Against Flexibility

Abstract

Contemporary legal thinking is in the thrall of a cult of flexibility. We obsess about avoiding decisions without all possible relevant information while ignoring the costs of postponing decisions until that information becomes available. We valorize procrastination and condemn investments of decisional resources in early decisions.

Both public and private law should be understood as a productive activity converting information, norms, and decisional and enforcement capacity into outputs of social value. Optimal timing depends on changes in these inputs’ scarcity and in the value of the decision they produce. Our legal culture tends to overestmate the value of information that may become available in the future while discounting declines over time in decisional resources and the utility of decisions. Even where postponing some decisions is necessary, a sophisticated appreciation of discretion’s components often exposes aspects of decisions that can and should be made earlier.

Disaster response illustrates the folly of legal procrastination as it shrinks the supply of decisional resources while increasing the demand for them. After Hurricane Katrina, programs built around flexibility failed badly through a combination of late and defective decisions. By contrast, those that appreciated the scarcity of decisional resources and had developed detailed regulatory templates in advance provided quick and effective relief.

Keywords: procrastination, decision-making, disaster planning, disaster response