What is the matter with American politics?
What is the matter with American politics?
The American political system is dominated by liberal Democrats who are either opposed to progress or do not understand its importance and conservative Republicans who prefer nostalgia for the past.
The following is an excerpt from my second book Promoting Progress: A Radical New Agenda to Create Abundance for All. You can order e-books at a discounted price at my website, or you can purchase for full price on Amazon.
Other books in my “From Poverty to Progress” book series:
See my other articles on Electoral Reform:
What is the matter with American politics? (this article)
To reform our policy, we must first reform our electoral system
Reforming the Political Process
Part One of this book presents a series of reforms of the political process to make it possible for supporters of Progress to achieve political representation. Because the American political system is dominated by liberal Democrats who are either opposed to progress or do not understand its importance and conservative Republicans who prefer nostalgia for the past over progress, we must focus on political reform first. Only by reforming the political system can supporters of Progress acquire representation in the political system.
Our current political system is undermining progress because it violates many of the concepts within the Five Keys to Progress and How Progress Works. The current American political system:
Concentrates political power into the hands of very liberal Democrats and very conservative Republicans
Highly restricts competition between political parties
Makes it very difficult for new parties to be formed and become competitive
Overcentralizes power into the hands of the federal government
Restricts the ability of local and state governments to experiment with different policies
Makes it very difficult to identify and implement policies that actually work.
Promoting Political Competition
The Third Key to Progress: Decentralized political, economic, religious and ideological power. Of particular importance are elites being forced into transparent, non-violent competition that undermines their ability to forcibly extract wealth from the masses. This also allows citizens to freely choose among institutions based upon what they have offer to each individual and society in general.
The bulk of this book is devoted to rolling back government policies that undermine long-term economic growth. This chapter focuses on reforming political structures that enable those policies to be implemented.
Throughout my From Poverty to Progress book series, I argue that transparent, non-violent competition between elites is an essential precondition for human progress. This competition undermines their ability to forcibly extract wealth from the masses and allows citizens to freely choose among institutions based upon what they have offer to each individual and society in general. Unfortunately, the terms of competition among American political elites are becoming increasingly distorted and dysfunctional.
Given the current state of the American political process, I do not believe that a Progress-based reform agenda can be implemented without first fixing those problems. Virtually all political power in America is held by the Democratic party or the Republican party. The Democratic party is controlled by left-liberal activists that are hostile to progress, while the Republican party is controlled by conservative activists that are skeptical of progress. Both are more concerned about defeating their partisan opponents than advancing the necessary reforms.
The fundamental problem is that the terms of competition between political elites has been distorted by our electoral process. Rather than healthy win-win competition that promotes good governance, we have a win-lose competition where ideologues win at the expense of the American people. Voters in the middle of the ideological spectrum are almost completely unrepresented and are growing increasingly alienated from the political system.
Of course, implementing these reforms does not guarantee that my proposed reform agenda will be implemented. Ultimately, that will be left up to the American people. But these political reforms would at least make it possible to implement a sweeping reform agenda.
This ideological polarization of American politics is the unintended outcome of many trends:
Complete domination of all political power by the two established parties. Independents and third parties have essentially no chance of winning elections. This is primarily caused by an electoral system that is based on plurality voting within single-member districts.
Declining electoral competition between Democrats and Republicans. Over 80% of Congressional seats are non-competitive with the winner known years before the election even takes place. This makes the vast majority of general elections meaningless.
The fact that each of the two parties selects their candidates via partisan primaries.
Very low turnout in partisan primaries. What little turnout there is in partisan primaries is dominated by ideological activists. These activists are overwhelmingly on the Left in the Democratic party primaries, and, they are overwhelmingly on the Right in the Republican party primaries.
Voters increasingly sorting themselves out geographically into “Red” states and “Blue” states.
The fact that Republicans in Blue states and Democrats in Red states thus get very little representation.
Gerrymandering to increase representation by the dominant party.
No real possibility for competitive third parties or Independents to emerge.
The media, social media, interest groups, and even non-political institutions are increasingly allying themselves with one of the dominant parties and then using their powers to vilify the other side to attract viewers, donors, and votes.
All of this is creating a toxic political culture that is increasingly fraying American culture and institutions.
The result of all of the above trends plus the centralization of government power at the federal level has resulted in a form of trench warfare between the two major parties. Neither of these parties represents anything close to the majority of American voters.
If the federal government were far weaker than it is today, many of these negative developments would be contained within a minority of states. In combination with an all-powerful federal government, these trends are fraying American culture and institutions. We must take steps to reverse as many of these trends as possible.
Declining Support for Major Parties
The combination of all the above trends has led to a serious decline in the support of the American people for the two major parties. In 2022, a clear majority of voters had negative views of each party; voters have 61% unfavorable versus 37% favorable views of Republicans, while Democrats have 57% unfavorable versus 41% favorable. About 27% of Americans have a negative view of both parties, almost four times the level in 1994 and 2002. This reaches 47% among Independents. Sadly, only 6% of Americans have a positive view of both parties (Pew).
More and more voters are supporting one of the parties not because they have a favorable view of that party but because they have an unfavorable view of the other party. Among Independents who lean to one party, only slightly more have a favorable opinion of their preferred party.
Independents who lean Republican have a 53% favorable versus 46% unfavorable view of the Republican party, while Independents who lean Democrat have exactly the same tepid level of support for their preferred party. Independent Leaners are also far more likely to give negative reasons for voting against a party rather than positive reasons for voting for a party (57-to-39% for Republican Leaners and 55-to-27% for Democratic Leaners).
Support for a third party is also quite high. In 2021 62% of Americans say that “a third party is needed,” while just 33% think that the two major parties “do an adequate job.” This is the highest support for third parties that has ever been recorded. In that same poll, 50% of Americans identified as Independents (Gallup).
The above was an excerpt from my second book Promoting Progress: A Radical New Agenda to Create Abundance for All. You can order prerelease e-books at a discounted price at my website, or you can purchase for full price on Amazon.
Other books in my “From Poverty to Progress” book series:
See my other articles on Electoral Reform:
What is the matter with American politics? (this article)
To reform our policy, we must first reform our electoral system