Introducing: Tools for Democracy

People want to understand how their government works, not just because of the impact that policy has on their own lives, but for the same reasons those of us who do this for a living are interested: they are intellectually curious, empathetic people who want things to get better.

This morning I launched, Tools for Democracy, a series of videos intended to offer tools for advocates, community organizations, and anyone else interested in engaging in state and local policy-making decisions. The goal is to decode processes that are confusing and frustrating for people with bills to pay and kids to raise.

The idea for this series came out of my own frustration, felt throughout my career, with how little political and policy professionals expect from the people they claim to advocate for. I’m not just talking about academics clacking away at white papers for various think tanks. I’m including many people who work as organizers and activists, who think of themselves as “in the field.”

It is an article of faith among those of us steeped in politics and policy all day that “normies” simply do not have the time or, more importantly, the interest to understand the ins and outs of government decision-making. People don’t want to be bored with talk of filibusters and omnibuses and budget deals. They just want to be heard and to see some benefit from whatever it is that goes on in state capitols and Congressional hearings every year.

But part of my job as a researcher and analyst has always been to make some of that dull, confusing stuff accessible. And what I’ve found in trainings and presentations with community members–people with varying levels of formal education, who may be struggling to pay for housing, access healthcare or earn a living wage–is that people want to understand how their government works. They are interested, not just because of the impact that policy has on their own lives, but for the same reasons those of us who do this for a living are interested: they are intellectually curious, empathetic people who want things to get better.

Rebuilding our democracy requires more than protecting the formal infrastructure of free and fair elections…It requires those of us who live and breathe politics to stop treating “normies” as hopelessly incapable of connecting the dots between events in their lives, the policies that created those events and the politicians responsible for those policies and to start viewing the inability to connect those dots as a failure of both journalism and activism.

The thing that makes people turn away from engagement with government decision-making is not a lack of interest, but a lack of trust and, ultimately, a deep lack of respect. People are not entirely wrong when they dismiss politicians as dishonest, but a lot of that dishonesty stems not from any individual politician’s lack of character but from a political discourse that makes truth-telling virtually impossible.

This is easiest to see in presidential elections. The president of the United States has very little power to do big, transformational things and a lot of power to do harm. That’s the nature of an office designed not to create laws, but to enforce them. The president’s most potent tool is malicious compliance.

For those of us who want to see government do more than fund the military and keep corporate taxes low, this structure is particularly damaging. Malicious compliance cannot get us universal healthcare or an increase in the minimum wage. For our preferred policies to become law, we have to have both houses of Congress (with a supermajority of 60 in the Senate) and the White House.

But if any presidential candidate, when asked what they would do if elected, offered an honest assessment based on what they believed they could get through Congress, they would most likely lose. So instead, candidates offer bold, sweeping plans they hope will inspire people to vote for them. And then news outlets track the new president’s performance based on whether any of those sweeping plans become law. Successful or not, the implication is that the president is a king when they're really closer to a courtier.

That misperception leads people to vote the incumbent out if things aren’t going well and, perhaps, vote in a new candidate who promises to succeed where the other person failed. Eventually people learn that the things presidential candidates say are mostly untrue and politicians in general are not to be trusted. Some version of this pattern exists in state and local government as well.

The result is the kind of cynicism and apathy that makes our institutions particularly vulnerable to an aspiring authoritarian who knows as little about the functions of government as his most ardent supporters.

Rebuilding our democracy requires more than protecting the formal infrastructure of free and fair elections, a free press, and safeguards against disinformation campaigns. It requires a transparent and accountable decision-making process at all levels of government. It requires those of us who live and breathe politics to stop treating “normies” as hopelessly incapable of connecting the dots between events in their lives, the policies that created those events and the politicians responsible for those policies and to start viewing the inability to connect those dots as a failure of both journalism and activism.

This series–and all of my work–is my small contribution to helping us meet those requirements.

Click below to check out the first installment of Tools for Democracy, like and subscribe!