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Performance Democracy: Democratic Elitism & the Crisis of Democracy

Applicability of Huntington's Ideas to Today

Our Contemporary

Crisis of Democracy?

Schumpeter's Solution

  • Huntington would develop these ideas further in his 1981 book, American Politics: Promise of Disharmony.

  • Drastically restrict the scope of the citizen--their role is only to select the elites that will make decisions.

  • Beyond this, they are incredibly dangerous.

  • Effective leadership is essential (must ensure that those who are chosen to be elites are capable of decision-making).

  • Once the people have chosen elites, they must step back from decision-making and leave it to the experts.
  • American society has a gap between its ideals (liberty) and its political/social/economic institutions (centralized power).

  • At predictable points in history these gaps manifest themselves in intense, contentious political periods..

  • Such periods are driven by "creedal passions" (a distrust of organized power manifested in political mobilization.

Does Huntington's framework apply to our contemporary political system?

What do you think that the "reform" produced by this period look like?

"Previously passive or unorganized groups in the population now embarked on concerted efforts to establish their claims to opportunities, positions, rewards, and privileges, which they had not considered themselves entitled to before."

The 1960s are usually held up as a high water mark for political participation.

Why would someone like Huntington view this as a problematic trend?

-Samuel P. Huntington on the 1960s

The "Democratic Surge" of the 1960s

  • The decades of the 1960s sees a wave of contentious political activity that took political elites by surprise.

American Society

in the 1960s

  • In particular, "non-traditional participation."
  • sit-ins
  • occupations
  • protests/marches
  • civil disobedience
  • violence/domestic terrorism

  • New scale of protest, as well as new political issues and movements. What movements/issues do we associate with the 1960s?

Huntington & the 1960s "Crisis of Governability"

Are large scale public protests evidence of democracy in action?

Or the failure of democracy?

What We'll Cover Today

For Next Time:

Pluralist Democracy

  • Dahl, "Dimensions of Pluralist Democracy."

Think about:

  • What is the role of organized interests in democracy?

  • Are organized interests a positive or negative force in shaping political outcomes?

1. Dangers of Democratic Excess?

2. Huntington on the "Crisis of Democracy" in 1960s American society.

3. Continuities with the present in the US (Drutman).

For Huntington, the real threat to democracy in America is "...the internal dynamics of democracy itself in a highly educated, mobilized, and participant society."

Huntington: "Dual Democratic Distempers"

What This Means for Democracy...

Concrete Impacts...

  • Many looked at the 1960s and attributed crisis to exceptional events of the time.

  • Huntington says something very different.
  • Crisis was caused by political mobilization.

  • In the 1960s, we saw an "excess of democracy."

  • Democracy depends on some degree of apathy and non-involvement and non-democratic forms of authority (traditional values, expertise, etc.)
  • Decline in public confidence/trust in leaders.

  • Greater ideological consistency/intensity.

  • Decreased affiliation with/consistent support for "establishment" political parties/positions/candidates.

  • Government cannot meet public demands, cannot call upon people for sacrifice--must give the illusion of activity.

  • Inability to meet popular demands INCREASES political mobilization further. This is a cyclical crisis.
  • The decade of the 1960s in the US characterized by two very important trends...
  • greater demands placed on government.
  • decreasing legitimacy/authority of government.
  • In Huntington's eyes, this embodies a "crisis of governability.
  • order, stability, predictability in democratic life and in our political institutions are breaking down.

  • What secondary effects emerge when this happens?

Rob Glover

POS 307-Democratic Theory

March 26, 2018

Image by Tom Mooring

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