ABSTRACT
This chapter shows how the burden of contradictory purposes has handicapped the urban renewal program and discusses Housing and Urban Development partial command over federal actions influencing the problems with which it was attempting to deal has likewise. The traditional structure of federal agencies is centralized and hierarchical. The approach Charles L. Schultze favors involves federal incentives and penalties designed to produce decisions on the private market that accord with the public purpose by making them more profitable. President Carter's proposed energy program contains many incentives and penalties. It also shows how difficult it is to design just the right incentives and penalties to influence the behavior of individuals and institutions in the desired way. The fragile balance between individual liberty and the necessary restraint of liberty has eroded. The important point is that a society so pervaded by the doctrine of permissiveness is less likely to produce responsible citizens, not to mention stable neighborhoods.
