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The Republican Assault on Democracy, Third (and Last) Part

I will keep it shorter today.  What follows is inspired by Ian Shapiro’s wonderful book, The State of Democratic Theory (Princeton UP, 2003).  He, in turn, derives his idea of “competitive democracy” from Joseph Schumpeter’s 1942 classic Capitalism, Socialism, and Democracy, a book that was still standard fare for undergrads when I was in college in the early 70s, but which seems to have dropped out of sight in the last fifteen years.

The basic idea is simple: it’s not a democracy unless the “outs” have a reasonable hope of someday becoming the “ins.” Another way to put the same idea: it’s not a democracy (in Iraq or anyplace else) unless you have had at least two peaceful transitions in which an incumbent party loses an election and hands over power to a rival party. 

The most obvious benefit of democracy, viewed this way, is peace.  The most important corollary benefit is that the opposition party plays a key role in keeping the party in power honest.  It is obviously in the opposition party’s interest to keep the public informed about the missteps and misdeeds of the administration party.  In other words, the opposition party is as crucial to ongoing publicity as a free press.  And publicity is a crucial safeguard (not the only one, but a crucial one) against governmental abuse of power. 

Democracy, in short, prevents one party rule.  Now, there’s a paradox here, since each of the rival parties can be expected to do everything it can to become the dominant party and to stay that way.  But, in fact, disaster will follow if any of the parties ever succeeds in getting what it wishes.  Because once you create a minority that is permanently on the outside, that loses the elections every single time, that minority has no incentive to stay inside the system.  They will be tempted to—and then will attempt—to secede.  Civil peace will yield to civil war.

Every democracy needs, in order to stay afloat, swing voters.  In fact, the more swing voters the better.  And, crucially, every democracy will be better off if the voting behavior of individual voters does not map predictably to ethnic, regional, sectarian, or class affiliations.  Take ethnicity, for example.  If 90% of the voters vote along ethnic lines, then there will not be much “give” in the electorate, and a winning ethnic configuration (be it a coalition of several ethnic groups or just one large ethnic group) can expect to repeat its success at the polls again and again.  Ethnic voters on the losing side will begin to feel permanently excluded. (That’s why democracy in Iraq is so iffy--as it is in any country where you can expect ethnically or religiously identified parties.  Unless there is some movement of voters from one party to the other, the lines of opposition will become firmly entrenched, thus lessening the chances of electoral swings and of peaceful hand-overs of power.)

So what’s the problem in 2005?  Basically, American democracy has been so remarkably stable (with the notable exceptions, to be discussed in a moment, of the Civil War and the Civil Rights conflicts) because our political parties have always run toward the center, have always aimed for inclusiveness.  They have—with the large and notable exception of racism—not advanced exclusionary platforms. (Exceptions like the Know-Nothings only suggest how little traction anti-immigrant and/or sectarian parties ever got in national politics.  Even Philip Roth’s counter-factual fantasy in The Plot Against America doesn’t imagine anti-Semitism prevailing very long in the United States. )

But today’s Republican Party is pursuing a policy of playing to its base and of demonizing its opponents as unfit to rule, as dangerous to America.  Yes, I see the irony; I’m doing the same thing apparently.  My only excuse is that I am fulminating not against what the Republics are using power—while they have it—to do, but against how the ways they are striving to get and maintain power endanger our democratic traditions and institutions.  I am running a form/content distinction if you will.  The content of what the Republicans do with power is legitimate so long as they work through the established democratic forms.  My argument is that Republicans tried to de-legitimize the Clinton presidency and keep it from accomplishing anything substantive by working outside the established forms.  They were so sure Clinton was a demon that they were willing to trash democracy in order to render him ineffective. And since gaining office, they have shown an equal willingness to trash democracy in order to make their own power more effective. They are utterly driven by content—and either have no understanding of or utter contempt for form.  Legal and procedural niceties are for sissies seems to sum up their basic, thuggish, approach to governing.

The more important point, however, is that they are hell bent on creating a majority that does not need to and has no desire to reach out to the opposition—either the opposition party or its opponents in the electorate.  And that’s the formula for civil strife.  There are few things worse in this world than sectarian violence.  Do the Republicans really know what fire they are playing with when they encourage sectarian divisiveness? 

