Foundations of New York City

Daniel Golliher
Dec 02, 2024
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Applications for The Foundations of New York City, running January—March 2025, are now open until December 30! Apply here. The Foundations of New York City is an accelerated introduction to NYC government and law, with its dependencies at the state and federal level. See the full semester announcement, including other classes, here.

Content

  • Application overview

  • What you will know how to do, and have done, by the end of the class

  • General class structure and information

  • Class expectations and etiquette

  • About your instructor

  • Class syllabus

Application Overview

Applications are open from December 2 until December 30 (5pm EST). Applications will be accepted on a rolling basis, and sooner is definitely better.

I’ll inform all applicants of their status, successful or not, by January 1 or sooner. I aim to answer each application within a week of its submission, although historically it can take a few days longer. If you have not heard back from me by then, feel free to shoot me an email: daniel@maximumnewyork.com.

Time: 6:30-8:30pm, Mondays, January 6—March 10 (10 weeks; no class February 10)
Location: near Downtown Brooklyn—there will be another section on the Upper West Side if that makes for enrollees
Prerequisites: None
Completion reqs: final sit-down exam, all homework, no more than two absences
Tuition: $0-2,000. The price is $2k, give yourself a discount if you need.

APPLY HERE

What you will know how to do, and have done, by the end of the class

  • You will have conceptual clarity about words like statute, administrative law, commissioner, and more.

  • Draw a basic timeline of New York City’s political history, and a basic timeline of important land use laws at the city and state level that impact the city.

  • You will know what political capital is, how to get it, and how to use it. You will graduate with more than you started. You will feel like you “know how to do government things” on a basic level, in part because some of your homework requires it.

  • Draw a robust map of the New York City political system, with its basic dependencies at the state and federal level. You will be able to describe every individual component on the map, how they relate to each other, and how soft and hard power change the government as described on paper.

  • Answer the question “What is the law?” for NYC. You will know the answer to this question for every locality, state, and the federal government in general terms as well.

  • Describe the process by which laws are made in New York City—not just statute, but rules as well.

  • Draw a basic map of the five boroughs by hand.

  • Recite “The New Colossus” from memory.

  • Optional and new: you can opt in to a “hard mode” of the class, which you’ll indicate on your application. If you do this, you will have extra homework in the form of reading, writing, memorization, and interacting with government. If a sufficient amount of students opt in, we will have a few extra seminars to discuss your work on top of the regular class meetings. This will add 1-3 hours of extra work a week, but you will go further, faster.

General Class Structure and Information

Meeting Time & Place

Class will meet for two hours (6:30-8:30pm) on Monday, beginning January 6 and ending March 10. There will be no class on February 10. Our classroom is near downtown Brooklyn.

Class Structure:

Classes will be structured as seminars, not lectures. In the first meeting of most “Foundations” classes, I will draw a map of the government on the whiteboard, and students will be the peanut gallery (it’s open season on questions and comments). We will repeat this exercise in various forms, including competitive ones, in each meeting.

There will be breaks about every 30 minutes. Eat snacks and do what you need to do then. And since class will be in the winter, and people will be coming in from the cold: please make sure to blow your nose and clear out sniffles before class, and as needed.

Attendance:

You cannot miss more than two of the nine class sessions. But if something comes up, just let me know and we can improvise.

If you are going to be late to class, you will need to text or email me with your approximate ETA. Don’t feel embarrassed or squirrely about being late, just let me know so I can conduct class accordingly.

Class Preparation & Homework:

  • There will be readings for each class, small class projects, and a final exam that is graded pass/fail. Plan to allocate at least 1-2 hours a week for this work. Final exams will be taken during your last class. If you fail the exam, you fail the class—but you can retake it once. You must earn 90% or above to pass.

  • Pre-class quizzes. You will have to complete an online quiz before each class that reviews all material we’ve covered in class up to that point. You must get 100% on it, but you may retake it as many times as you need.

  • You must complete two “witnessing government” assignments. You will attend government meetings and respond to a variety of prompts based on what you witness. There will be evening, weekend, remote, and pre-recorded options; however, the most productive event is a live City Council meeting during the work day. You must complete these two assignments to pass the class.

  • Join the Maximum New York Discord. Class participants will be added to a Maximum New York Discord server, which will be our primary mode of communication for coursework, office hours, and general discussion. There will be a code of conduct you need to accept to join the Discord, similar to the class expectations and etiquette outlined in the next section.

And after the course, the real fun of government and politics begins. It’s an open world.

Class Expectations & Etiquette

Classes are open to anyone who wants to improve the capacity of NYC’s government, with an end toward making NYC larger, more wealthy (both absolutely and per capita), more opportunity-rich, and more enjoyable for everyone. Maybe you want to get deeply involved in politics. Maybe you’re just intellectually curious. Maybe you’re somewhere in between. You’re welcome in any case.

The classroom environment I encourage is one of exploration, curiosity, playfulness, and charity/tolerance; if you have dug-in political ideas, you need to let those go, at least for the duration of the class. We are here to learn how things work first and foremost, although larger questions of political philosophy absolutely come into play at various points. You should think about politics as a systems problem with no perfect solutions, but still plenty of good ones.

This class has four formal rules of etiquette that you must follow:

  1. Politics is a good word, and a potentially beautiful thing. We are here to learn how to do government as friends, in a chill fashion, even while dealing with weighty issues.

  2. No bullshitting, aka be concrete. We’re here to learn together, but we’re doing it in a rigorous fashion. You must always strive to deeply understand the reality of governance that underpins your political thought.

