Tradeoffs, though inevitable, need not be accepted unregretted or beyond reform

Evidence

While it is inevitable that policy choices involve tradeoffs between competing considerations, the following matters are not inevitable: that the nation become complacent about the manner in which tradeoffs are resolved; that lives lost or harms caused be accepted rather than regretted; that the institutions, technologies, and pro cesses that structure any momentary depiction of inevitable tradeoffs themselves lie beyond reform; or that there be no advantage in seeking to fail better, rather than to optimize, when society aims to protect life and the environment. — Douglas A. Kysar, Regulating from Nowhere, 666

Categorization

• XREF: ‘Seeking to fail better rather than to optimize’ directly ties to ch3’s claim that regret is what formalized risk regulation cannot register — the idea that cost-benefit’s optimization erases regret. — connects to: Environmental crisis roots are epistemological, ethical, and political, a crisis of ideas — Douglas A. Kysar, Regulating from Nowhere: Environmental…, 654; Uncompromising reformers harm the poor by preventing partial reforms — Robert A. Caro, The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the…, 572