Podcast Summary: "577 | Steve Teles: Why the Realignment Has Made Think Tanks More Relevant Than Ever"

Podcast: The Realignment
Air Date: October 7, 2025
Hosts: Marshall Kosloff
Guest: Steve Teles, Senior Fellow at the Niskanen Center; Professor of Political Science at Johns Hopkins University

Episode Overview

In this episode, Marshall Kosloff and Steve Teles explore the role and growing relevance of think tanks amid America’s ongoing political realignment. Using the Niskanen Center as a primary case study, they discuss how think tanks shape policy, build coalitions, and attempt to foster transpartisanship in an era marked by ideological polarization and shifting party identities. The episode also compares the evolution of think tanks on the left and right, their unique institutional identities, and the updated demands placed on these institutions by the current policy landscape.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. What is the Niskanen Center? (00:07–04:02)

• Background:
  • Marshall, now a full-time Niskanen staffer, often gets asked what exactly the Niskanen Center is ([00:07]).
  • Steve Teles details his academic background and involvement with Niskanen since 2017, shortly after the Trump election.
  • As a “historical institutionalist,” Teles frames the evolution of Niskanen as a response to post-2016 turbulence, emphasizing the need for a think tank that could build relationships across the ideological spectrum ([01:14]).
  • Niskanen was conceived as a place for “strange bedfellows” coalitions—not merely centrist or bipartisan work, but alliances that cut against standard partisan divides.

“I did kind of think of this as my war work. Right. That this was going to be a really weird era. And my sense was that it was going to be really important to have some think tank that had relationships with Republicans, with conservatives during that period.”
— Steve Teles ([01:45])

2. The Value and Changing Role of Think Tanks (04:02–06:38)

• Think Tanks Skepticism:
  • Marshall notes cynicism around think tanks—perceptions of endless unread white papers and pointless panels ([04:02]).
  • He argues their real value lies in doing the deep, necessary policy thinking that political actors (especially in turbulent times) don’t have bandwidth for.
• Periods of Stability vs. Realignment:
  • In stable eras (1990s–2000s), party identities and coalitions were clear, reducing the demand for think tanks’ big-picture theorizing.
  • In volatile “realignment” periods like today, everything is up for grabs—requiring more intellectual innovation and coalition-building.

“In periods like this realignment period over the past decade, I think everything is up for grabs. There are these weird straight... new issues...what I’ve found with my peers...is, I don’t have time to think about all this.”
— Marshall Kosloff ([05:15])

3. The Evolution of Think Tank Models (06:38–16:05)

• Different Generations and Models:
  • Steve provides a historical tour: RAND as a government contractor/research hub, Brookings as a “university without students” focused on quality research, Heritage as a "Party Research Office" akin to European party think tanks ([06:38–12:12]).
  • Heritage is intentionally designed to serve the Republican party, while Brookings avoids explicit partisanship despite its center-left orientation.
  • “Mandate for Leadership” (Heritage’s playbook for Reagan’s day one) set the precedent for think tanks generating explicit policy blueprints—replicated with Project 2025 and Project 2029.

“The idea of a think tank that basically works for a party is a very European model…That’s essentially what Heritage is...created to serve Republican House members.”
— Steve Teles ([08:20])

• Hybrid/New Models:
  • Niskanen, Institute for Progress (IFP), and Foundation for American Innovation (FAI) represent a new type: they blend “50,000ft” philosophical synthesis with granule policy analysis/coalition-building, neither wholly academic nor solely advocacy organs.
  • These think tanks seek out uncoded, cross-partisan issues and push for transpartisan coalitions.

“Whereas [Heritage is] always looking for what’s the issue that isn’t already completely coded in that particular way. And that’s what a lot of our people in our policy groups do.”
— Steve Teles ([15:01])

4. The Challenge of Institutional Identity (22:04–29:30)

• Why is identity harder for hybrid think tanks?
  • Marshall describes the straightforward branding claims of traditional and explicitly partisan think tanks (Heritage, Brookings). In contrast, Niskanen and similar orgs operate in the ambiguous middle zone ([22:04–25:20]).
  • Their relevance often comes from low-profile, high-impact technical expertise (ex: housing regulations, energy transmission) rather than broad, brandable visions.

“If our number one goal is to get attention, we’re going to rebrand ourselves as the D.C. center for abundance. ...But there is just a tension here.”
— Marshall Kosloff ([24:45])

• Outputs:
  • Niskanen produces granular, technical policy reports and big-picture theory papers (“Cost Disease Socialism,” “Varieties of Abundance”).
  • These outputs shape both immediate policy and long-term ways of framing debate.

“That was a big 50,000ft kind of way of saying everybody’s thinking about policy in the wrong way...we need to do it with supply.”
— Steve Teles ([27:05])

5. Nature of Coalition-Building (18:13–22:04; 30:32–34:55)

• CAP vs. Heritage:
  • Center for American Progress (CAP) was intended as a Democratic Heritage, but became an appendage of the party, lacking the forward-driving ideological independence that makes conservative think tanks proactive.
• Transpartisan Innovation:
  • Niskanen, IFP, FAI, and similar orgs focus on low-salience issues and cross-ideological, sometimes “weird” coalitions—often supporting bills with unexpected sponsors (e.g., Tim Scott + Elizabeth Warren on housing).
• Think Tanks as “Legislative Subsidy”:
  • Teles describes think tanks as providing the research, network-building, and tactical knowhow that allows overlooked or cross-party initiatives to coalesce.

