RESTORING
AMERICAN DEMOCRACY
Oil companies have calculated that at current rates
of consumption, the world will run out of oil in 40 years. Since the rate of oil usage is increasing,
some believe 30 years is a more realistic estimate.
Oil doesn’t just fuel our cars. It powers industry, heats our homes, and
drives agriculture. Oil fuels our
tractors and trucks, powers irrigation systems, and is made into fertilizers
and pesticides. In other words, “life
as we know it” will not continue once the oil is gone. Of course, that doesn’t mean our society
can’t be reinvented along sustainable lines.
But that task is daunting, to say the least.
America has just completed war with Iraq. Since Iraq has the largest oil reserves of
any country in the world except Saudi Arabia, much of the world concludes that
the central purpose of the war was to seize control of oil.
But according to the Nuremberg Principles, which we
used to put Nazis on trial after the Second World War, our invasion was
illegal. Also, by turning our backs on
the U.N., NATO, and world public opinion, we squandered widespread good will
that followed the 9/11 attacks, and may have set the stage for future
terrorism.
How was the decision to pursue this war made? Advisors to the Bush administration include
militarists and have ties to the oil industry.
We have heard of PNAC (Project for a New American Century), and the Bush
Doctrine. These seem to prescribe aggressive
wars to keep a second superpower or an economic rival from emerging.
The administration’s position could be symbolized by
the SUV ( Sport-Utility Vehicle). SUV’s and cheap gasoline to fuel them
represent for many the view that “The American lifestyle is not debatable”
(George H.W. Bush). This position is
associated with reliance on militarism, since there is no cooperative way to
maintain the American lifestyle of high consumption in a world that is largely
poor.
What is the alternative view? Since the first picture of the earth taken
from space, growing numbers of people have begun to see themselves as connected
with the planet, its ecosystem, and with each other. In this view, the growing human population, combined with
depletion of oil and other resources, and threats to the climate from human
activity, signal the need for a fundamental change.
The change required is not just ecological, to
protect the planet so that the planet can continue to sustain us. We need to be concerned about the whole
earth, because the proper operation of its systems affects all of us. That means we must cooperate with people in
other countries. For the first time in
human history, because our fates are intertwined, our national objective must
be for the whole world to prosper over the long haul, rather than to gain a
competitive advantage.
In the realm of energy, the transition required is
from reliance on fossil fuels (oil, coal, and natural gas) to renewable energy
from the sun. Wind farms and
photovoltaic (PV) power plants generate electricity from the sun. Electricity itself is hard to store and
transport, but it can be used to extract hydrogen gas from water. Hydrogen can be compressed and piped long
distances, and can power industry.
Prototype fuel cell cars already exist that run on hydrogen, and whose
exhaust is pure water.
To rebuild our prosperous technological society to
run on solar power would be a staggeringly large job. Thousands of square miles of PV solar collectors would be
required. It would be a new industrial
revolution, creating millions of new jobs.
Fortunes would be made, but not necessarily by the oil companies and
weapons manufacturers.
We can choose an energy policy, and indeed a
domestic and foreign policy, based on global cooperation for sustainability and
prosperity. We can call this the “PV”
(photovoltaic) alternative.
So, is our future to be SUV, or PV? Of course choosing public policy for the
future isn’t that simple. There are
also questions about the environment, the economy, health care, and economic
justice. But our country has been
having war in Iraq, policy squarely in the SUV camp, without first debating the
options. What happened to democracy?
We Americans are justly proud of our democratic
tradition. Our Constitution spells out
the rules of government; we are a representative democracy. “We the people” elect senators,
representatives, and the president, and these people are to govern in our
interest. The Constitution provides for them to have terms of between 2 and 6
years, so they are on a short leash, and can be recalled by the people before
doing much harm.
These short terms were devised by the American
revolutionaries, who were sensitive to the need to reign in the tyranny of
kings. But times have changed.
Two things have become problems. First, in the age of expensive TV campaigns
to reach the millions of citizens—something never anticipated by the founding
fathers—we force our candidates for public office to solicit very large amounts
of money for their campaigns. Most of
this money comes from corporations, so corporations can essentially hire the
politicians they want to work on their behalf.
This seriously compromises our democracy.
The other problem is that technology, and world
population growth, have led to entirely new issues in the world, that our
Constitution doesn’t address. Our
country has always had a frontier.
There was an outlet for excess workers, who could “go west,” and
homestead, or mine, or do logging, or otherwise make a living from the
resources there. Now the frontier is
gone, in America and in the world.
Overpopulation is even more serious in Africa and
Latin America, where extreme poverty leads to famine, plague, wars, and a
breakdown of the education system, further threatening the future.
The very-large-scale problems the world faces
include climate change, nuclear weapons threats, looming fresh water scarcity,
economic injustice, topsoil loss, habitat loss—the list goes on. But our politicians can’t think about these
problems, because they need to get reelected, in a matter of months, or at most
a few years.
If a politician suggested that a big investment were
needed in the human future, it would tend to poison his reelection unless it
benefited his corporate sponsors right away.
So if someone proposes a $500 billion system to put weapons into space
for the purpose of projecting American power, there is already industry waiting
for the contracts. But a politician
can’t propose universal education of everyone in the world, to help solve the
population problem, since there is no rich industry waiting to get the
money.
Large corporations simply contribute money to the
campaigns of political candidates whose policies they like. Corporations also lobby congress for laws
favorable to their industries. This has
been going on for a long time, so what we see is the outcome most beneficial to
the corporations. That is, the SUV
option has become the status quo.
If we don’t like Republican policies, why not just
vote for the Democrat? Because both
parties need to court big business.