  3. Extend grace to everyone. We’re here to learn together. Government and politics are complicated fields, and no one knows everything. We will be better, together.

  4. Find the good time. Taking things seriously does not mean being mad about them. The wider world can pressure people to get mad to prove that they take political ideas seriously. I do not equate anger with either sophistication or dedication, so I relieve you of that burden. Make jokes, be serious, push back, learn a lot. But give yourself (and others) a break while you’re in class.

About Your Instructor

Hello, my name is Daniel Golliher (goll- as in the gall, the nerve, and the audacity; iher- as in how they say “your” where I come from: Gol-yer). I’ve lived in New York City for six years. Besides my writing on this website, you can learn more about me on Twitter, LinkedIn, and my personal blog. I’ve written a few books, play the piano and sax, enjoy all manner of physical fitness, and can’t wait to meet you.

When it comes to understanding government and law, my default response is to simply exert maximum effort.

I graduated from Harvard College in 2014 with a degree in Government1, and since then I’ve worked in the legal industry, a coffee shop, higher ed, the legal industry again, and now I dedicate my time to Maximum New York.

Picture of yours truly by Duane Stanford, at a Hottie Bop headshot social (2023).

Class Syllabus

The following is a general outline of subjects that we will cover in class. Additions and subtractions will be made according to student interest and competency.

The Foundations of New York City will focus on three broad domains of NYC: history, political theory, and political practice. They’ll all be addressed in an integrated fashion, rather than in sequence or isolation.

History is vital, because it reveals why New York is the way it is. Cities are the product of path dependency and lock-in effects, and you shouldn’t govern if you don’t take these into account, because you’ll be producing them no matter what you do.

Political theory is necessary to inspire and motivate. It examines how government has been formed and revised in the past, and gives us the knowledge about how we might do it again now and in the future.

Political practice, otherwise called political strategy, is the study of how to connect political means to political ends. How to do things, not vaguely bullshit with your friends about what someone should do. Politics is as sophisticated as any science, and we will treat it that way. Some vital components of this field are knowledge of the governing structures of the city themselves, and the political players within them.

History:

  • The consolidation of New York City in 1898

    • Why consolidate?

    • Effects of consolidation and the last Mayor of Brooklyn

    • The consolidated government and the Board of Estimate

  • Consolidation to WW2: it’s time to build

    • Subway expansion

    • The Bronx: an instant city

    • 1916 Zoning Resolution

    • Skyscrapers!

    • Urban renewal and the Progressive Era

    • The Port of New York and New Jersey, 1921

    • New York City Housing Authority (NYCHA), 1934

  • 1960s: turning points

    • The Death and Life of Great American Cities, by Jane Jacobs, 1961

    • 1961 Zoning Resolution (!!)

    • Along comes the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA), 1968

    • Preservationism: the Landmarks Preservation Commission (LPC), the Landmarks Law, historic districts, the fight to save Carnegie Hall, and the demolition of Pennsylvania Station, 1961-1965

    • Urban renewal continues: the demolition of Lincoln Square, the rise of Lincoln Center (with a cameo from President Eisenhower), 1955—1969

  • The 1970s: change and turmoil

    • The twin towers completed in 1973

    • The Power Broker in 1974 and the end of Robert Moses

    • City bankruptcy of 1975, the intervention of Albany

    • The charter revisions of 1975, Uniform Land Use Review Procedure (ULURP) and Community Boards

    • The near-demolition of Grand Central Station (1975-1978); compare to the preservation fights of the previous decade

    • The blackout of 1977: literal and spiritual

  • The charter commission of 1989 and Board of Estimate of City of New York v. Morris

  • The ghosts of Jane Jacobs and Robert Moses, how they haunt the city, and whether to exorcize them

Political theory:

  • Case studies of creation and revision:

    • 1898 consolidation of NYC and the first city charter

    • NYC charter revisions of 1975 and 1989

  • Maximum New York’s political philosophy

Political practice:

  • The NYC government

    • Charter, Local Laws, Resolutions, The Rules, Administrative Code, Parliamentary Procedure, the Zoning Resolution, the Chancellor’s Regulations

    • Branches: Mayor, City Council, Comptroller, Public Advocate, Executive and Administrative Agencies, Borough Presidents, Borough Boards, Community Boards/Districts and co-terminality

    • The Unified Court System of New York State, local courts, and district attorneys

    • Elections, ballot access, and political party governing structure

    • Budget: Expense, Capital, Contract, and Revenue; dependence on Albany and DC.

    • The boroughs: what do they do? Why do we have counties?

    • ULURP: case study on the nature of governmental review and public comment

    • Local authorities, public-private partnerships, and a mini-module on corporations and corporate law: The New York City Economic Development Corporation and the Central Park Conservancy case studies

  • Tracking government and keeping up-to-date

  • The city’s external dependencies: NYC in the federal system

    • The NYS government

    • Other state (and national!) governments

    • The U.S. government

    • Public authorities

      • MTA (Metropolitan Transportation Authority)

      • NYCHA (New York City Housing Authority)

      • The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey

    • Public sector unions and collective bargaining

  • Various topics in city politics:

    • The players and their stage

    • Put up or shut up: the epistemic value of prediction markets in politics

    • Housing: NYCHA, markets, LPC, and zoning

    • Transit: why is it the way that it is?

    • Procurement and city purchasing

    • Law enforcement, Rikers, and the NYPD

    • Other topics that surface during the course

1

“Political Science Degrees Must End” (Golliher, 2023)