The Danger of Self-Evident Truths

evident truths in public policy making. The presumption that large numbers of small governmental units serving a metropolitan area produce inadequate, inefficient, and inequitable services has been widespread throughout this century. Its converse--that big, centralized governments are more professional and offer economies of scale in the production of public goods and services--has been considered to be similarly obvious. But are these assumptions correct? For much of this century, few questioned this common-sense wisdom. Consequently, lacking systematic empirical evidence to substantiate this belief, local governments throughout the U.S. and West Europe adopted proposals to reform their structure by consolidating local governments. In general, these reforms have failed to generate predicted benefits. A second example illustrates the way in which self-evident truths can be