“Legislative subsidy…what Cato...wasn’t doing right, as it wasn’t...in these offices, helping members do the kind of things that lobbyists do.”
— Steve Teles ([33:24])

6. Defending Think Tanks’ Relevance Today (34:55–40:44)

• Why Do Think Tanks Still Matter?
  • Marshall and Steve push back against think tanks’ critics, emphasizing the renewed demand for coalition brokering and deep policy expertise amid polarization and realignment.
  • The “market” for new ideas and legislative coalitions has never been greater, and think tanks that operate outside the old party-overlap, “bipartisan” model are better suited for this era.
• Pragmatism vs. Philosophy:
  • Steve clarifies that Niskanen’s approach is pragmatic out of necessity, but ultimately rooted in a classical liberal philosophy: pro-market, pro-social-architecture, emphasizing competition and creative destruction accompanied by supportive welfare-state institutions.

“We can’t get enough of creative destruction…But you have to actually build supportive welfare state institutions so that people aren’t constantly worried that if their job gets taken away, that they’re just going to be destitute.”
— Steve Teles ([38:01])

7. Think Tanks and Democracy (40:44–55:34)

• Evolving Classical Liberalism:
  • Niskanen’s identity has evolved alongside the “mugging by reality” of traditional libertarian/conservative policymakers—the necessity of government action and coalition crossovers in the wake of Trump- and populism-driven disruption ([40:44–48:16]).
  • The classical liberal tradition is now viewed as a broad church, containing Keynes and Hayek, and emphasizing “the need for lots of social architecture to make a free society work” ([39:30]).
• Think Tanks as Democratic Actors:
  • Teles argues that think tanks advance democracy by providing essential information and countervailing expertise that enables ordinary interests to counter rent-seeking (whether from doctors, homeowners, or legacy licensure groups) ([49:41–53:43]).
  • By facilitating “secret congress” coalitions, they foster policy innovation that isn’t simply party-driven, but taps into latent majoritarian preferences or under-organized constituencies.

“One thing think tank work can do is…supply those people who are trying to create countervailing power...with all of the tools to do that democratic, majoritarian kind of work.”
— Steve Teles ([53:43])

• Performing Democracy:
  • The YIMBY movement is given as a prime example of a policy campaign that is both center-coded and mass-participatory, which think tanks can support by providing data, organizing concepts, and technical knowhow ([52:03–53:43]).

8. Bipartisanship vs. Transpartisanship (55:34–57:34)

• Steve distinguishes:
  • Bipartisanship: Building coalitions from the (now non-existent) overlap between left and right.
  • Transpartisanship: Fostering coalitions on issues that cut across established party lines or create “strange bedfellows” through a shared interest in lower-salience or cross-cutting issues. This is the only viable path amid polarization.

“There is no center right in Congress...So, transpartisan [work] is about imagining, well, how do we actually get coalitions of people who don’t have any ideological overlap...”
— Steve Teles ([55:59])

Notable Quotes

• “I always answer the question about what something is by talking about how it came into being.”
  — Steve Teles ([01:21])

• “Think tanks as a model get a ton of shit…but at our best, we can, for our different factions, our different parties, actually do that thinking in a way that needs to be collaborative and democratic.”
  — Marshall Kosloff ([05:52])

• “Transpartisanship as trying to find coalitions between the parties in a world that’s really optimized for a high degree of polarization.”
  — Steve Teles ([56:41])

Key Timestamps for Reference

• [00:07] Origins and mission of the Niskanen Center
• [06:38] Definitions: What is a think tank? Historical models
• [12:12] Heritage, party think tanks, and "Project 2025"
• [16:05] Why left-leaning (Democratic) think tanks face different challenges than right-leaning ones
• [22:04] Identity constraints for Niskanen and its peers; what makes a “brand”
• [27:03] Example: “Cost Disease Socialism”’s impact on policy
• [33:24] “Legislative subsidy:” Think tanks as coalition facilitators
• [38:01] Niskanen’s classical liberal foundation
• [49:41] Think tanks and democracy/rent-seeking
• [52:03] YIMBY and performing democracy
• [55:41] Transpartisanship vs. bipartisanship
• [57:34] Episode wrap-up and thanks

Tone and Language

• The conversation is reflective, intellectual, and conversational, with frank acknowledgment of institutional challenges and openness to ideological complexity.
• Both speakers emphasize storytelling, coalition-building, and practical, adaptive approaches to real-world policymaking.
• Teles provides historical and theoretical depth, while Kosloff grounds the discussion in practical, current institutional dilemmas.

Final Word

The episode makes a compelling case that as America’s political, ideological, and institutional landscapes shift, think tanks that can straddle divides—scanning for new coalitions, providing deep research, and adapting to unexpected alliances—are more relevant than ever. Rather than being obsolete, modern think tanks that are neither purely academic nor narrowly partisan have a vital role to play in reweaving the social and policy fabric in times of realignment.