'Our implicit “social contract,” developed in the post-war period, has become deeply dysfunctional and needs re-negotiation. We need to rekindle a more freedom-oriented politics.'
We do seem to be in an era of regime-level politics. We're not arguing so much about how high income taxes should be or what the healthcare market should look like (although those debates are ongoing), but rather the fundamental character of the polity. Who are we? What are our non-negotiables? Who decides?
These are inherently high-stakes questions. Burke worried social tranquility was impossible when politics approaches first-principles territory. Perhaps he was right.
Agree with this, and would only add that on the question "who decides" it seems like the real opinion of most Americans is, "I don't want either of these parties running my life. More choices, please?"
My read on the situation is that for most of American history the political parties were first and foremost coalitions of groups - ethnic groups, interest groups, business groups, etc. Yes they leaned right or left, but in the 1950's there were conservative Democrats in Congress along with liberal Republicans. This seems to be what the American system was really designed for.
Then in the late 1960's the Republicans realized that there are more conservatives than liberals, and they are geographically well distributed. If they could get the overwhelming majority of conservatives to vote for Republicans, they could become the dominant party. Starting with the 1968 elections you see a multi-generation project of getting the parties to sort by ideology, led by the Republicans. Nixon, Reagan and Gingrich were the main leaders in this realignment.
This has been a slow process, and it was resisted strongly by the Democratic Party. In the 1990's there were more Democrats who identified as conservative than liberal. When Obama was elected in 2008 there were Democratic senators in West Virginia, the Dakotas, Nebraska, Louisiana, Arkansas and a bunch of other red states. Now they're all gone, mainly due to the 2010 and 2014 midterms. Joe Manchin was the last of them. The Democratic Party still wins the overwhelming majority of black Americans - many of whom are conservative. As we get further from the civil rights era though, we're seeing some of those voters shifting to the Republicans.
The reason I bring this up is that the American system is fundamentally not equipped to deal with ideologically unified political parties in the way that European parliamentary systems are. Gerrymandering and the Senate dramatically reduce the number of competitive elections in any given cycle. This gives disproportionate influence to primaries, where the party's most hardcore supporters vote in. An incentive structure is created where the most successful politicians are NOT the ones who are great at winning swing voters, but rather people who are great at winning factional battles within their party.
All of this means that the quality of our leaders gets worse and worse over time.
The philosophy of voting is a funny thing. I consider voting in large contemporary democracies as a "necessary lie", a collective suspension of disbelief to preserve a system where change of leadership is non-violent.
'Our implicit “social contract,” developed in the post-war period, has become deeply dysfunctional and needs re-negotiation. We need to rekindle a more freedom-oriented politics.'
We do seem to be in an era of regime-level politics. We're not arguing so much about how high income taxes should be or what the healthcare market should look like (although those debates are ongoing), but rather the fundamental character of the polity. Who are we? What are our non-negotiables? Who decides?
These are inherently high-stakes questions. Burke worried social tranquility was impossible when politics approaches first-principles territory. Perhaps he was right.
Agree with this, and would only add that on the question "who decides" it seems like the real opinion of most Americans is, "I don't want either of these parties running my life. More choices, please?"
Which leads us back to "a politics of freedom."
My read on the situation is that for most of American history the political parties were first and foremost coalitions of groups - ethnic groups, interest groups, business groups, etc. Yes they leaned right or left, but in the 1950's there were conservative Democrats in Congress along with liberal Republicans. This seems to be what the American system was really designed for.
Then in the late 1960's the Republicans realized that there are more conservatives than liberals, and they are geographically well distributed. If they could get the overwhelming majority of conservatives to vote for Republicans, they could become the dominant party. Starting with the 1968 elections you see a multi-generation project of getting the parties to sort by ideology, led by the Republicans. Nixon, Reagan and Gingrich were the main leaders in this realignment.
This has been a slow process, and it was resisted strongly by the Democratic Party. In the 1990's there were more Democrats who identified as conservative than liberal. When Obama was elected in 2008 there were Democratic senators in West Virginia, the Dakotas, Nebraska, Louisiana, Arkansas and a bunch of other red states. Now they're all gone, mainly due to the 2010 and 2014 midterms. Joe Manchin was the last of them. The Democratic Party still wins the overwhelming majority of black Americans - many of whom are conservative. As we get further from the civil rights era though, we're seeing some of those voters shifting to the Republicans.
The reason I bring this up is that the American system is fundamentally not equipped to deal with ideologically unified political parties in the way that European parliamentary systems are. Gerrymandering and the Senate dramatically reduce the number of competitive elections in any given cycle. This gives disproportionate influence to primaries, where the party's most hardcore supporters vote in. An incentive structure is created where the most successful politicians are NOT the ones who are great at winning swing voters, but rather people who are great at winning factional battles within their party.
All of this means that the quality of our leaders gets worse and worse over time.
By the way you are right about Europe. Unfortunately.
The philosophy of voting is a funny thing. I consider voting in large contemporary democracies as a "necessary lie", a collective suspension of disbelief to preserve a system where change of leadership is non-violent.
Rachel for president?