David A. Moss

To all who declare that American democracy is broken—riven by partisanship, undermined by extremism, and corrupted by wealth—history offers hope. In nearly every generation since the nation’s founding, critics have made similar declarations, and yet the nation is still standing. When should we believe the doomsayers? In Democracy: A Case Study, historian David Moss adapts the case study method made famous by Harvard Business School to revitalize our conversations about governance and democracy and show how the United States has often thrived on political conflict.

Democracy’s nineteen case studies were honed in Moss’s Harvard course, which is among the institution’s most highly rated. Each one presents readers with a pivotal moment in U.S. history and raises questions facing key decision makers at the time: Should delegates to the Constitutional Convention support James Madison’s proposal for a congressional veto over state laws? Should President Lincoln resupply Fort Sumter? Should Florida lawmakers approve or reject the Equal Rights Amendment?

These vibrant cases ask readers to weigh choices and consequences, wrestle with momentous decisions, and come to their own conclusions. They provoke us to rethink which factors make the difference between constructive and destructive conflict, and they provide an opportunity to reengage the passionate debates that are crucial to a healthy society. Democracy: A Case Study invites us all to experience American history anew and come away with a deeper understanding of our democracy’s greatest strengths and vulnerabilities as well as its extraordinary resilience over time.

From Cambridge University Press: When regulations (or lack thereof) seem to detract from the common good, critics often point to regulatory capture as a culprit. In some academic and policy circles it seems to have assumed the status of an immutable law. Yet for all the ink spilled describing and decrying capture, the concept remains difficult to nail down in practice. Is capture truly as powerful and unpreventable as the informed consensus seems to suggest? This edited volume brings together seventeen scholars from across the social sciences to address this question. Their work shows that capture is often misdiagnosed, and may, in fact, be preventable and manageable. Focusing on the goal of prevention, the volume advances a more rigorous and empirical standard for diagnosing and measuring capture, paving the way for new lines of academic inquiry and more precise and nuanced reform. 

• The first book-length treatment of regulatory capture to be published in more than three decades
• Provides a new, testable definition of regulatory capture
• Provides original case studies offering a new direction on capture scholarship and prevention

 

As the financial crisis has shown, neither traditional market failure models nor public choice theory, by themselves, sufficiently inform or explain our current regulatory challenges, nor point us toward the best solutions. Regulatory studies, long neglected in an atmosphere focused on deregulatory work, are in critical need of new models and theories that can guide effective policymaking. This interdisciplinary volume points the way toward the modernization of regulatory theory: its essays, by leading scholars in a number of fields, move past predominant approaches to integrate the latest research about the interplay between human behavior, societal needs, and regulatory institutions. The book concludes by charting a research agenda for scholars that would better incorporate emerging perspectives on government regulation, with the hope of sparking sustained academic engagement on questions of regulation and the economic role of the state.

New regulation shouldn't rely on old ideas. Since the 1960s, influential research on government failure helped to drive the movement for deregulation and privatization. Yet even as this branch of research was flourishing, very different ideas were sprouting in the social sciences with profound implications for our understanding of human behavior and the role of government. Some of these ideas, particularly from the field of behavioral economics, have begun to enter into discussions of regulatory purpose, design, and implementation. The process is far from complete, and many other exciting new lines of research - on everything from social cooperation to co-regulation - have hardly been incorporated at all. It is imperative that lawmakers and their constituents be able to draw on the very latest academic work in thinking anew about the role of government. This is the purpose of this book: to make the newest and most important research accessible to a broad audience.

