The United States of America has long considered itself the heritage of democracy. They promoted democracy throughout the world. They fought - with great losses - for democracy, against fascism in Europe during World War II. And now that battle is raging within the country.
America's authority as a democratic country has always been slightly tarnished. The United States was created as a representative democracy, yet only a small portion of the population (mostly white men who ate real estate) had the right to vote. After the abolition of slavery, the white population of the American South tried for almost a century not to allow African Americans the right to vote. For example, through poll taxes and literacy tests, they made voting out of reach for the poor. The right to vote was guaranteed to them only after almost half a century, after women were given that right in 1920.
Full-right democratic countries limit the dominance of the majority and therefore protect certain fundamental rights that cannot be denied to anyone. But in the US, all that is turned upside down. The minority dominates the majority and does not care much about its political and economic rights. Most Americans want gun control, an increase in the minimum wage, guaranteed access to health insurance, and improved regulation of the banks that brought the country into crisis in 2008. However, all these goals seem unattainable.
The reasons are partly related to the US Constitution. Two out of three presidents elected this century took office regardless of the fact that they lost the total number of votes they received. If there was no Electoral College, a provision that was included in the Constitution at the insistence of the less populated slave states, Albert Gore would have become president in 2000, and Hillary Clinton in 2016.
The Republican Party's use of various methods of election manipulation, including creating barriers to voting for certain groups of voters and redistricting, also helped to thwart the will of the majority. The methods of that party can, of course, be understood. The point is that demographic changes have put Republicans in an unenviable electoral position. The non-white population will soon become the majority in America, and the world and economy of the XNUMXst century cannot possibly be combined with a male-dominated society. In addition, in the cities, where most Americans live (whether in the North or the South), people have learned to appreciate differences in population composition.
Voters living in areas of economic growth and dynamism understand the role government can and must play in providing for the general well-being. They have rejected the mantras of the past, sometimes overnight. Therefore, minorities in a democratic society (be it large corporations that seek to exploit workers and consumers, or banks that try to exploit debtors, or those that have sunk into the past and are trying to revive a long-lost world) have only one way left to keep its economic and political dominance, that is - the weakening of democracy itself.
That strategy foresees many different tactics. Republican officials not only support selective immigration, but also try to prevent potential Democratic supporters from registering to vote. In many Republican-controlled states, more difficult ways to identify voters at the polls have been introduced. In addition, some local governments are excluding Democratic supporters from the voter rolls, reducing the number of polling stations, and also shortening the hours they are open.
It is truly incredible to what extent America makes it difficult to vote, that is, to exercise a fundamental right of citizens. The United States is one of the few democratic countries where elections are held on a weekday rather than a Sunday. Obviously, this makes it seriously difficult for those who are employed to vote. This situation is in sharp contrast with the situation in other democratic countries, for example in Australia, where all citizens are obliged to participate in elections, or even with the situation in some US federal states (eg in Oregon), which have simplified voting by mail. .
In addition, the mass incarceration system, which has historically targeted African Americans, serves three functions. Besides providing cheap labor and creating pressure to lower their wages (even today, as Michael Poiker of Columbia University notes, approximately 5% of industrial production in America is done by prisoners), the system was introduced to disenfranchise convicts.
When all those methods fail, Republicans try to tie the hands of elected governments, filling the federal courts with judges who can be counted on to overturn decisions that Republican sponsors and supporters oppose. Several important recently published books (for example, "Democracy in Chains" by historian Nancy McLean of Duke University and "The One Percent Solution" by political scientist Gordon Laffer of the University of Oregon) analyze the intellectual sources and organizational mechanisms of the Republican attack on democracy.
The American ideal of freedom, democracy and justice for all was, of course, never fully implemented, but now it is openly attacked. Democracy has turned into the rule of the few and for the few people; justice for all is available to anyone who is white and can afford it.
Of course, it's not just an American problem. Authoritarian leaders are coming to power all over the world, who have very little interest in democracy: Recep Erdogan in Turkey, Viktor Orban in Hungary, Jaroslav Kaczynski in Poland, and now Jair Bolsonaro in Brazil. Some, taught by the past, claim that all this will pass. Remember all those disgusting dictators of the 1930s. Remember those like Salasar in Portugal and Franco in Spain that kept them in power after World War II. All of them are gone.
But even the briefest mention of their names immediately reminds us of the human victims of those dictatorships. And Americans are obliged to admit that their president, Donald Trump, is helping and encouraging the emergence of new potential despots.
This is just one of the many reasons why it is important for the Democrats to have a majority in Congress, in order to oppose Trump's authoritarian tendencies, as well as to elect such leaders at the state and local government level who will restore the right to vote to everyone to whom it belongs by law (published text on election day in the USA - prim.ed.).
Democracy is in danger and all of us, wherever we are, are obliged to do everything to save it.
The author is a Nobel Prize winner in economics and a professor at Columbia University
Copyright: Project Syndicate, 2018.
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