Tuesday, November 25, 2025

Today, Hoover’s Center for Revitalizing American Institutions releases a new survey exploring the state of US civics education. Andrew B. Hall explores how AI firms can take on concerns about their chatbot’s political bias. And John H. Cochrane explains why enacting price controls during a natural disaster can slow down recovery efforts.

Revitalizing American Institutions

The State of Civic Education

Civic education is experiencing a revival among American educators, who seek to strengthen students’ understanding of the principles essential to life in a democracy. Recent waves of education reform continue to bypass civics, even as the damage caused by insufficient civics knowledge becomes ever more apparent. A sweeping survey by the Working Group on Civics and American Citizenship at the Center for Revitalizing American Institutions finds that America’s “civic crisis” must transcend ideology and that education experts largely consider civics both nonpartisan and essential. Progress, the report concludes, demands both explicit and persistent efforts to overcome varieties of “culture wars” in the schools. Read more here.

AI’s Political Architecture

Writing on his Substack, Senior Fellow Andrew B. Hall outlines how AI firms should confront the perceived political bias of their chatbots. He points out polling data that indicates up to one in five Americans has consulted an AI chatbot with a political question. He suggests the best path forward is for AI firms to find out what Americans themselves believe are unslanted, politically neutral responses to their questions, instead of coming up with neutral language themselves. “If firms want real public trust, they need to open their systems to user judgment, letting Americans themselves signal what feels neutral or biased, and be transparent about how their models separate facts from values,” Hall writes. Read more here.

The Economy

The Price Control Trap

In this week’s “Grumpy Economist Weekly Rant,” Senior Fellow John H. Cochrane takes on the economics of price controls during natural disasters. When governments freeze prices after hurricanes, fires, or earthquakes, they may prevent “gouging”—but they also shut down the very incentives that bring supply where it’s needed most. Cochrane explains why blocking prices from rising leads to shortages, long lines, and life-or-death situations where people can’t access essentials at any price. Drawing on examples from the 1906 San Francisco earthquake to more recent gas shortages, he shows that flexible prices—not freezes—help communities recover faster. And if policymakers want to help people, he argues, they should give cash, not distort markets. Watch his rant here.

How Milei Made Austerity Popular

In Engelsberg Ideas, Research and Teaching Fellow Julieta Casas works to explain how Argentine President Javier Milei managed to win his country’s midterm elections despite enacting harsh austerity measures that have cut income and social supports for wide swaths of the populace. Comparing Milei’s approach with the efforts of three previous fiscal disciplinarians who led the country, Casas suggests the winning part of Milei’s formula was to quickly get inflation under control. “Austerity seems to be politically viable under two circumstances: when the economic shock is felt early on the ground (the further away from mid-term elections, the better), and when the administration has inflation under control,” Casas writes. Read more here.

Confronting and Competing with China

China’s Generals, Purges, and Power Plays

On the latest episode of China Considered, Senior Fellow Elizabeth Economy speaks with Bonny Lin, director of the China Power Project at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, about China’s evolving security posture and military ambitions under Xi Jinping. Lin explains how China's goals extend beyond regional dominance to achieving global parity with, or superiority over, the United States. Economy and Lin trace major inflection points, including South China Sea island-building, military reforms, and the strategic partnership with Russia following its invasion of Ukraine. They then discuss ongoing purges of senior officers within the Chinese military and, in turn, what these upheavals mean for military competence and readiness. Read more here.