The decline of civic engagement in the United States

WorldView: Leaving a small-town junior high school in the American Midwest some time ago I was deeply struck by a memorial plaque…

WorldView: Leaving a small-town junior high school in the American Midwest some time ago I was deeply struck by a memorial plaque near the entrance, writes Anthony O'Halloran.

Memorials are usually erected to remind us of history's elite, be they politicians, poets or actors. The plaque in question was dedicated to a deceased janitor, a much loved and respected gentleman who had obviously quietly encouraged students.

The act of dedicating this memorial has a strong egalitarian ring to it. The average US citizen is intolerant of ascribed status, snobbery or social prestige. Status or titles will not generally afford you advantage or preferential treatment.

Drawing on liberal thinking, American political discourse is permeated with an egalitarian rhetoric. Legally expressed as citizenship, it cements a disparate, diverse and complex polity together, creating a strong overarching national identity.

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Europeans could draw on ethnic and cultural ties to generate a national identity. Americans on the other hand drew on a liberal egalitarian political philosophy to shape the nation's emerging identity and citizenship culture. The fact that civic rather than ethnic identity binds Americans together is an extraordinary political achievement.

At another level, however, the United States is a deeply stratified society and a very divided polity. Anyone who cares to visit a small town in the Midwest will encounter what can only be described as ultra-right-wing thinking.

I had read much about this dimension of American politics, but nothing prepares you for these encounters. I confess to being scared of this ideology's broader implications. Like all forms of extremism, its proponents cannot think outside their own very limited view of social and political reality.

There is no real discussion. Rather, one is presented with pre-programmed answers. There is a strong them-and-us mentality. Empathising with others who are different in either their thoughts or actions is simply impossible.

Thus the idea of solidarity beyond kindred spirit does not arise. Proponents think and act within their socially and politically constructed box. So-called liberals are despised.

One individual told me he would leave the United States if Hillary Clinton ever became president. Talk-show hosts who offer a distorted world view day after day stoke up much of this venom. This merely tends to reinforce a strong sense of collective identity among the far right.

In overall terms the far right is in the ascendant. Liberals appear to have lost their confidence. Both in Ireland and the European continent I have encountered quite a few students of a liberal democratic persuasion. Many were not returning to the US and most did not want to because of the hold the far right appears to have on the Bush Presidency.

It was as if they had temporarily thrown in the towel. One could not help forming the melodramatic image of American liberals fleeing their country seeking a more tolerant political environment elsewhere.

The mere fact that American liberals engage in the discourse of exile surely demonstrates that something is amiss. The gap between them and the far right is in my opinion unbridgeable. On a range of social issues, such as the death penalty and abortion, a dialogue of the deaf ensues. There is no middle ground.

On the economy the divisions are even deeper. Any form of intervention in the free market is anathema to the far right. They speak as if all forms of collective governance are self-evidently evil. Particular spite is reserved for welfare recipients.

After all, citizens do not deserve handouts. Remind them of inherited unearned income, and somehow that is differentiated from welfare payments to feed the poor.

Forty-one years after President Kennedy's assassination it is interesting to read his 1961 inaugural address. Telling his fellow citizens that they "dare not forget today we are the heirs of that first revolution", he reminds citizens that "each generation of Americans has been summoned to give testimony to its national loyalty".

Kennedy made his address in an era of global and national division. The Cuban missile crisis was to test his presidency. Internally race relations would plague his successors during the 1960s. Vietnam was to divide Americans as few issues have. Yet 41 years on the United States remains a deeply divided polity.

Uniquely, those on the far right have been conferred with legitimacy by the Republican Party elite. Ultra-dogmatic thinking has been brought in from the margins.

What are the implications for contemporary American politics? The answer lies in American history. The Founding Fathers were very fearful of factions. Ultimately they could divide and fragment the polity.

In particular, they feared the consequences of two almost equally strong opposing factions.

How could this dilemma be solved? The solution was to encourage the creation of a vast array of factions in a large-scale federal polity. A vibrant and pluralistic civil society dispersed across a large-scale polity would ensure that no single faction would get a permanent majority. The tyranny of the majority was thus avoided.

This is how American political history evolved. An ultra-vibrant civil society with high rates of volunteerism and civic engagement has been the norm until quite recently. Cleavages tended to be cross-cutting and dispersed rather than dichotomous.

A vibrant civil society prevented the emergence of one single and all-embracing cleavage - precisely what the Founding Fathers hoped for.

Recently civic engagement has plummeted. Simultaneously, it seems, the polity is dividing among two deeply hostile and polarised factions, one of which is fuelling ideological extremism.

An interesting question therefore arises. Will this have a negative impact on the polity's overarching sense of unity, leading to fragmentation? The Founding Fathers would almost certainly answer in the affirmative.

Anthony O'Halloran is a research fellow with the department of government at UCC. He was previously a visiting Fulbright Scholar at the department of political science at Southern Illinois University, Carbondale