I care a lot about "politics," and this blog, after all, is entitled, "We Live In A Political World." Still, I don't, generally, do very much "academic" reading about politics. I am not, actually, all that much interested in "studying" politics, as an academic discipline, which requires undertaking a systematic observation of the world of politics, followed by an accurate report of what you find. That, it seems to me, is a pretty good description of an "academic" endeavor and of an "academic" approach to politics. Just speaking personally, I am much more interested in what are sometimes called the "normative" questions, i.e., what should we be doing, right now?
Still, when friends recommend that I read something, even if it's "academic," I almost always follow up. Thus, following up on a suggestion from a friend, I recently tracked down an article entitled, "Testing Theories of American Politics: Elites, Interest Groups, and Average Citizens," authored by Martin Gilens and Benjamin I. Page and published by the Cambridge University Press.
Here is an excerpt from the "Abstract" of that article by Gilens and Page:
AbstractEach of four theoretical traditions in the study of American politics—which can be characterized as theories of Majoritarian Electoral Democracy, Economic-Elite Domination, and two types of interest-group pluralism, Majoritarian Pluralism and Biased Pluralism—offers different predictions about which sets of actors have how much influence over public policy: average citizens; economic elites; and organized interest groups, mass-based or business-oriented.
A great deal of empirical research speaks to the policy influence of one or another set of actors, but until recently it has not been possible to test these contrasting theoretical predictions against each other within a single statistical model. We report on an effort to do so, using a unique data set that includes measures of the key variables for 1,779 policy issues.
Multivariate analysis indicates that economic elites and organized groups representing business interests have substantial independent impacts on U.S. government policy, while average citizens and mass-based interest groups have little or no independent influence. The results provide substantial support for theories of Economic-Elite Domination and for theories of Biased Pluralism, but not for theories of Majoritarian Electoral Democracy or Majoritarian Pluralism (emphasis added).
This "academic" paper, in other words, based on extensive work by Gillens and Page, pretty much confirms what I have always asserted is the case:
"Proving" the above propositions, through the kind of research done by Gillens and Page, is certainly important academic work. Again, though, the real question for me is what we are going to do about it.
Particularly if that last statement of mine is correct, and the rich have so much power because the rest of us don't use our own, the key question is how we can, in actual and practical fact, mobilize our own power so as to achieve what the scholars are calling "Electoral Democracy" or "Majoritarian Pluralism."
Those "scholarly" designations are the "academic terms" for what I call "self-government," which is our legacy from the American Revolution and the Civil War. We have been tested on "self-government" at various points in our past, and another test may be coming up soon - as soon as November of this year, as a matter of fact.
Despite all their research, the scholars aren't going to be able to tell us if what Abraham Lincoln talked about at Gettysburgh still has relevance for us, today. Lincoln saw the Civil War as a "test":
Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate -- we can not consecrate -- we can not hallow -- this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us -- that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion -- that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain -- that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom -- and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth (emphasis added).
Abraham LincolnNovember 19, 1863
Are we ready for another test?
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