One of the best things about the last two years was getting to know so many new people. I love talking to people, and Trump generated a tremendous amount of new interest in politics.
While this is great, it can also prove challenging, as it’s very easy for new people to get discouraged. To feel that what they’re doing doesn’t matter, or to feel like some kind of cog in the machine. For that matter, I guess it’s easy for all of us to sometimes feel this way.
Where does this come from?
This belief comes from Enlightenment thinking.
Enlightenment thinking is basically Descartes 17th-century Age-of-Reason thinking. It’s the idea that we’re all rational and that therefore we all reason the same. Enlightenment thought is what liberals tend to learn in college. If you give people the facts, they learn, everyone will reach the same conclusion.
We see this in the academic world, where there’s this belief that the best idea wins. The ideas with the most proof and the most evidence bubble to the top and “win.”
And we tend to take this idea from the academic world and bring it over into our beliefs about politics. I hear this all the time: “What Democrats need to do is support xyz.” You see this with the Green Party and its environmental platform. You see this with Socialists and their belief that we need to adopt their ideas. And I hear this all the time from different activists who want to see different things accomplished and think that everyone would be more engaged if the Democratic Party simply adopted “my idea.”
The belief is that if we give people the facts that we have used to come to our conclusion about our idea, everyone else will hop on board. Liberals like to fight Enlightenment fights.
Now some folks here are probably going to say: How can you be against reason?
Short answer is, I’m not. People are not rational creatures, though. We tend to believe that we make 98 percent of our decisions rationally and 2 percent irrationally. In reality, it’s closer to the reverse. Science backs me up on this.
What I’m doing is examining some of our beliefs about academic culture when we try to translate these to the political world.
In the Enlightenment world, it’s OK to tell people that they’re wrong
What we don’t tend to realize is that schools and universities have created a culture where the best ideas often win. They don’t always win, because we’re human. If you’ve ever had a professor who gave you a bad grade just because they didn’t like you, it’s easy to understand that we don’t always behave like rational animals.
But Enlightenment culture can save us from ourselves. When you have a culture that allows for openness, freedom of expression, and exploration, and regards facts and evidence strongly, the best ideas often bubble to the top. It’s OK to tell people they’re wrong if you can present stronger evidence and make a better case.
In the political world, if you tell people that they’re wrong, it often only reinforces in them the sense that they’re right. They also may hold a grudge against you personally. Have you ever met someone whose ideas you agreed with, but you really didn’t want anything to do with them because they were so arrogant or so obnoxious about it?
I see this happen all the time.
An easy one is watching people talk to millennials about voting. They will tell them things like, “You have to vote” or “It’s your civic duty,” or they will tell them they’re stupid for not voting.
Basically, they will say, “You’re wrong.”
And what happens? The person walks away only more convinced that they’re right. Usually what the person believes or was trying to say was that they feel their vote doesn’t matter. That it doesn’t make a difference.
And when you tell them they’re dumb, you may have lost them. They may not engage.
Ok … so let’s say I believe you … are there better ways?
Politics is different from the Enlightenment world. Especially politics in the United States, where we have a winner-take-all system. In this system, it’s not the best ideas that win. It’s the ideas that have the most representation in the system.
When the NRA wants its ideas to win, it’s figured out that what it needs is representation. So it puts extreme amounts of time, effort, and money into electing representatives who will carry water for it in our government. When politicians realize that the NRA can make or break them, many decide to take the path of least resistance.
Now, we may not like this system. I can also not like it all day with you and debate better systems. This won’t change the fact that it’s the system we have. In this system, in order to get representation, we have to figure out how to get enough people together to make this happen. We have to organize.
We have to figure out ways to get enough people to work together to elect representatives that will do better things. If we’re all fighting about which idea is the best, this can be difficult. This is one of the reasons that corporate special interests often favor divide-and-conquer strategies. If we’re divided, fighting about ideas, it’s difficult to elect better representatives.
What we want to look for are strategies that bring people together.
Active listening and violent agreement
So I’ve suggested that it’s not the best idea to argue with each other over specific policy ideas. Obviously, this isn’t always true. If you know folks and are comfortable that you’re fighting on the same team, it can be fun to do this. But if you don’t know them as well, and/or if they’re new to politics, a better conversation looks like this:
- Actively listen.
- Agree with where they want to get to (if you do agree. Don’t lie. If you don’t, find commonality).
- Let them know that you agree with where they want to get to. Establish that you’re on the same side.
- Ask the question: “How do we get there?”
All too often activists want to get to their issue. As a leader, you want to let them. The temptation is to want to correct them or explain things to them in an Enlightenment fashion. Especially if you are in a position where you happen to feel you know more.
Hold off. Actively listen.
Active listening involves letting the person know you’re listening. It’s a conversation. People can tell when you’re actively listening and when you’re just waiting for your turn to change the subject. Active listening is about understanding what the person is saying.
The simplest way to demonstrate that you’re listening is to repeat what the person is saying back to them. Say something like, “Let me see if I understand you. This is what’s going on, why it’s important to you, why it matters.”
If you agree with what they’re saying, talk about how you agree from your own perspective. If you don’t agree with everything, talk about the points you do agree with. Find that common ground.
If it’s a specific policy proposal that you don’t agree with, but you agree with the value being shared, talk about your values. For example, it’s easy to agree on values around equality, freedom, or mutual responsibility, even if you don’t necessarily think a certain policy recommendation is the best.
Violently agree with them about something. We both want to get to the same place.
How do we get there?
Once you’re at a point where you agree, you’re on a team. You’re “we,” not “I.” You’re not fighting with each other over some idea; you’re on the same side.
At this point, you can ask the question: “Ok … so how do we get there?”
If you can get to this point, much of your work is done. You’re on the same team. At this point, I’ll talk about how other groups have achieved their goals. You can talk about women’s suffrage, the civil rights movement, the LGBT movement, or the corporate-special-interest movement (the Milton Friedman movement that started in the 1970s). I’ll talk about how political change involves three components:
Social change -> political change -> policy change
Because this can be a little overwhelming, I’ll also try to find some way for folks to get involved that isn’t overwhelming. I’ll ask what they’re good at and what they like doing. People can be involved at any of the three levels.
Look for their talents and encourage them to take a small step.
The good news is that this is both an easy conversation to have with people, and also a much more productive conversation.
Because no single policy idea is going to change everything. Our challenge isn’t that we don’t have better ideas. The challenge is organizing in large-enough numbers to make any of these ideas happen.
David Akadjian is the author of The Little Book of Revolution: A Distributive Strategy for Democracy (also available as an ebook).