Pub Date : 2022-01-01DOI: 10.1177/00027162211070059
D. Slater
Modern democracies comprise multiple institutions and diverse principles. This can make them vulnerable to “democratic careening,” as polarized actors emphasize opposing views of what democracy means and requires. I argue that America’s current bout of democratic careening is founded on differing partisan perspectives of the ultimate purpose of government, and whether widespread political participation is necessary to fulfill it. While leftists generally take a gain-oriented approach to government, conservatives are more threat oriented. A byproduct of this foundational difference is that leftists’ conception of democracy is participation heavy, while conservatives’ conception tends to be participation light. The fact that liberals and conservatives differ on the importance of participation to democracy is a potential source of democratic careening, and the fact that conservatives do not necessarily see participation as a core democratic virtue poses the more serious risk of outright democratic collapse.
{"title":"Threats or Gains: The Battle over Participation in America’s Careening Democracy","authors":"D. Slater","doi":"10.1177/00027162211070059","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/00027162211070059","url":null,"abstract":"Modern democracies comprise multiple institutions and diverse principles. This can make them vulnerable to “democratic careening,” as polarized actors emphasize opposing views of what democracy means and requires. I argue that America’s current bout of democratic careening is founded on differing partisan perspectives of the ultimate purpose of government, and whether widespread political participation is necessary to fulfill it. While leftists generally take a gain-oriented approach to government, conservatives are more threat oriented. A byproduct of this foundational difference is that leftists’ conception of democracy is participation heavy, while conservatives’ conception tends to be participation light. The fact that liberals and conservatives differ on the importance of participation to democracy is a potential source of democratic careening, and the fact that conservatives do not necessarily see participation as a core democratic virtue poses the more serious risk of outright democratic collapse.","PeriodicalId":48352,"journal":{"name":"Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science","volume":"699 1","pages":"90 - 100"},"PeriodicalIF":2.8,"publicationDate":"2022-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47137682","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-01-01DOI: 10.1177/00027162211061318
L. Jacobs, Judd Choate
Headlines decried the fragility of American democracy during the 2020 elections, but extensive institutional structures steered officials in both political parties to certify the results of the election, and independent judges have validated their decisions. Political battles over election laws and procedures are not themselves signs of democracy’s demise, because legal and administrative guardrails contain the degree to which voting rights are threatened. These formidable institutional structures blunted former president Donald Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election and limited the scope and impact of new state legislation to restrict access to voting. The guardrails of elections operated as designed, but Trump’s unfounded charges of fraud coupled with state restrictions are corroding the credibility and fairness of elections. We examine the scope and function of election law and administration to understand how they protected American democracy in the contentious 2020 election.
{"title":"Democratic Capacity: Election Administration as Bulwark and Target","authors":"L. Jacobs, Judd Choate","doi":"10.1177/00027162211061318","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/00027162211061318","url":null,"abstract":"Headlines decried the fragility of American democracy during the 2020 elections, but extensive institutional structures steered officials in both political parties to certify the results of the election, and independent judges have validated their decisions. Political battles over election laws and procedures are not themselves signs of democracy’s demise, because legal and administrative guardrails contain the degree to which voting rights are threatened. These formidable institutional structures blunted former president Donald Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election and limited the scope and impact of new state legislation to restrict access to voting. The guardrails of elections operated as designed, but Trump’s unfounded charges of fraud coupled with state restrictions are corroding the credibility and fairness of elections. We examine the scope and function of election law and administration to understand how they protected American democracy in the contentious 2020 election.","PeriodicalId":48352,"journal":{"name":"Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science","volume":"699 1","pages":"22 - 35"},"PeriodicalIF":2.8,"publicationDate":"2022-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48474206","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-01-01DOI: 10.1177/00027162221083494
Lee Drutman
As American democracy remains in crisis, reform proposals proliferate. I make two contributions to the debate over how to respond to the current crisis. First, I organize reform proposals into three main categories: moderation, realignment, and transformation. I then argue why transformation is necessary, given the deep structural problems of American democracy. Only reforms that fundamentally shake up the political coalitions and electoral incentives can break the escalating two-party doom loop of hyperpartisanship that is destroying the foundations of American democracy.
