## Notes from 31 January 2026 [[2026-01-30|← Previous note]] ┃ [[2026-02-01|Next note →]] ## The Progressive DOGE Debate Since November there’s been an interesting conversation emerging in France after [Alexandre Pointier](https://open.substack.com/users/4020672-alexandre-pointier?utm_source=mentions) published “_[Manifeste pour un DOGE de gauche](https://legrandcontinent.eu/fr/2025/10/15/manifeste-pour-un-doge-progressiste/)_” in Grand Continent. Radio France picked it up in early December, and I particularly liked this opening they used from David Graeber’s _Bureaucracy: The Utopia of Rules_: “[The right wing makes a critique of bureaucracy. It is a bad critique, but at least it exists. The left wing has none](https://www.radiofrance.fr/franceculture/podcasts/un-monde-connecte/un-monde-connecte-chronique-du-vendredi-05-decembre-2025-2738342)”. Then in late January there was a [debate at École normale supérieure](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tcWxjr9_Kuk&list=PLozHmP-20rdPq49EO60kztU0jnISPYrd-&index=4) where Pointier and others discussed whether you can actually reform the state in Europe. What Pointier is bringing to the table is essentially this: the current democratic crisis in France and Europe is fundamentally a crisis of state efficiency, not just ideology or economics. If progressives don’t address this, the demand for protection will shift toward authoritarian and identity-based movements. He’s arguing the left needs to reclaim “efficiency” from neo-reactionaries and libertarians — efficiency not as state withdrawal but as strategic reallocation. Audit the state, cut things that don’t work, reinvest massively in what matters (health, education, housing), measure real social impact, use technology to simplify access to rights. Make every euro count with the same obsession the right has when they’re dismantling social programs. I think he’s onto something but there are some nuances worth adding. First, the [[Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE)|DOGE]] phenomenon as we saw it in the US doesn’t tell the whole story and it’s basically concluded now in the form it took during Trump’s first year. You have competing projects inside the administration — [[Russell Vought]] at OMB (Project 2025 guy, wants to traumatize civil servants) versus [[Scott Kupor]] at OPM (ex-Andreessen Horowitz, actually doing at least some interesting things — go read his [Substack](https://substack.com/@usopm) or [Statecraft interview](https://www.statecraft.pub/p/998-of-federal-employees-get-good?hide_intro_popup=true) if you’re curious). They sometimes play bad cop/good cop but these are different visions of what reform means. Second, it’s a bit naive to completely decouple fiscal adjustment from state reform. The demand for this varies by country. In France where this debate is happening, fiscal adjustment is real — the budget deficit is too large and thinking you’ll solve it only with tax increases is delusional, especially when [the pension system pays retirees more than the average salary of active workers](https://x.com/AlecStapp/status/2018366767689544072/photo/1). So while I agree these are agendas that need careful orchestration, the relationship exists and can’t be ignored. That said, Pointier and the others have a point. A few years back I went through dozens of OECD reports and one pattern kept showing up: in places where public administration reform was just a pretext for fiscal adjustment, once the fiscal pressure eased the reform was reversed or abandoned. I get that in many contexts state reform can’t get political momentum and becomes “dependent” on fiscal adjustment to move forward — it’s the only way many reformers get their topics on the agenda. This needs to end. There needs to be political appetite for state reform on its own terms, which means dealing with interests and all the inertia that characterizes government action. On some of Pointier’s specific arguments: he’s right that NPM offers instruments that can be used for various purposes, not just shrinking the state. Measuring performance, giving managers autonomy — these aren’t inherently neoliberal tools. Anyone who doesn’t buy the closed package that NPM was one monolithic thing applied uniformly everywhere knows this. NPM is a grab bag with useful stuff in it, some things that were useful but need updating, and some things that are just “public management” not “new public management”. He also raised this point at the École normale supérieure debate: hospital and school directors in France can’t build their own teams — they inherit staff and have no real say over who works for them. This is fundamental. You have government leaders without capacity to lead, without [[Executive Decisiveness]]. Hard to demand results when they can’t actually manage. That’s NPM too: let managers manage. What’s interesting is this debate is popping up across different contexts. In France you had [[Émilie Agnoux]]'s _[Puissance publique](https://www.jean-jaures.org/publication/puissance-publique-contre-les-demolisseurs-detat/)_ trying to propose a progressive state reform agenda, then Pointier’s manifesto. In the UK with Labour in government, [[Morgan Wild]] and [[Peter Hyman]] wrote “[A progressive case for state reform](https://www.labourtogether.uk/all-reports/progressive-case-for-state-reform)” and [[Geoff Mulgan]] published “[DOGE done better: The case for progressive efficiency](https://demos.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2025/06/DOGE-done-better_paper_2025.ac_.pdf)”. In the US there’s obviously a lot of people thinking about what a non-Republican post-DOGE reform agenda would look like — [[Jennifer Pahlka]] is one of the most interesting voices on this. Same instinct everywhere — reclaim efficiency, don’t cede it to the right. Worth tracking where else this surfaces.