08/bo...
[ Joe Klein continues, ]
Lewis defines it this way: “The risk a society runs when it falls into the habit of responding to long-term risks with short-term solutions. … ‘Program management’ is the existential threat that you never really even imagine as a risk. … It is the innovation that never occurs and the knowledge that is never created, because you have ceased to lay the groundwork for it. It is what you never learned that might have saved you.”
"..Lewis asks MacWilliams [ MacWilliams is John J. MacWilliams, a Fellow at the Center on Global Energy Policy. Prior to joining CGEP, MacWilliams served as Associate Deputy Secretary of the U.S. Department of Energy after being appointed in August 2015. He also served as DOE's Chief Risk Officer. Link: https://energypolicy.columbia.edu/joh... ] to list the top five risks.
The first four are predictable:
Broken Arrows [missing or damaged nuclear weapons.]
North Korea.
Iran (that is, maintaining the agreement that prevents Iran from building a nuclear bomb).
Protecting the electric grid from cyberterrorism.
But the fifth, most important risk is a stunner: “program management.” Hence, the title of this book. ".. Link: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/08/bo...
[ Joe Klein continues, ]
Lewis defines it this way: “The risk a society runs when it falls into the habit of responding to long-term risks with short-term solutions. … ‘Program management’ is the existential threat that you never really even imagine as a risk. … It is the innovation that never occurs and the knowledge that is never created, because you have ceased to lay the groundwork for it. It is what you never learned that might have saved you.”
Sara
Under the category of "program management," Lewis & his experts explain it as the risk you don't anticipate -- the unintended consequences you never thought about. In the book's stunning final paragraph, after describing the woman who said she prayed every day for a tornado to wipe her red barn away because she had to look at it everyday, & it was where her husband had committed suicide, Lewis states: "And so you might have good reason to pray for a tornado, whether it comes in the shape of swirling winds, or a politician. You imagine the thing doing the damage that you would like to see done, and no more. It's what you fail to imagine that kills you."
Maria Tsakos
Governing the country like it will all end tomorrow and there is no big picture to think of, no future.
JDK1962
Project/Program Management.
About Goodreads Q&A
Ask and answer questions about books!
You can pose questions to the Goodreads community with Reader Q&A, or ask your favorite author a question with Ask the Author.
See Featured Authors Answering Questions
Learn more