And just look at the electoral map of the past two presidential elections.  The South and the West are lined up against the Pacific Coast States and the North.  We haven’t had such a regional divide since 1860.  How long can California and the Northeast be shut out from national power?  A population hardened into set divisions—i.e. a population without a big percentage of swing voters—is in bad shape; a population where those divisions correspond to geographic boundaries is really courting disaster.  The great Achilles heel of American history has been the relation to non-whites—and it has proved so threatening to the nation as a whole because it has made the South electorally monolithic.  If the South and West maintain their current coalition, we have a reversion to the regionalism that culminated in the Civil War.  Certainly, there is plenty of evidence to suggest that the South continues to be the fly in the ointment of American democracy.  It has never been as fluid in its awarding of votes in national elections as the other regions and that has been a constant problem.

Am I saying civil war is around the corner in America?  No. Certainly the past six years have shown that no one ever lost a bet overestimating the torpor of the general public.  As the bumper sticker has it, “If you aren’t outraged, you aren’t paying attention.” Seems like a lot of people aren’t paying attention. Less cynically, we can say that American life is good enough on a day to day basis that tons of people have a stake in ongoing civil peace. 

What I am saying is that I think we have lost any sense of how our democracy functions—or that it may be much more fragile than we assume.  We are in a period of tremendous consolidation of power into the hands of the few, not only of the very wealthy but also of an almost permanently installed political class.  (The Democrats are as much to blame here as the Republicans; they have been full co-conspirators in establishing uncompetitive legislative districts and in the spiraling campaign costs that so favor incumbents.) We are taking our democracy for granted while engaging in political practices that undermine it.  We are assuming an immunity from civil strife that is hardly guaranteed. 

So where is the hope that I began this set of guest blogs espousing?  The first glimmer is that the people seem both more weary and more wary of the current partisanship than hard-core political types (of which I am obviously one.  I cannot imagine what could ever bring me to vote Republican, which means, as a decidedly non-swing voter, I’m part of the problem, not part of the solution.) Just like the people wouldn’t let the Republicans drive Clinton out of office, so I hope that we can count on them to rein in Republican and sectarian excess.  All of which means that I still rest my faith on a Democratic Party that goes to the country with a unifying message about fostering a prosperity and a freedom in which all can share.  Because, as I also said in that first post, if the people don’t choose to sustain democracy against all that threatens it, democracy will not be sustained. 

Posted by on 06/10 at 12:59 PM

  1. Good series. Very thought provoking.

    Posted by Steinn Sigurdsson  on  06/10  at  01:21 PM

  2. Excellent job. I can’t imagine myself voting for a Republican either. But I could have imagined it, before BushCo took over.

    I was intrigued by the speculation around Colin Powell entering the race a few years ago. I have thought highly of John McCain, thinking that while I don’t agree with his politics, I thought he would try and be a president for all Americans, not just the few he owes favors to or grew up around.

    But no more. These two in particular and all current Repub politicos have, through the merging of the religious right with the wealthy, made a deal with the devil in return for power. But if a Teddy Roosevelt should rise one day from the ashes of the GOP, I’d give him or her a serious look. I just can’t imagine that happening.

    Posted by ccobb  on  06/10  at  01:53 PM

  3. While I’m happy to hear that Michael’s recovered, I’ll miss your excellent analyses, as demonstrated by this series, John. Maybe you can return and offer what you think that ‘unifying message’ should be.

    Posted by Kevin Hayden  on  06/10  at  03:19 PM

  4. Amen, brother. Great series. I know, as a reformed Republican, I can’t imagine voting for those people for anything.

    As for Teddy (and Abe), if they suddenly returned, they’d be Dems!

    Posted by  on  06/10  at  03:54 PM

  5. Let me add my voice to the chorus of thanks, John. I’ve very much enjoyed your sojourn here. I look forward to reading more at your blog, and I am grateful to Michael for my introduction to your work.

    And I hope you’ll take what I have to say about this post in the collegial spirit in which it’s intended.

    Going point by point:

    Democracy, in short, prevents one party rule.

    You haven’t made that case. In fact, your piece goes on to argue against it. What you have laid out - and admirably well - is the set of conditions necessary for democracy to survive: an honest and forthright opposition party, a majority party that prizes bipartisanship, a truly free press, an electorate each member of which votes his or her conscience. But to say that democracy prevent one-party rule is, I think, to invert the syllogism.

    As you so ably point out, in fact:

    The more important point, however, is that they are hell bent on creating a majority that does not need to and has no desire to reach out to the opposition—either the opposition party or its opponents in the electorate.

