Michael Johns Quotes

Good organization does not necessarily mean it will produce good policy. But bad organization will almost never produce good policy.

Unintended Consequences

Politics is tricky; it cuts both ways. Every time you make a choice, it has unintended consequences.

People don't necessarily do evil deeds because they want to; people happen to do something with horrible consequences even if they meant to be kind.

Inevitably, these sorts of things are going to come back to blow up in people's faces.

Short-term thinking is the greatest enemy of good government.

I don't think anyone sets out to do something bad, it's just that it's very difficult.

People (political and military leaders) much prefer to speak of what they are going to do rather than what the outcome will be.

What matters is not a simple sense of an issue’s salience, but whether a government can shape outcomes on it, where there is the greatest likelihood that the parties will actually be able to implement their policies.

Fully consider the future and the immediate results of all undertakings, and the good and bad sides of all past actions.

There is only one conflict, and that’s between short-term and long-term thinking.

The road to Hell is paved with good intentions.

Competing pressures tempt one to believe that an issue deferred is a problem avoided. More often it is a crisis invited.

Policy remedies tend to have unfortunate side effects.

There is something wrong with the way in which we make our decisions. The Government listen too much to the pollsters and the party managers. The trouble is that they are not even very good at politics, and they are entering too much into policy decisions. As a result, there is too much short-termism, too much reacting to events, and not enough shaping of events. We give the impression of being in office but not in power. Far too many important decisions are made for 36 hours' publicity.

You don't determine what is good policy by polling.

Nobody likes to make a hard decision, because you're running every two years.

In history, good intentions do not always make good consequences

Bad decisions made with good intentions, are still bad decisions.

I learned that you have to evaluate the effects of public policy as opposed to intentions.

History isn't something you look back at and say it was inevitable, it happens because people make decisions that are sometimes very impulsive and of the moment, but those moments are cumulative realities.

Every choice you make has higher stakes - or that's how it feels.

Anyone who has actually had to take responsibility for consequences by running any kind of enterprise whether economic or academic, or even just managing a sports team is likely at some point to be chastened by either the setbacks brought on by his own mistakes or by seeing his successes followed by negative consequences that he never anticipated.

Hell is full of good intentions and wills.

The crucial question for any policy is not what, are its intentions, but what are its effects?