This drives the two parties toward the same policies. When George W. Bush ran against Al Gore in
the 2000 election, their positions were similar, and both got corporate
contributions. Ralph Nader, running as
the Green Party candidate, could not attract big corporate money to buy TV ads,
and was excluded from the presidential debates.
How might American democracy be restored, to
represent the interests of people instead of wealth? Three changes are needed:
First, we need 100% public financing of
elections.
What about free speech? Some consider it heresy that a very rich man should be prevented
from placing an advertisement on TV supporting his candidate. He should be free to speak out. And so he is. But if his speaking is done on television, the transaction is not
so much speech as a paid commercial message.
If the candidate’s opponent can’t afford equivalent exposure, we’re
right back to money buying votes.
But can we afford public financing of
elections? Suppose public financing
cost as much as $1 billion per year.
Our military budget is $400 billion per year—about equal to military
spending of the rest of the world combined.
Would ¼ of 1% of that money be too much to pay for honest, responsive
government?
Secondly, we need Instant Runoff Voting (IRV).
In this system if there are just two candidates for
an office, nothing is different. But if
there is a third candidate, the voter selects both a first and second
choice. If any one candidate gets most
of the votes, he wins. But if no
candidate is the first choice of most voters, the candidate with the fewest
votes is removed from consideration.
But votes cast for the dropped candidate are not
lost. They are transferred to the
voters’ second choice candidates.
Let’s return to the Bush / Gore / Nader presidential
race. Suppose a voter liked Nader best,
then Gore, then Bush. In the existing
system, the voter would know from polls that Nader couldn’t win, and so could
not vote for him without potentially benefiting his third choice, Bush.
In the IRV system, he could vote for Nader, then
Gore, then Bush. Assuming Nader came in
last, a vote for him would go to the voter’s second choice, Gore.
As the Democrat and Republican parties drift toward
the same (pro business) position, democracy requires new parties to represent
alternative views. But such parties are
effectively excluded by the present voting system.
Besides respecting the wishes of the voter as
discussed, instant runoff voting (IRV) has another advantage. In the present
two-candidate-only system, negative campaigning tends to be effective. As long as the voter has only two choices,
the candidates need not explain what they will do in office if they can
effectively advertise the faults of the other candidate. In the IRV system, positive campaigning is
encouraged, because if the two leading candidates convince the voters they are
both unqualified, a third party candidate might look like a good alternative to
both of them.
IRV is a special case of the general topic of
proportional representation (PR). Proportional representation is used in most
of Europe for electing legislative bodies, because it better represents the
range of diverse views. That is, it is
more democratic than our winner-take-all system of representation. If the U.S. Congress were elected using PR,
our government would be more accountable to the people. But that would require a radical change to
the Constitution, and may be unnecessary.
Thirdly, we need a council to advise the citizens,
as well as the executive and legislative branches of government.
The objective of the council would be to safeguard
the future of the country and the world, for (let’s say) the next 100
years. It would do this by pointing up
the risks and benefits of various possible public policy choices. It would report directly to the American
people, on television, with such visual aids they consider most suitable, so
that anyone with access to a television could know the implications of upcoming
policy decisions.
This body would be advisory only, having no
lawmaking authority. It would consist
of “the best and the brightest” from academia, non-governmental organizations
(NGO’s) and might include citizens chosen at random. The advisory council would bring in expert witnesses and hear
testimony on both sides of issues. Like
the Supreme Court, it would decide what issues to study, and what findings to
report to the people.
Thought would have to be given to the selection,
term, payment, etc. of the council members, to make them untouchable. Members might be paid a small percentage
more money than they were making before joining, so there would be no incentive
either to join or to quit because of the money. It might work best if members served for relatively short
terms—perhaps a few years—long enough to consider all the angles of some big
subjects, but short enough not to get stale.
Members quitting the council should be prevented from profiting
monetarily from the experience, such as by writing a book or lecturing or
taking a job connected to the government, to avoid any appearance of
corruption. Clearly the reports of such
a body could have major financial implications.
The council might study the SUV / PV issue.
The council might tackle a question like whether the
U.S. should lead the world away from reliance on nuclear weapons, or reliance
on military solutions in general.
Clearly the status quo is that the military-industrial complex does not
want such a discussion to take place, and politicians see the question as too
long-term and politically dangerous to touch.
Also, politicians have strong incentives to bring military spending to
their own districts.
Politicians in the present system can’t even
theoretically consider ending the nuclear threat to the world, because the
short-term disruption resulting would make them unelectable. In the long-term, on the other hand, nuclear
disarmament may make sense. So might
single-payer health care. The U.S.
might consider whether to help the world to guarantee human rights, including
an education for every child, and a job for everyone who wants one.
Just because the council advised against some course
of action would not mean elected officials would have to take the advice. But politicians might find it difficult to
pass legislation widely considered to be damaging to our country’s future.
We’ve talked about the threat to the United States
as the oil runs out. Our “SUV” public
policy directly threatens our country, and our children’s future. An alternative future is possible, based on
renewable energy—the photovoltaic (PV) option.
But we can’t even discuss alternatives until American democracy is
restored.
Three reforms could renew democracy in the United
States:
-100% public financing of
campaigns,
-Instant runoff voting (IRV), and
an
-Advisory Council, to safeguard the
future.
Clearly these are not reforms the media and their
corporate sponsors are advocating.
Democracy would be something entirely different from the status quo.
But America was designed to be an experiment in
democracy. Can we live in a society
without a king, where the people govern themselves?
The world’s population is exploding, overwhelming
the resources available. Doomsday
weapons, once considered necessary to our survival, threaten the human
race. Technology has gone from horse
and buggy to telephone, radio, TV, satellites, and the Internet.
Can our democracy right itself, and adjust to the
world we live in? Can we live in a
society without a king?