Statecraft

Mar 06 2025 36 ep. 50 mins 85

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In this podcast, we interview top appointees and civil servants about how they managed to achieve a particular policy goal. Subscribe at www.statecraft.pub to get interview transcripts in your inbox once a week.

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50 Thoughts on DOGE

Mar 06 2025 27 mins

DOGE is the most interesting story in state capacity right now. Yet although we’ve talked around it on Statecraft, I haven’t covered it directly since the beginning of the administration. In part, that’s because of the whirlwind pace of news, but also because of the sense I get in talking to other DOGE watchers, that we’re like blind men feeling different parts of the eleph

How to Run a Private Military Company

Feb 28 2025 53 mins

Today’s guest is John Lechner, a writer and researcher. He's here today to talk about his new book about the Wagner Group, a Russian state-funded private military group, or PMC. The book is called Death Is Our Business: Russian Mercenaries and the New Era of Private Warfare, and is out March 4th (you can preorder it here). It’s a crazy read, and draws on multiple trips John too

There Are Too Many Judicial Injunctions

Feb 19 2025 33 mins

Friend-of-the-pod Nick Bagley joined us to explain judicial review: why it's not as confusing as it sounds, and why it's at the center of a political firestorm.Bagley is an expert in administrative law who served as special counsel and chief legal counsel to Democratic Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer. We've had him on a couple times for conversations on how bureaucracy is breaki

How to Beat Megafires

Feb 07 2025 58 mins

What happened in LA last month? On that, basically everyone agrees: devastating wildfires that killed at least 29 people and cost at least $100 billion.But why did those fires burn so intensely for so long? I had my own view, but I don’t follow fires closely. So I talked to Matt Weiner, CEO and founder of Megafire Action.We discuss:* California knows it has a fire problem. Why ca

Why the Two Parties Operate Differently

Jan 29 2025 28 mins

Today I'm talking with Jo Freeman: a founding member of the women’s liberation movement in the 1960s, a civil rights campaigner, an attendee to every Democratic party convention since 1964, and a political scientist. She’s not the most typical Statecraft guest. But her work on how the two parties work - not just what they believe, but how they operate organizationally - is incr

How to Budget for the SEC

Jan 23 2025 40 mins

This is the second in a two-part series with my dad, Diego Ruiz. In the first episode, we discussed his time helping run a political campaign in Nicaragua, and later his time staffing California Representative Chris Cox. Today, we jump ahead to his time as executive director of the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) during the 2008 financial crisis.In this episode, we discuss

How to Win an Election Against the Communists

Jan 16 2025 44 mins

Today's guest is near and dear to my heart. It's my dad, Diego Ruiz. We recorded this in person, and we both had the same cold, which you may be able to hear. At some point, you may also hear my son in the background, which makes three generations of Ruizes on the podcast.Diego has helped win elections in the US and Central America, served as Executive Director of the Securities an

What to Expect From DOGE

Jan 08 2025 36 mins

Happy New Year! I went on the American Compass podcast last month to talk to American Compass chief economist Oren Cass about government efficiency, state capacity, and what Trump’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) is likely to tackle.We discuss:* Why is it so hard to fire federal employees?* Off-the-wall ways to save government money* The West Coast meets East Coast dy

What Can the Brits Teach Us About State Capacity?

Dec 20 2024 50 mins

Today, we talk to Jennifer Pahlka and Andrew Greenway about their new paper on state capacity. It’s called “The How We Need Now: A Capacity Agenda for 2025 and Beyond.”We discuss:What is “state capacity?”Why is there fresh interest in the topic in the UK?How did the model of a “government digital service” spread to the US?How do you fix unemployment insurance? This is

Did the Courts Just Nuke Environmental Review?

Dec 18 2024 60 mins

Today, we’re diving into everyone’s favorite Statecraft topic: administrative law! The two court cases we’re discussing could have huge ramifications for how we build things in America.We brought three of our favorite administrative law professors together: James Coleman is a professor at the University of Minnesota, Adam White is the Executive Director of the Gray Center for