How far and how fast could reform of the state go? For now that question seems fanciful, like asking how a man who has been getting fatter for decades would do in a marathon. Yet fatalism about an un-reformable state seems misguided. To begin with, the patient is not in his current condition by design. In a forthcoming book about the role of the state, Vito Tanzi, an Italian-born economist, shows that it changed dramatically during the 20th century.
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