1. Discuss the balance between power and accountability and individual freedom and government control. Do you think the U.S. government does a good job or a not- so-good job balancing? What sectors are balanced particularly well? Poorly? What ideas do you have for striking a better balance?

2. What do you think about the paradoxical views of Americans about their government? Is safety in the subjects mentioned, and the ones you can imagine but are not mentioned in the quote, worth the sacrifice of individual freedom?

3. What is the role of state and local regulation? What are some of the uses of regulation at these levels? What is partial preemption? Why would Congress choose to preempt state regulatory activity?

4. What is a class-action suit? How has it become pertinent to the issue of government regulation? Can you provide examples of class-action suits from the text?

5. Regulatory administration emphasizes what three values? How are these values interlinked? How are they in conflict?

6. How have presidents regulated the regulators? When did this activity become popular? What do people think is the president’s responsibility regarding regulation?

7. What is the difference between social regulation and economic regulation? How much regulation is too much regulation? How much is too little? In your opinion, are there areas of government in which more or less regulation is necessary?

8. Cost-benefit analysis assumes at its core that dollar values can be assigned to the things that government regulates. Do you think it is possible to put a dollar value national treasures? What about the EPA’s assignment of dollar values to each human life being $8.04 million but then after July 2008 $7.22 million?

9. The study of public administration forces the study of efficiency versus accountability versus coordination. How do those three elements—efficiency, accountability, and coordination—function in the regulation of administration?

10. In examining the different branches of regulators, which branch—the executive or the judicial—seems to have the most authority or legitimacy to be doing so and why?

11. The text describes how the Fifth and the Fourteenth amendments to the Constitution “prohibit the national government and the states (including their local governments) from depriving any person of life, liberty, or property without due process of law” and go on to frame what government regulation can do and how, procedurally, government must do it. Treating corporations as “persons,” courts apply these provisions by requiring fair procedures and substantively by using their own judgment of whether the deprivation of property or of a fair return on it seems “reasonable” in the eyes of the courts. What do you think about this system? How democratic does it seem to you? Does it fit with the notions of accountability discussed so far? Can you think of a better method?

12. Courts and agencies make “strange partners,” the text says, because they are organizations with different histories and have staffs comprising very different types of people. Further, courts are “passive” whereas agencies are “active.” Describe and discuss these differences and the strategies that have developed to accommodate these differences, namely, the courts pushing agencies to involve more citizens and groups in the process of rulemaking and also “making law.” What do you think of how these two groups have accommodated to each other’s differences? Can you think of better ways?