{"title":"Moderation, Realignment, or Transformation? Evaluating Three Approaches to America’s Crisis of Democracy","authors":"Lee Drutman","doi":"10.1177/00027162221083494","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/00027162221083494","url":null,"abstract":"As American democracy remains in crisis, reform proposals proliferate. I make two contributions to the debate over how to respond to the current crisis. First, I organize reform proposals into three main categories: moderation, realignment, and transformation. I then argue why transformation is necessary, given the deep structural problems of American democracy. Only reforms that fundamentally shake up the political coalitions and electoral incentives can break the escalating two-party doom loop of hyperpartisanship that is destroying the foundations of American democracy.","PeriodicalId":48352,"journal":{"name":"Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science","volume":"699 1","pages":"158 - 174"},"PeriodicalIF":2.8,"publicationDate":"2022-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42284529","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-01-01DOI: 10.1177/00027162211061124
Aziz Z Huq
This article explores the role of the U.S. Supreme Court in contemporary democratic backsliding. I identify three dynamics that have placed American democracy under strain: (1) the incomplete democratization of national institutions created in 1787; (2) a half century of rising inequalities in wealth, market power, and political influence; and (3) a resurgence of intolerant, authoritarian, white-ethnic identity politics associated with the Republican Party. I argue that the Court has proved itself to be capable of creating linkages between these distinct institutional, economic, and sociocultural domains. In doing so, the Court has enabled the transformation of economic or sociocultural power into durable political power and the transformation of political power into the entrenchment of a “permanent minority” immured from democratic defeat. I describe specific doctrinal mechanisms by which this arbitrage role is performed, showing how the Court can be a vector of democratic backsliding.
{"title":"The Supreme Court and the Dynamics of Democratic Backsliding","authors":"Aziz Z Huq","doi":"10.1177/00027162211061124","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/00027162211061124","url":null,"abstract":"This article explores the role of the U.S. Supreme Court in contemporary democratic backsliding. I identify three dynamics that have placed American democracy under strain: (1) the incomplete democratization of national institutions created in 1787; (2) a half century of rising inequalities in wealth, market power, and political influence; and (3) a resurgence of intolerant, authoritarian, white-ethnic identity politics associated with the Republican Party. I argue that the Court has proved itself to be capable of creating linkages between these distinct institutional, economic, and sociocultural domains. In doing so, the Court has enabled the transformation of economic or sociocultural power into durable political power and the transformation of political power into the entrenchment of a “permanent minority” immured from democratic defeat. I describe specific doctrinal mechanisms by which this arbitrage role is performed, showing how the Court can be a vector of democratic backsliding.","PeriodicalId":48352,"journal":{"name":"Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science","volume":"699 1","pages":"50 - 65"},"PeriodicalIF":2.8,"publicationDate":"2022-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"64684274","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-01-01DOI: 10.1177/00027162211070060
C. Mudde
The rise of Donald Trump has weakened the dominance of the “American exceptionalism” paradigm in analyses of U.S. politics, but the pivot to views of the United States as part of a global trend toward democratic backsliding ignores important, uniquely “American” cultural, historical, and institutional attributes that make the country more at risk for democratic erosion than most other established democracies. This short article puts Trump, and his Republican Party, into the broader comparative perspective of (European) far-right studies. I argue that Trump in many ways fits the “fourth wave” of postwar far-right politics, lay out the unique challenge that the United States is facing in terms of democratic erosion, and draw on the case of Viktor Orbán in Hungary to learn lessons for the United States. The article ends with some suggestions of how democrats (not just Democrats) should address the far-right Republican challenge to U.S. democracy.
{"title":"The Far-Right Threat in the United States: A European Perspective","authors":"C. Mudde","doi":"10.1177/00027162211070060","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/00027162211070060","url":null,"abstract":"The rise of Donald Trump has weakened the dominance of the “American exceptionalism” paradigm in analyses of U.S. politics, but the pivot to views of the United States as part of a global trend toward democratic backsliding ignores important, uniquely “American” cultural, historical, and institutional attributes that make the country more at risk for democratic erosion than most other established democracies. This short article puts Trump, and his Republican Party, into the broader comparative perspective of (European) far-right studies. I argue that Trump in many ways fits the “fourth wave” of postwar far-right politics, lay out the unique challenge that the United States is facing in terms of democratic erosion, and draw on the case of Viktor Orbán in Hungary to learn lessons for the United States. The article ends with some suggestions of how democrats (not just Democrats) should address the far-right Republican challenge to U.S. democracy.","PeriodicalId":48352,"journal":{"name":"Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science","volume":"699 1","pages":"101 - 115"},"PeriodicalIF":2.8,"publicationDate":"2022-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"43620031","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-01-01DOI: 10.1177/00027162211069730
Ashley Jardina, R. Mickey
Political observers have expressed concern about the failure of some Americans to uphold democratic principles. We argue that support for antidemocratic authoritarian governance is associated with some whites’ psychological attachment to their racial group and a desire to maintain their group’s power and status in the face of multiracial democracy. Drawing on historical work, we posit that whites’ efforts to restrict democracy are deeply rooted in America’s past; and we present empirical analysis demonstrating that today, whites with higher levels of racial solidarity are notably more supportive of authoritarian leadership than whites who do not possess a racial group consciousness.