    How would that be possible if Democracy “prevented” one-party rule? Under a number of conditions, including the conditions we currently enjoy, democracy makes one party rule possible, creating conditions under which a sustained campaign by a vanishingly small minority of well-connected people can fundamentally alter the terms of political discourse, moving the “center” deep into the domain of their own party’s former ideological territory, then consolidating power as a result.

    Further…

    Basically, American democracy has been so remarkably stable (with the notable exceptions, to be discussed in a moment, of the Civil War and the Civil Rights conflicts) because our political parties have always run toward the center, have always aimed for inclusiveness.

    Isn’t there a contradiction between those last two “always"es?  Running toward the center implies a turning away from disparate points of view, a meshing of the official POVs closest to what is defined as the “center.” One can very easily view American history as a series of conflicts with the excluded, and though you note two of the most pivotal conflicts involving some folks’ exclusion from power, there are dozens of others. I need reach no further than the other side of my bed for an example of people with whom the US has not “always aimed for inclusiveness”: aside from being female, my wife is part of a family with a long legacy of encountering legal and illegal discrimination under rubrics such as the Chinese Exclusion Act. The name of that law couldn’t be much clearer now, could it?

    Lastly:

    And just look at the electoral map of the past two presidential elections.  The South and the West are lined up against the Pacific Coast States and the North.  We haven’t had such a regional divide since 1860.  How long can California and the Northeast be shut out from national power?  A population hardened into set divisions—i.e. a population without a big percentage of swing voters—is in bad shape; a population where those divisions correspond to geographic boundaries is really courting disaster.

    To tell you the truth, I’m a little surprised at this argument. The geographic division you describe is for the most part an artifact of the Electoral Vote system. Confronted with the Fox News graphics showing a red sea across the heartland, people did a lot of number crunching in the second week of November, 2004. And (as I expect you will recall) the results do not support such a clean geographic partition of the US. There is a rural-urban divide, to be sure, but those political faultlines don’t run along “South Canada - Jesusland” lines so much as along the stucco walls that divide center cities from gated suburban communities. Correct the map to account for population density, and the broad geographical divides become even less important.

    All that said, I definitely found this piece thought-provoking, and I’ll be following you over to your blog. I promise I won’t always nitpick like this.

    Posted by Chris Clarke  on  06/10  at  05:01 PM

  6. Ditto on appreciation for the most worthy John; the tenor’s certainly been different in these parts lately.

    Last time I pulled for a Repub over a Demo was in Ford vs. Carter.  Granted, I was a callous teenager with inchoate, ill-informed political opinions-- more of a normal American.  Only “reason” for preferring Ford was that Carter rubbed me wrong on some vague gut level.

    But boy, were those times unlike the present.

    Posted by  on  06/10  at  05:20 PM

  7. if only ian shapiro would extend such a framework to look at his own graduate students, maybe he wouldn’t have spent half of the last ten years shilling for the union-busting antics of the Yale administration…

    Posted by  on  06/10  at  10:40 PM

  8. Thanks.  I have to admit I came here to see if Berube was back, but I read the last 3 posts and am glad I did.

    I often think we should not criticize the many apolitical folks, even the non-voters.  They are the residual swing votes we need to keep the democracy going.  It is nice to see you saying something similar.

    Posted by  on  06/10  at  11:45 PM

  9. I linked to this post in a diary on BooMan Tribune:

    http://www.boomantribune.com/story/2005/6/10/143214/471

    and on dKos:

    http://www.dailykos.com/story/2005/6/10/181131/283

    Posted by Aaron Barlow  on  06/11  at  09:34 AM

  10. I, too, have really enjoyed this series, John. Thanks for it!

    I have a number of thoughts about this post, but I wanted to start with a concern about where you begin. Although I haven’t read the Shapiro book, I have some misgivings of any discussion of democracy that uses Schumpeter as a starting point. Let me apologize off the bat for the length of this comment, but these are important and complicated issues.

    I agree that Capitalism, Socialism, and Democracy, still more or less essential reading when I was in college in the mid-’80s, has seemed to become something of a forgotten classic. It shouldn’t be. Schumpeter’s book is fascinating, brilliant, and challenging. However, I also think it’s dangerously wrong about a number of fundamental issues.

    Among other things, Schumpeter argues that (what he calls) socialism will inevitably replace capitalism, but that (what he calls) democracy is not incompatible (though by no means required by) the coming socialism.  What makes this argument unusual is that Schumpeter was very much a man of the old European right, who had no real sympathy for either socialism or democracy. Indeed, during the 1930s and 1940s, having moved to the US from his native Austria and taken up a position at Harvard, his hatred of Communism and the New Deal led him dangerously close to a sort of Nazi sympathizing by default.

