Word: consensus
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...Federal Reserve at a time when it is undergoing deep changes. The most apparent change was the replacement in February of William McChesney Martin Jr. by Economics Professor Burns. Chairman Burns, 66, a strong-willed administrator, has abandoned Martin's insistence on always shaping a policy consensus on the board. If he finds himself in the minority, he will not try to negotiate a compromise but will let himself be outvoted. While this practice could enable the board to move more quickly to shift policy, it could also lead to damaging splits...
...Open Market Committee (FOMC), which is composed of the seven board members and the twelve regional Federal Reserve bank presidents, only five of whom vote. The FOMC decides how much new money to pump into the banking system, which in turn lends it to businessmen and consumers. Under the consensus-seeking Martin, FOMC meetings followed a minuet-like ritual. Everyone had to make some sort of report on economic conditions, with Martin always speaking last and summing up what he thought was the majority sentiment. Under Burns, members speak only if they wish, and anyone can break in with questions...
...unlike civil rights and Vietnam, was not a grass-roots movement among students. Nixon, for example, by turning attention away from the divisive issues of the war and white racism-where certain classes feel themselves grievously exploited, namely, young people and blacks respectively-can unite the nation behind the consensus of ineffectuality that he seeks. Workers and bosses are both affected by pollution, of course, so that traditional leadership can assert itself to restore our endangered environment...
...conforms to nobody's exact wishes," Hughes said, but urged approval of the resolution, saying "the tone should be one of conciliation and consensus...
...prove resistant to change, but that inertia is the critical variable. The public provides the climate, if not the specific cues, in which the government sets policy. That climate determines how well the ministry party pulls together on crucial issues. Crossman's focus would distort the decision-making process: consensus is needed in the party, coercion in the nation. He underestimates the multiple centers of power which prevail in a pluralist democratic electorate...