{"title":"White Racial Solidarity and Opposition to American Democracy","authors":"Ashley Jardina, R. Mickey","doi":"10.1177/00027162211069730","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/00027162211069730","url":null,"abstract":"Political observers have expressed concern about the failure of some Americans to uphold democratic principles. We argue that support for antidemocratic authoritarian governance is associated with some whites’ psychological attachment to their racial group and a desire to maintain their group’s power and status in the face of multiracial democracy. Drawing on historical work, we posit that whites’ efforts to restrict democracy are deeply rooted in America’s past; and we present empirical analysis demonstrating that today, whites with higher levels of racial solidarity are notably more supportive of authoritarian leadership than whites who do not possess a racial group consciousness.","PeriodicalId":48352,"journal":{"name":"Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science","volume":"699 1","pages":"79 - 89"},"PeriodicalIF":2.8,"publicationDate":"2022-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44414899","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-01-01DOI: 10.1177/00027162211070061
Suzanne Mettler, T. Brown
Throughout American history and as recently as the early 1990s, each of the major political parties included both rural and some urban constituencies, but since then the nation has become deeply divided geographically. Rural areas have become increasingly dominated by the Republican Party and urban places by the Democratic Party. This growing rural-urban divide is fostering polarization and democratic vulnerability. We examine why this cleavage might endanger democracy, highlighting various mechanisms: the combination of long-standing political institutions that give extra leverage to sparsely populated places with a transformed party system in which one party dominates those places; growing social divergence between rural and urban areas that fosters “us” versus “them” dynamics; economic changes that make rural areas ripe for grievance politics; and party leaders willing to cater to such resentments. We present empirical evidence that this divide is threatening democracy and consider how it might be mitigated.
{"title":"The Growing Rural-Urban Political Divide and Democratic Vulnerability","authors":"Suzanne Mettler, T. Brown","doi":"10.1177/00027162211070061","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/00027162211070061","url":null,"abstract":"Throughout American history and as recently as the early 1990s, each of the major political parties included both rural and some urban constituencies, but since then the nation has become deeply divided geographically. Rural areas have become increasingly dominated by the Republican Party and urban places by the Democratic Party. This growing rural-urban divide is fostering polarization and democratic vulnerability. We examine why this cleavage might endanger democracy, highlighting various mechanisms: the combination of long-standing political institutions that give extra leverage to sparsely populated places with a transformed party system in which one party dominates those places; growing social divergence between rural and urban areas that fosters “us” versus “them” dynamics; economic changes that make rural areas ripe for grievance politics; and party leaders willing to cater to such resentments. We present empirical evidence that this divide is threatening democracy and consider how it might be mitigated.","PeriodicalId":48352,"journal":{"name":"Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science","volume":"699 1","pages":"130 - 142"},"PeriodicalIF":2.8,"publicationDate":"2022-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42410522","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-01-01DOI: 10.1177/00027162211072952
R. Mickey
After a half century of stable performance, American democracy is now under threat. The threat emerged from nationalized party competition, but it is made manifest largely in the actions of Republican politicians at the state level. This article describes these actions and suggests how and why the current threat to democracy differs from past periods.
{"title":"Challenges to Subnational Democracy in the United States, Past and Present","authors":"R. Mickey","doi":"10.1177/00027162211072952","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/00027162211072952","url":null,"abstract":"After a half century of stable performance, American democracy is now under threat. The threat emerged from nationalized party competition, but it is made manifest largely in the actions of Republican politicians at the state level. This article describes these actions and suggests how and why the current threat to democracy differs from past periods.","PeriodicalId":48352,"journal":{"name":"Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science","volume":"699 1","pages":"118 - 129"},"PeriodicalIF":2.8,"publicationDate":"2022-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47575510","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-01-01DOI: 10.1177/00027162211070885
J. Grumbach, Jamila Michener
The United States has a particularly decentralized form of federalism that provides important authority to multiple levels of government. This decentralization is typically seen as beneficial for democratic politics. But while federalism both constrains and enables democratic participation, we argue that it does so unevenly, and in ways that deepen inequalities in the processes of democracy. We propose four mechanisms by which the institutional decentralization of American federalism obstructs or reduces democratic accountability and equality: (1) inequality in venue selection, (2) information asymmetry, (3) an unequal exit threat, and (4) decentralized accountability. In contemporary American politics, these mechanisms both create and expand advantages for economic and political elites, while generating and deepening barriers to the full and equitable inclusion of less powerful groups in society, especially economically and racially marginalized Americans.