    Schumpeter believed that elite rule was both necessary and good; the people neither could nor should be in charge. Not surprisingly, his peculiar definition of democracy reflected these beliefs. Schumpeter explicitly set aside what he called the “classical doctrine of democracy” which concerned issues like the common good, and instead offered the following definition:  “the democratic method is that institutional arrangement for arriving at political decisions in which individuals acquire the power to decide by means of a competititve struggle for the people’s vote.” John is correct that, in Schumpeter’s view, true political competition is a necessary part of democracy. But just as significantly a part of this view is the absolute separation between “the people,” whose political activity starts and stops with casting their votes, and the elite individuals who are actually ruling and making decisions.

    For perhaps obvious reasons, this new vision of democracy became very important during the 1950s (C,S, and D was published during World War II, but really didn’t get much attention until after the war ended), when Cold War liberal pluralist political scientists saw in it a way to judge democracies in a “value neutral” manner that drew a clear line between (good) democratic political behavior (voting) and (bad) mass political behavior (other kinds of political activity by “the people"). Schumpeter’s definition of “democracy” also cleanly excised any social democratic meaning from the word.  Democracy was about voting, not about more equal distribution of other social and economic goods.

    Those of you interested in these issues with easy access to back issues of academic journals might want to check out a paper by John Madearis, “Schumpeter, the New Deal, and Democracy” in The American Political Science Review, vol. 91, no. 4 (Dec. 1997), 819-832.  I’ll conclude this overly long comment with an overly long quotation from the end of Madearis’ piece:

    “Both the force of arguments for democratic participation and the actual historical significance of struggles over the scope of inclusion and participation are lost when democracy is viewed merely as an institutional arrangement fostering elite competition.  So, too, are the importance of ideals such as freedom, equality, and human development – along with their significance in motivating and gathering adherence to democratic movements.  Again, the possibility and significance of demands that social and economic institutions be democratized are simply lost to a conception that defines democracy, a priori, as an arrangement of political institutions. And all these losses are aspects of a broader one:  the loss of the ability to view democratization as a transformative historical tendency in liberal societies, a tendency linked to concrete battles for expanded participation, arguments for the realization of democratic values, and movements to democratize and restructure social and economic institutions.”

    Posted by  on  06/12  at  12:08 PM

  11. A clarification: when I said that Capitalism, Socialism, and Democracy shouldn’t be a forgotten classic, I meant that it shouldn’t be forgotten, not that it shouldn’t be a classic.

    Posted by  on  06/12  at  06:39 PM

  12. The basic idea is simple: it’s not a democracy unless the “outs” have a reasonable hope of someday becoming the “ins.... Since gaining office, [Republicans] have shown an equal willingness to trash democracy in order to make their own power more effective. They are utterly driven by content-and either have no understanding of or utter contempt for form.  Legal and procedural niceties are for sissies seems to sum up their basic, thuggish, approach to governing.

    This is a thought-provoking piece, and I agree on the theory-but it’s a case where what you see depends on where you sit.  I hope you will agree that most of the content-driven policy-making has been on culture-war issues; you have to look at what has happened from the conservative side.

    On most of the culture-war issues of the last 55 years, the “outs” have had no reasonable chance of becoming the “ins”-and the clearer that became, the less willing cultural conservatives have been to play along with “legal and procedural norms” that seem designed to lock them out.

    It started with Brown, which broke the Solid South.  Remember, Brown was not a democratic decision, nor did it follow any procedural niceties; it ignored 70 years of precedent, and the laws of the majority of the country, and ended up being enforced by using Federal troops to do domestic police work.  It was a liberal (freedom-based) decision, but it wasn’t democratic, and it couldn’t be overturned democratically.

    Then came Murray v. Curlett / Abington Township v. Schempp-the school prayer cases.  Again, the decision went against long-established precedent and the practices of much (probably most) of the country.  And again, there was no way that it could be changed by the normal democratic process.

    Ditto for Roe v Wade; ditto for Lawrence; and given the Loving precedent, court-mandated recognition of same-sex marriage could easily follow the same path.

    Becoming your enemy is always a risk; I think that the cultural conservatives have fallen into it, but--it is easy to see why “legal and procedural niceties” are being ignored, when you realize that cultural conservatives have been losing battles where the other side wasn’t constrained by those niceties, and they were, for 50 years.

    Posted by  on  06/17  at  01:09 PM

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