Breaking the Two-Party Doom Loop by Lee Drutman

Author:Lee Drutman
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Published: 2019-02-17T16:00:00+00:00

Campaign finance and lobbying are big problems too. A multiparty democracy will make them easier to reform.

I’m also deeply concerned about the role of money in politics. Wealthy billionaires pour hundreds of millions of dollars into the political system. This distorts public policy. Members of Congress spend endless hours listening to and responding to the concerns of uniquely rich people and lobbyists so that these donors will sign campaign checks for thousands of dollars. This distorts their priorities. As I discussed in chapter 3, candidates’ and parties’ increasing reliance on private money for campaigns has toxified politics. Congress should absolutely pass laws to support public funding of elections, using either campaign finance vouchers, small-donor matching, or both.

I would also expect a new multiparty Congress to be more likely to pass public financing for elections, in line with most other advanced democracies. It’s yet another commonsense policy that has been ensnared in the zero-sum politics of partisan advantage-seeking, with Republicans mostly opposed because they feel they’ve benefited more from the existing system. But break the zero-sum toxic partisanship, and it’s much easier to assemble a coalition. As North Carolina representative Mark Meadows, the head of the Freedom Caucus, said in response to Democrats’ 2019 campaign finance reform proposal for small-donor matching: “Generally speaking, campaign-finance reform, that I do support.” But, he added: “Typically, when someone puts forth an initiative, it’s all about gaining partisan advantage.”83 That’s the kind of thinking that makes all reform tricky. But break the “It’s all about gaining partisan advantage” mindset, and many other things start to seem possible.

I also fully expect a less polarized, more decentralized, and thus stronger Congress to emerge under a new multiparty system. With more opportunity to legislate and less focus on keeping or gaining a narrow majority, Congress will invest in more policy expertise and therefore will be less dependent on corporate lobbyists and the executive branch for basic policy knowhow.

Once American politics is not trapped in zero-sum toxic politics, much more becomes possible. But electoral reform is the key to getting us there.

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