{"title":"American Federalism, Political Inequality, and Democratic Erosion","authors":"J. Grumbach, Jamila Michener","doi":"10.1177/00027162211070885","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/00027162211070885","url":null,"abstract":"The United States has a particularly decentralized form of federalism that provides important authority to multiple levels of government. This decentralization is typically seen as beneficial for democratic politics. But while federalism both constrains and enables democratic participation, we argue that it does so unevenly, and in ways that deepen inequalities in the processes of democracy. We propose four mechanisms by which the institutional decentralization of American federalism obstructs or reduces democratic accountability and equality: (1) inequality in venue selection, (2) information asymmetry, (3) an unequal exit threat, and (4) decentralized accountability. In contemporary American politics, these mechanisms both create and expand advantages for economic and political elites, while generating and deepening barriers to the full and equitable inclusion of less powerful groups in society, especially economically and racially marginalized Americans.","PeriodicalId":48352,"journal":{"name":"Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science","volume":"699 1","pages":"143 - 155"},"PeriodicalIF":2.8,"publicationDate":"2022-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44840447","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-01-01DOI: 10.1177/00027162221077516
Suzanne Mettler, R. Lieberman, Jamila Michener, Thomas B. Pepinsky, Kenneth M. Roberts
A democracy is in trouble. even before the 2016 election, the united States had slipped in international democracy rankings, losing its long-held stature as a “full” democracy and joining the “flawed” democracies (economist Intelligence unit 2020; V-Dem Institute 2021). Scholars of democracy around the world have identified several key weaknesses in American democracy, such as an increasingly dysfunctional government and fraying social cohesion, that undermine the regime’s accountability and responsivness. For decades, political scientists have observed key threats to democracy that have been on the rise: political polarization; conflict—incited by racism and nativism—over the boundaries of American citizenship and the civic status of those in different social groups; soaring economic inequality; and executive aggrandizement (Mettler and Lieberman 2020). the confluence of these threats fueled the candidacy
一个民主国家陷入了困境。早在2016年大选之前，美国的国际民主排名就已经下滑，失去了长期以来作为“完全”民主国家的地位，加入了“有缺陷的”民主国家行列(经济学人智库2020;V-Dem研究所2021)。世界各地研究民主的学者已经指出了美国民主的几个关键弱点，比如政府功能日益失调，社会凝聚力日益削弱，这些都削弱了该政权的问责和反应能力。几十年来，政治学家观察到民主面临的主要威胁一直在上升:政治两极分化;由种族主义和本土主义煽动的冲突，跨越了美国公民身份和不同社会群体公民地位的界限;经济不平等加剧;和行政强化(Mettler and Lieberman 2020)。这些威胁共同推动了他的竞选
{"title":"Democratic Vulnerabilities and Pathways for Reform","authors":"Suzanne Mettler, R. Lieberman, Jamila Michener, Thomas B. Pepinsky, Kenneth M. Roberts","doi":"10.1177/00027162221077516","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/00027162221077516","url":null,"abstract":"A democracy is in trouble. even before the 2016 election, the united States had slipped in international democracy rankings, losing its long-held stature as a “full” democracy and joining the “flawed” democracies (economist Intelligence unit 2020; V-Dem Institute 2021). Scholars of democracy around the world have identified several key weaknesses in American democracy, such as an increasingly dysfunctional government and fraying social cohesion, that undermine the regime’s accountability and responsivness. For decades, political scientists have observed key threats to democracy that have been on the rise: political polarization; conflict—incited by racism and nativism—over the boundaries of American citizenship and the civic status of those in different social groups; soaring economic inequality; and executive aggrandizement (Mettler and Lieberman 2020). the confluence of these threats fueled the candidacy","PeriodicalId":48352,"journal":{"name":"Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science","volume":"699 1","pages":"8 - 20"},"PeriodicalIF":2.8,"publicationDate":"2022-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47091840","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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