The American electoral system, and with it what passes for representative democracy, is facing a crisis of legitimacy reflected in continued fallout from the 2016 election. The duopoly political Parties—Democrats and Republicans, have both experienced mass exoduses for reasons specific to each. Because they have effective control over which candidates and programs get put forward in elections, they must be gotten out of the way for constructive political resolution to be possible.
The Republican Party saw a mass exodus of registered voters when George W. Bush’s war against Iraq became a conspicuous quagmire. By the time of the financial crisis that marked the onset of the Great Recession, some fair number had registered as Democrats while others dropped their duopoly Party affiliation to become what are implausibly called ‘independents.’
At the time it became apparent that the Obama administration was intent on restoring the forces of economic repression— Wall Street and corporate-state plutocracy, the Democrats saw their own mass exodus. Against the storyline of competing interests, registered voters fled both Parties. By implication, these mass exoduses suggest that neither duopoly Party represents the programs and candidates of interest to voters.
These mass exoduses have several implications: (1) with voters fleeing both duopoly Parties, it is the political system that has lost credibility, (2) the back-and-forth of faux ‘opposition’ that provided the illusion of political difference has lost potency as a driver of domestic politics and (3) charges that foreign influence determined the 2016 electoral outcomes are wholly implausible when placed in the context of the scale of voter disaffection with the duopoly Party system.
For instance, 71% of eligible voters didn’t vote for the Democratic Party candidate. 73% didn’t vote for Donald Trump (Clinton won the popular vote). Ninety million eligible voters (40%) didn’t cast a ballot at all. Why it makes sense to present outcomes in terms of what voters didn’t do is (1) the duopoly Parties control which candidates and programs are put forward and (2) voters have fled the duopoly Party system rather than simply switching Parties.
The political problem for the national Democrats is that one can endorse the very worst that can be said about their alleged opposition, the Republicans, without raising their standing. Between 2009 and 2016 somewhere between eight and ten million registered voters— 20% of registered Democrats, fled the Democratic Party. In conjunction with the loss of over 1,000 legislative seats over this same period, the Democrats were in the midst of a full blown political crisis going into the 2016 election.
But here’s the punchline— the Republicans were also in the midst of a political crisis of their own. As disaffection with Barack Obama’s programs took hold, national Republicans saw little benefit (top graph). Voters didn’t simply switch Parties. They left both Parties. The implied motivation isn’t that the ‘opposition’ Party had better ideas. Had this been the case, total Party affiliation would have remained largely unchanged. But that isn’t the case. For a two-Party political system, such abandonment of the ‘center’ is a textbook definition of a crisis of legitimacy.
Over the prior century the duopoly Party strategy has been to maintain control of the political system by controlling the electoral process regardless of levels of political disaffection. The Democrats’ ‘crises’ of 1968 and 1972 were a result of systemic inflexibility in the face of widespread political disaffection. Phrased differently, tightly controlled electoral ‘choices’ are inadequate during crises of systemic legitimacy. Their ultimate response was to lead a right-wing coupagainst the political accommodations of the New Deal and the Great Society.
Back in the present, the strategic term for newly unaffiliated voters is ‘independent,’ as if the wholesale, willful abandonment of Party affiliation solved the problem of Party control over which candidates do and don’t get to run for office. By 2016 over 40% of registered voters, including those who had recently left the Democratic Party, were self-defined as unaffiliated with either duopoly Party (graph below). And this figure leaves aside thirty million eligible voters who aren’t registered to vote.
In response, political pollsters created categories of ‘Democratic-leaning’ and ‘Republican-leaning’ as if (1) the mass exodus from Party affiliation were a fashion statement rather than one of political disaffection and (2) duopoly Party control over the electoral process doesn’t effectively preclude unaffiliated candidates and Parties from running for office. Including unaffiliated voters in duopoly Party tallies is a strategy of systemic legitimation in that it implies choices outside of the duopoly Party system that don’t exist.
The institutional response has been to re-conjure the ‘foreign influences’ that so well supported American imperial endeavors in the past. For those short on nostalgia for the days of MAD (Mutual Assured Destruction) and genocidal slaughters, what hasn’t yet been well explained is (1) how foreign meddling prevented one hundred and sixty five million eligible voters (71%) from voting for Hillary Clinton and (2) how this external meddling differs from internal meddling in the form voter disenfranchisement and the legalized bribery that ‘motivates’ American politics.
