When David Cameron and Boris Johnson boasted that the Olympic venues had been delivered on time and "on budget", international observers may have seen it as confirmation that the UK is good at big projects. As well as the successful Olympic preparation, this year has seen a hitch-free royal wedding and major global sporting competitions at Wimbledon, Silverstone and Royal St George's running as smoothly and profitably as usual.
It's not just events (which by their nature have to be delivered on time). The Channel Tunnel rail link, the renovation of St Pancras and the Jubilee Line extension show how we can get big projects right . Why then can't we summon up the mixture of political leadership and public support needed to modernise and maintain our basic infrastructure? We are building houses at about a third of the rate needed, our transport system is outdated, our sewers are crumbling, our waste management is poor and question marks hang over our ability to develop an energy infrastructure which can deliver both sustainability and security of supply.
What can explain this contrast and can anything be done about it? In the face of the intractability of infrastructure development, some use the excuse of national geography. But while being a small, crowded country makes some things more difficult (finding space for houses and train lines), it should make others (creating economies of scale) easier.
Of more relevance may be aspects of our national character. Whatever the human cost of violent revolution or a defeat in war, such events can help associate the central state with the idea of national mission and renewal. The evolutionary compromises of the British constitution bequeath our national leaders few such pretensions. On the upside, our system of government is among the most open and accountable in the world. On the downside, it leaves government and their civil service advisers lacking the legitimacy to forge ahead with projects which rely on a faith in the long term to offset short-term disruption and costs.
The consequences of our historical predisposition only to trust the state at times of national emergency (even then grudgingly) are reinforced by the adversarial winner-takes-all electoral system which we have recently voted to keep. The length of time in infrastructure projects between the pain of writing cheques and the pleasure of cutting ribbons means ministers have little incentive to make sacrifices today, the benefits of which will be enjoyed by a different government of the future.
But there is a deeper problem still with our democratic culture, one that affects our ability to update our creaking infrastructure but also many other policy areas, from the funding of social care to the allocation of school places. As the old, class-based political order declined from the 1960s on, it was replaced by the myth of democracy as consumerism. In line with a neo-liberal ideology which equated the private sector and markets with efficiency and virtue and the state and politicians with ineptitude, the notion that "the customer is always right" was translated into the focus group techniques of market research.
But the voter isn't always right. The opinions people express when first asked a question can change dramatically when they are furnished with a few basic facts. And most of us hold apparently contradictory positions. As Ben Page from Ipsos MORI says, the British people have a simple desire: "A Scandinavian welfare state on American taxes." There's nothing wrong with public debt if it is incurred by investing in the future. But the debt mountain threatening to engulf Europe and the USA is different. It is in large part the manifestation of the politicians being afraid to tell the more privileged that there is a limit to the number of times they can have their cake and eat it.
Going back to infrastructure, confused public opinion extends to localism where we simultaneously demand more affordable housing for our children while rejecting any being built where we live. The National Housing Federation reports that more than 200,000 houses have been removed from the planning system since the coalition's populist decision to scrap regional strategies. Without accepting, let alone addressing, the inherent tensions, ministers blithely promise to create a system which delivers on the commendable goals of accelerating growth within the current economy, laying the foundations for a radically different green economy of the future and handing power to neighbourhoods.
So what needs to change? In the face of poor policy-making and public cynicism, the debate about democratic reform tends to focus on institutions and processes but more important are the terms of public discourse. Genuinely good governance moves us beyond our innate human tendencies to self-interest and short-termism to identify a coherent idea of enlightened public interest.
History tells us democracies are better stewards of the environment and that the flipside of the grand plans of dictators are the destruction of communities, and disastrous follies which are only revealed years later. But as America divides over a budget deficit built up despite a failure to invest in infrastructure, it is far from clear that a gridlocked democracy is better suited to tomorrow's challenges than a technocratic autocracy.
In an open, querulous democracy such as ours, neither authoritarianism nor a return to deference is an option. Instead, we need a combination of new forms of public engagement and innovative policy-making. Citizens' juries may not be the best way to make detailed policy, but they can help build a consensus that action is necessary and that there are no pain- or controversy-free options. New forms of hypothecated and local taxation, charging and community investment can help to create incentives to act more in the long-term interest.
Ideas like these have been around for ages but our risk-averse, policy-making establishment still clings to the old ways. The citizens' juries Gordon Brown announced soon turned out to be a toothless listening exercise. The big society debate has seen lots of talk of new vehicles to encourage community investment in local infrastructure, but cash-strapped councils are sceptical and there is a chronic shortage of starter capital.
The Olympics show the public can get behind a major national project and that we have the management, engineering and construction skills we need. But from sewers to power stations, the infrastructure deficit continues to grow and today's problems pale by comparison to the challenges which could be posed by 21st-century resource shortages and climate change. There are no immovable deadlines or international competitions to force the state or private sector to invest for the future. The impetus will have to come from within our political system and at the moment that is severely in doubt. We may be good at organising sports events but we are still not winning the game of long-term leadership. Maybe it's time to consider new ways of playing.
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