Professor Moss's academic work in this area explores how and why governments manage private-sector risks. Based on historical and institutional research, he argues that risk management constitutes a critical function of government with far-reaching implications. Some examples of risk management policy include limited liability law, bankruptcy discharge, deposit insurance, workers' compensation, unemployment insurance, old-age insurance, federal disaster relief, disability insurance, workplace safety regulations, and product liability law. Although these policies serve an extremely wide variety of social objectives, the essential vehicle in each case is risk management. That is, all of these policies (and numerous others) achieve their objectives either by shifting, spreading, or directly reducing risk. In order to develop a better understanding of why governments manage risk and under what circumstances, Moss has begun charting the history of public risk management in the United States. He considers why the major risk management policies were enacted, what economic functions they were designed to serve, and, more broadly, how risk management policy has developed over time. At root, this line of research explores the fundamental role and evolution of government risk management in a modern capitalist economy.

Under what conditions are public policies in a democracy determined by special interests or, alternatively, by the general interest?  A good deal of academic work, particularly associated with the economic theory of regulation, suggests that special interests nearly always dominate policy outcomes.  In this line of research, Professor Moss seeks to test that presumption against the historical record in the United States and to identify (and better understand) the historical circumstances under which either special interest or general interest has been relatively more influential in shaping legislative and regulatory outcomes.

This line of research aims to inform our understanding of modern financial challenges and vulnerabilities by reexamining important financial innovations and financial crises of the past, with particular but not exclusive attention to U.S. financial history. 

For Harvard College undergraduates and MBA students

Today we often hear that American democracy is broken - but what does a healthy democracy look like? How has American democratic governance functioned in the past, and how has it changed over time? This course approaches American history with these questions in mind. Based on the case method, each short reading will introduce students to a different critical episode in the development of American democracy, from drafting of the Constitution to contemporary fights over same-sex marriage. The discussion-based classes will encourage students to challenge each other's assumptions about democratic values and practices, and draw their own conclusions about what "democracy" means in America.

Creating the Modern Financial System offers a vital perspective on finance and the financial system by exploring the historical development of key financial instruments and institutions worldwide. The premise of the course is that students will gain a richer and more intuitive understanding of modern financial markets and organizations by examining where these institutions came from and how they evolved. The course is ideal for anyone who wants to deepen his or her understanding of real-world finance.

Course Organization and Objectives

The course content covers seminal financial developments in a diverse set of countries - but with a special focus on the United States - from the 18th century to the present. Reaching across the chronological arc of the course are three broad topics: (1) financial markets and instruments, (2) financial intermediaries, and (3) financial behavior. Although nearly every case touches on all three topics, each case also has a primary focus. Whereas some cases highlight the introduction of new financial markets (such as the Dojima futures market in early modern Japan) or the creation of new instruments (such as mortgage-backed securities), others trace the emergence and maturation of critical financial institutions (including banks and insurance companies). Still others focus on the behavior of financial actors and groups, particularly in the context of financial bubbles and crashes. Because the course highlights the origins of financial markets and instruments as well as the fallout from numerous financial crises, government also looms large as an actor in many of the cases.

Throughout the course, the goal is to provide students with the broadest possible grounding in real-world finance by exposing them to some of the greatest (and, at times, most devastating) moments in modern financial history. Although the past is unlikely to repeat itself exactly, business managers who have a strong background in financial history are likely to be better prepared for the full diversity of financial innovations, shocks, and crises that they'll face in the future.

Course Administration

Course grades will be based on class participation (50%) and a final paper (50%). Throughout the semester, Professor Moss will be available to meet with students by appointment.

Elected as a Member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2021.

Honored with the Ticonderoga Award for a Continental Vision in 2020.

Received the HBS Student Association Faculty Teaching Award in 2019.

Received the 2009 Charles M. Williams Award for Excellence in Teaching.

Received the 2005-2006 Robert F. Greenhill Award.

Winner of the 2004 Kulp-Wright Book Award for When All Else Fails: Government as the Ultimate Risk Manager (Harvard University Press, 2002), presented by the American Risk and Insurance Association for the book considered to be the most influential text published on the economics of risk management and insurance.

Winner of the Editors' Prize for the Best Article of 1999 from American Bankruptcy Law Journal for "The Rise of Consumer Bankruptcy: Evolution, Revolution, or Both" (with Gibbs A. Johnson, spring 1999).