Terry M. Moe

[1] Moe began his career in 1976 as an assistant professor of political science at Michigan State University.

In 1980, he published his first book, The Organization of Interests, which explored the organizational foundations of political interest groups, building on the work of Mancur Olson.1 In 1981, he moved from Michigan State to Stanford, but he soon took temporary leave to be a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution in Washington, D.C. During his stay there, 1984–86, he engaged in collaborative work with John E. Chubb on what became their 1990 book, Politics, Markets, and America's Schools—which, in showing how politics and special interests undermine the organization and performance of public schools, and in arguing the value of school choice, had a major impact on the education reform movement and remains widely cited.2 At the same time, Moe was writing on the presidency, public bureaucracy, and political institutions more generally.

Through such articles as “The New Economics of Organization,”3 “The Politicized Presidency,”4 “The Politics of Bureaucratic Structure,”5 and “Political Institutions: The Neglected Side of the Story,”6 he was an early proponent of putting the analytics of institutional theory to use in transforming the study of bureaucracy and the presidency.

A theme running throughout his work was (and is) that the organization of government—of departments, agencies, schools—arises out of politics and the power of special interests, and thus is literally not designed to be efficient or effective.

The Case of Public Sector Labor Laws.”13 Most recently, he has been engaged in a project on presidential power and American democracy with William G. Howell, which has led, among other things, to two books—Relic14 and Presidents, Populism, and the Crisis of American Democracy15—with a third on the way, expected to be published in 2025, that explains how and why the presidency has become so powerful that, in the wrong hands, it has the capacity to take democracy down.16 1 Moe, Terry M. 1980.

Politics, Markets, and America’s Schools (Washington, D.C.: Brookings Institution Press).

“The Politicized Presidency.” In John E. Chubb and Paul E. Peterson, eds., The New Direction in American Politics (Washington, D.C.: Brookings Institution Press): 235-271.

“Political Institutions: The Neglected Side of the Story.” Journal of Law, Economics, and Organization 6: 213-254.

Special Interest: Teachers Unions and America’s Public Schools (Washington, D.C: Brookings Institution Press).

The Politics of Institutional Reform: Katrina, Education, and the Second Face of Power (New York: Cambridge University Press).

The Case of Public Sector Labor Laws.” American Political Science Review 110 (4): 763-777.

Relic: Why the Constitution Undermines Effective Government—And Why We Need a More Powerful Presidency (New York: Basic Books).