This is a book review.
The folk theory of democracy: The common perception holds that the people elect their leaders at the polls and then hold them accountable for representing their will. The folk theory is appealing because it puts the will of the people and their interests at the heart of government. Sovereignty resides with the people who control the agenda. Voters act as government watchdogs to enforce shared values and curb abuses. Voters correct their mistakes or punish failure at the polls by changing governments, while rewarding competence with continued time in power.
My guess is that most readers here (> 70% ?) would at least suspect that the there’s something not quite right with the folk theory. For example, many people believe that one or both parties and the will of the people are often or usually co-opted by special interests backed by money in politics. That’s out of synch with the common perception of democracy. Those people would be correct in their suspicions.
Despite concerns about something being “wrong” with current American democracy, people the world over still believe in the folk theory and how it ought to work. The belief is deep and entrenched. Even dictators pretend to democracy. North Korea suffers under one of the most repressive governments on Earth, but nonetheless calls itself the “Democratic People's Republic of Korea.” Most people on Earth believe they live under a democracy even when it is obviously and objectively false, at least from the American point of view. Surveys of Chinese citizens show two things: first they value democracy as much as Americans, and second, they believe that China is just as democratic as America. That confusing reality reflects the staggering power of wishful thinking (cognitive bias), the profoundly subjective (personal) nature of political concepts (“democracy”) or, more likely, some combination of both.
A recently published book, Democracy For Realists: Why Elections Do not Produce Responsive Governments (Christopher H. Achen and Larry M. Bartels (“A&B”), Princeton University Press, Princeton NJ, April 2016) analyzes data on the nature of voting and democracy in America and other countries from the early 1900’s through 2012. Much of they find isn’t anywhere close to what people believe about the elements of democracy under the folk theory, e.g., where sovereignty resides, “the will of the people”, or the true nature of voters’ role in democracy.
If the current election season is any indication, most Americans are pretty unhappy with the state of affairs in their democracy. They see something wrong. So do A&B:
“One consequence of our reliance on old definitions is that the modern American does not look at democracy before he defines it; he defines it first and then is confused by what he sees. We become cynical about democracy because the public does not act the way the simplistic definition of democracy says it should act, or we try to whip the public into doing things it does not want to do, is unable to do, and has too much sense to do. The crisis here is not a crisis in democracy but a crisis in theory.”
Give that observation a moment to sink in. Don’t overlook the phrase “is unable to do.” That reflects the reality that most people (> 90% ?) don’t pay attention to politics, often can’t pay attention and are biologically too limited to really understand what’s going on even if they tried:
“. . . . the typical citizen drops down to a lower level of mental performance as soon as he enters the political field. He argues and analyzes in a way which he would readily recognize as infantile within the sphere of his real interests. . . . cherished ideas and judgments we bring to politics are stereotypes and simplifications with little room for adjustment as the facts change. . . . . the real environment is altogether too big, too complex, and too fleeting for direct acquaintance. We are not equipped to deal with so much subtlety, so much variety, so many permutations and combinations. Although we have to act in that environment, we have to reconstruct it on a simpler model before we can manage it.”
From the biological point of view, that’s reality, not a criticism of people or their limitations. Almost everything in politics, if not everything, is far more complex than people give it credit for. Worse, most if it is either at least partially hidden from the public, distorted under the “free speech” shield, or both.
This book adds to evidence of the overwhelming role of cognitive biology in politics. In agreement with that view of politics, A&B point out that “a democratic theory worthy of serious social influence must engage with the findings of modern social science.” Although A&B’s book dissects democratic theory and analyzes mountains of science and history data from the last hundred years or so, the exercise is really about analyzing the role of human cognitive biology as it pertains to how democracy works. Our beliefs about democracy are shaped by human biology, not political theory.
In Democracy for Realists, A&B assert that democratic theory has to adapt to the reality of what democracy really is. That directly reflects the necessity of understanding human biology by analyzing the data.
Two points exemplify the case that this is about human biology first and what political theory needs to do to be helpful. The first point is that the “will of the people” that’s so central to the folk theory is a myth. There is no such thing as the will of the people. The people are divided on most everything and they usually don’t know what they really want.
For example, voter opinions can be very sensitive to variation how questions are worded. This reflects a powerful cognitive bias called framing effects. Marketers and politicians are acutely aware of this unconscious bias and they use it with a vengeance to get what they want.
For example in one 1980’s survey, about 64% said there was too little federal spending on “assistance to the poor” but only ~23% said that there was too little spending on “welfare.” The 1980s was the decade when vilification of “welfare” was common from the political right. Before the 1991 Gulf War, about 63% said they were willing to “use military force”, but less than 50% were willing to “engage in combat”, while less than 30% were willing to “go to war.” Again, the overwhelmingly subjective nature of political concepts is obvious, i.e., assistance vs. welfare and military force vs. combat vs. war. Where is the will of the people in any of this? If it is there, what is it?
Serving the will of the people under the folk theory of democracy is a phantom. It can’t be done.
The second point is that voters usually don’t rationally hold politicians accountable for failure or reward them for success. People don’t logically distinguish success from failure. A&B point out that politicians are routinely voted out of office for things they cannot logically be held accountable for. For example, droughts, floods and an increase in shark attacks (yes, shark attacks) routinely cost incumbent presidents significant numbers of votes. On economic issues, voters only consider a few months leading up to an election to decide if a president or party has done well. Data analysis suggests that if the 1938 recession had occurred two years earlier, FDR would not have been reelected and the New Deal would have ended. Similar “myopic” voting in the 1930s occurred in other countries and ideology had nothing to do with it. Perceptions of success and failure dominated voting in response to the Great Depression, not anything else.
That voting rationale is clearly flawed. It contradicts the notion that voters rationally reward success and punish failure. In other words, politicians have little incentive to adhere to the folk theory. They know that their own success and failure can easily depend on things outside their control. That’s another key aspect of the folk theory that the data blows to smithereens.
If democracy is so dismal, which it isn’t, then what’s the point of doing more research? A&B give compelling reasons. They argue that “the mental frameworks” that both liberals and conservatives employ can be defended “only by willful denial of a great deal of credible evidence . . . . intellectual honesty requires all of us to grapple with the corrosive implications of that evidence for our understanding of democracy.” The data point A&B to believe that most voters vote not on policy preferences or ideology, but on who they are, i.e., their social identities. This is what shapes thinking and voting behavior, which mostly “reflects and reinforces social loyalties.” It is nonetheless “a mistake to suppose that elections result in popular control of public policy.”
More importantly, A&B observe that flawed perceptions of democracy have led to flawed remedies to fix it. Such fixes, e.g., term limits and state level ballot initiatives, often undercut what people want from their democracy. Instead of acting to make democracy fit the theory, the “more democracy” fixes that voters keep trying wind up shifting power to organized special interests at the expense of the public interest.
The point is clear. If you don’t understand how and why democracy really works, you can’t fix what you don’t like about it. Therefore, go figure out what democracy really is, then try to fix it. A&B have gone a long way toward pointing out how and why it really works, but solutions to problems are not clear. It will probably require years of empirical trial and error.
However, despite the strange nature of biological democracy, at least a more rational way forward is apparent. That is encouraging. The disappointment is that, at least to A&B, solutions are not obvious and fixes won't be easy.
