What If America Asked a Different Question?

Americans have become remarkably good at identifying problems.

Congress is broken.

Healthcare is broken.

Education is broken.

Housing is broken.

Immigration is broken.

Artificial Intelligence is dangerous.

The economy isn't working.

Politics is corrupt.

Social media is destroying us.

Everyone seems to know what's wrong.

Very few people ask a more interesting question:

Who's getting it right?

That question changed my life.

During my doctoral research, I used a methodology called Appreciative Inquiry.

Unlike traditional problem-solving approaches that begin by asking, "What's broken?" Appreciative Inquiry begins somewhere completely different.

It asks:

"What's already working?"

"Why is it working?"

"How can we build on those strengths?"

It's a deceptively simple idea.

Instead of treating every challenge as a failure requiring repair, Appreciative Inquiry searches for excellence, studies it carefully, and asks how its success can be replicated. It focuses on identifying the conditions that allow people and organizations to flourish rather than becoming consumed by deficiencies alone.

The more I think about it...

The more I wonder why we don't govern this way.

Imagine if Americans approached public policy the same way.

Instead of asking:

"Which political party has the answer?"

What if we asked:

"Which country has solved this problem most effectively?"

Not perfectly.

Effectively.

Those are very different standards.

Take childcare.

The Nordic countries consistently rank among the world's strongest performers in parental leave, childcare access, work-life balance, and overall measures of life satisfaction. Their policies didn't emerge by accident. They were built over generations through deliberate choices about family life, labor, and public investment.

Does that mean America should copy Norway line for line?

Of course not.

History matters.

Culture matters.

Economics matter.

But refusing even to study what appears to be working because it originated somewhere else?

That isn't patriotism.

That's intellectual insecurity.

Consider Artificial Intelligence.

Today, the United States has largely allowed private companies to drive the pace of AI innovation.

That approach has obvious strengths.

Competition fuels creativity.

Markets reward innovation.

Entrepreneurs move faster than bureaucracies.

But markets are not designed primarily to optimize long-term public welfare.

They're designed to compete.

Other countries have taken different paths.

China, for example, has pursued a far more centralized approach to AI development and infrastructure, combining government planning with regulatory oversight in areas such as data governance, energy use, and the siting of major computing facilities. Whether one agrees with that broader political system or not, those policies raise legitimate questions about how governments should balance innovation, resource management, and public accountability.

Notice what I didn't say.

I didn't say America should become China.

I said America should be willing to learn.

Those are not the same thing.

One of the greatest mistakes modern politics makes is assuming ideas belong to countries.

As if good ideas require passports.

As if effective policy somehow becomes contaminated because another nation implemented it first.

History tells a different story.

The Founding Fathers borrowed heavily from Enlightenment philosophers.

The American Constitution drew inspiration from English common law, Roman republicanism, and centuries of political thought stretching back to Aristotle.

Innovation has always involved borrowing.

Civilizations grow by learning.

They stagnate by assuming they already know everything.

Somewhere along the way, however, politics became sports.

The goal shifted from solving problems to defeating opponents.

If Democrats propose an idea...

Republicans oppose it.

If Republicans propose an idea...

Democrats oppose it.

If Europe succeeds...

Ignore it.

If Asia succeeds...

Distrust it.

If Scandinavia succeeds...

Dismiss it as impossible.

If America succeeds...

Assume no one else has anything to teach us.

That's not leadership.

That's ego.

Real confidence isn't threatened by someone else's success.

Real confidence studies it.

Adapts it.

Improves it.

Appreciative Inquiry taught me something I wish more governments understood.

The opposite of criticism isn't blind optimism.

It's curiosity.

Curiosity asks:

"How did they accomplish that?"

"What conditions made success possible?"

"Which parts might translate to our own culture?"

"Which parts wouldn't?"

Those are difficult questions.

They're also the beginning of wisdom.

No country is perfect.

Not Norway.

Not Japan.

Not Singapore.

Not China.

Not the United States.

Every nation has blind spots.

Every nation has failures.

Every nation also has something worth studying.

Imagine if America became the country that borrowed great ideas from everywhere.

Imagine if we measured patriotism not by insisting we were always right, but by having enough confidence to admit someone else occasionally found a better way.

That wouldn't diminish America.

It would strengthen it.

Because the goal of civilization has never been to prove we're superior.

The goal has always been to become wiser.

Appreciative Inquiry reminds us that growth begins with a remarkably simple act:

Notice excellence wherever it appears.

Study it without envy.

Learn from it without shame.

Then have the courage to build something even better.

Perhaps that's the question America should ask next.

Not:

"Who's winning?"

But:

"What can we learn?"

That may be the most patriotic question of all.