Citizens who are discontent with certain aspects of society may complain with the familiar refrain, “There ought to be a law!” In reality, however, the introduction of new laws does not necessarily signify immediate, smooth, or effective resolutions to the problems they are intended to solve. The primary reason why changes made by legislators tend to be incremental in nature is that laws are not enacted and implemented in a vacuum.
Laws, especially when enacted at the federal level, require a great deal of public and private debate where all aspects of the case in question are heard and given equal weight. This can be a lengthy process as summons are given and adequate time is given to prepare reports that can often take days of hearing to get through. Even when there are laws that require timely action by legislators to cope with a contemporary situation that has just given rise to the need for more laws to be made, the process can be long. Certainly, some issues are heard before others because the needs are greater. For instance, a law that might influence national security will be given precedence over a law that regulates an industry or only helps a relatively small number of individuals.
The transition of a law from an abstract notion to a tangible, enforceable regulation is typically slow because it requires the integration of disparate systems, many of which are already overburdened. The legislative branch of the government, which is responsible for creating laws, must coordinate to some extent with the judicial branch of the government, which will bear the obligation of interpreting and enforcing the law. There are many other entities aside from legislators that must also become involved, however, and shifting from old standards to new ones requires time to operationalize the new law.
Take, for instance, the example of the welfare-to-reform act passed by the Clinton administration. The coordination of numerous systems, both public (government) and private (employers, social service providers, and the like), required time to shift not only from the former paradigm, but also from old operating systems to new ones. Pragmatic changes demanded by new laws require changes in organizational structure, tasks, resources, allocations, and almost every other aspect of an organization’s life. For this reason, legislators often establish benchmarks that set a timeline for the transition to be implemented and evaluated. Change is incremental, as much as we may want to rush it along.
