My time in Amsterdam taught me redundancy is better than efficiency, few distinctions matter as much as the one between a mommy state and a nanny state, and if you want peace in your town, make it porous (streets and neighborhoods easy to get to and through), shops for daily essentials and weekly needs within ten minutes from anyone's home, and a safety net for those who might need it rather than one only for those who must cling to a thread just to prove themselves.
What America has been teaching me since I got back (a few years ago), is that a virtuous cycle begins with the citizenry, that virtue means rule of law, a middle class majority, and science does better than whim and greed when it comes to setting national policy. Also, that we are close—so close—to a turning the wheel to a time when your grandkids and the grandkids of your enemy will chill with one an another. But we have to turn it together—do it—rather than talk about it
I don’t know what you mean by mommy state and nanny state.