The Republican Party saw a mass exodus of registered voters when George W. Bush’s war against Iraq became a conspicuous quagmire. By the time of the financial crisis that marked the onset of the Great Recession, some fair number had registered as Democrats while others dropped their duopoly Party affiliation to become what are implausibly called ‘independents.’
At the time it became apparent that the Obama administration was intent on restoring the forces of economic repression— Wall Street and corporate-state plutocracy, the Democrats saw their own mass exodus. Against the storyline of competing interests, registered voters fled both Parties. By implication, these mass exoduses suggest that neither duopoly Party represents the programs and candidates of interest to voters.These mass exoduses have several implications: (1) with voters fleeing both duopoly Parties, it is the political system that has lost credibility, (2) the back-and-forth of faux ‘opposition’ that provided the illusion of political difference has lost potency as a driver of domestic politics and (3) charges that foreign influence determined the 2016 electoral outcomes are wholly implausible when placed in the context of the scale of voter disaffection with the duopoly Party system.
For instance, 71% of eligible voters didn’t vote for the Democratic Party candidate. 73% didn’t vote for Donald Trump (Clinton won the popular vote). Ninety million eligible voters (40%) didn’t cast a ballot at all. Why it makes sense to present outcomes in terms of what voters didn’t do is (1) the duopoly Parties control which candidates and programs are put forward and (2) voters have fled the duopoly Party system rather than simply switching Parties.
The political problem for the national Democrats is that one can endorse the very worst that can be said about their alleged opposition, the Republicans, without raising their standing. Between 2009 and 2016 somewhere between eight and ten million registered voters— 20% of registered Democrats, fled the Democratic Party. In conjunction with the loss of over 1,000 legislative seats over this same period, the Democrats were in the midst of a full blown political crisis going into the 2016 election.
But here’s the punchline— the Republicans were also in the midst of a political crisis of their own. As disaffection with Barack Obama’s programs took hold, national Republicans saw little benefit (top graph). Voters didn’t simply switch Parties. They left both Parties. The implied motivation isn’t that the ‘opposition’ Party had better ideas. Had this been the case, total Party affiliation would have remained largely unchanged. But that isn’t the case. For a two-Party political system, such abandonment of the ‘center’ is a textbook definition of a crisis of legitimacy.
Over the prior century the duopoly Party strategy has been to maintain control of the political system by controlling the electoral process regardless of levels of political disaffection. The Democrats’ ‘crises’ of 1968 and 1972 were a result of systemic inflexibility in the face of widespread political disaffection. Phrased differently, tightly controlled electoral ‘choices’ are inadequate during crises of systemic legitimacy. Their ultimate response was to lead a right-wing coupagainst the political accommodations of the New Deal and the Great Society.
Back in the present, the strategic term for newly unaffiliated voters is ‘independent,’ as if the wholesale, willful abandonment of Party affiliation solved the problem of Party control over which candidates do and don’t get to run for office. By 2016 over 40% of registered voters, including those who had recently left the Democratic Party, were self-defined as unaffiliated with either duopoly Party (graph below). And this figure leaves aside thirty million eligible voters who aren’t registered to vote.
In response, political pollsters created categories of ‘Democratic-leaning’ and ‘Republican-leaning’ as if (1) the mass exodus from Party affiliation were a fashion statement rather than one of political disaffection and (2) duopoly Party control over the electoral process doesn’t effectively preclude unaffiliated candidates and Parties from running for office. Including unaffiliated voters in duopoly Party tallies is a strategy of systemic legitimation in that it implies choices outside of the duopoly Party system that don’t exist.
The institutional response has been to re-conjure the ‘foreign influences’ that so well supported American imperial endeavors in the past. For those short on nostalgia for the days of MAD (Mutual Assured Destruction) and genocidal slaughters, what hasn’t yet been well explained is (1) how foreign meddling prevented one hundred and sixty five million eligible voters (71%) from voting for Hillary Clinton and (2) how this external meddling differs from internal meddling in the form voter disenfranchisement and the legalized bribery that ‘motivates’ American politics.
by Rob Urie, Counterpunch | Read more:
Images: Carlos Pacheco and Gallup
