Our Goal: The Vitalization of Democracy

Why Do the Heathen Rage?
Why Does My District
Always Vote Republican?

What is clear is that when the grassroots speak, via elections, in my district they speak with a loud voice that they prefer Republicans. Such speech baffles me.

Why do the heathen rage? The heathen rage, in the final analysis, I guess, because they dwell in darkness. Part of the problem in dealing with the heathen is that the heathen don’t know that they dwell in darkness; they do they know that they are bound by ignorance. Part of the problem is that the heathen have allegiance to false ideas. And so they rage.

The idea of sending light to free mankind from its darkness has inspired progressives and missionaries throughout the ages. It is through enlightenment that one is educated. Certainly an educated heathen would not habitually rage, and certainly an educated voter would not habitually vote Republican.

It almost seemed that speakers who fondly eulogized and reminisced about President Ford were also reminiscing about a former version of Republicanism that has now disappeared. By their character sketches of Ford, implicitly, many speakers negatively contrasted President Ford to President Bush. I was reminded by watching the Ford funeral that Republicanism, as personified by George W. Bush, is certainly much less attractive than Republicanism as personified by Gerald Ford.

I wonder if many of the habitual Republican voters in my district are not really sick of this new Republicanism and that, with the right approach, many could be persuaded to vote Democratic. Truthout republished Bill Moyer’s essay, “For America’s Sake” originally published in The Nation. Moyer writes, “The American public is committed to a set of values that almost perfectly contradicts the conservative agenda that has dominated politics for a generation now.”

So, why does a large potion of the public continue to vote for Republicans who push a conservative agenda? Evidently, many voters really do not understand that the Republican agenda contradicts their own core values. Surprise, surprise: voters make election choices that are based on misconceptions and ignorance.

And so, the answer to ignorance is education, the answer to darkness is light. How easy it is to say, but how difficult to comprehend a coherent vision of what providing education or sending light to the electorate might really mean. The Grassroots Committee needs to think through The Plan that will succeed in freeing those bound by ignorance. The Grassroots Committee has a lot of work to do.



This is the first part of a three part analysis to be presented to The Montgomery County Democratic Grassroots Committee.

The Grassroots Committee:
Specifying Purpose

There are two key questions of purpose that the Grassroots Committee should seek to answer: What are we trying to accomplish? What does accomplishment look like?

Imagine in November, 2008, this Dayton Daily News (DDN) report is published:

County Votes Democratic In Landslide Sweep

A vigorous grassroots movement culminated yesterday in a Montgomery County landslide of Democratic victories. Democrats won in each General Assembly race; a Democratic won the 3rd Congressional District race; and a Democrat won, by an unprecedented margin in this county, in the Presidential race.

The aspect of the story that would seem to me most amazing, is the fact that even those districts most gerrymandered -- districts that habitually vote 65% Republican for General Assembly members -- would vote for a Democrat to go to the General Assembly. It may seem that such an event is impossible, but I think that such an event is, in fact, very feasible. We have a unique conjunction of elements that makes such a result feasible: time -- 2008, place -- Dayton, Ohio; and circumstance -- Ted Strickland is our Governor. What we need is The Plan.

I’m trying to focus my thinking on is the phrase, “grassroots movement.” I am wondering: What in the world would a “movement” look like that could be credited with such a stunning result? What would be its beginnings? What would keep it going?

Milton Friedman on Market Mechanisms

Milton Friedman, the Nobel winning economist who passed away in 2006, wrote about grassroots in terms of “market mechanisms.” He said:

Fundamentally, society's resources can be organized in only one of two ways, or by some mixture of them. One way is by market mechanisms: from the bottom up. The other way is by command: from the top down. The market is one mechanism. Authoritarian organization-the military is a clear example--is the other. The general gives the order, the colonel passes it on to the captain, and so on down the fine. In the market, the orders come the other way. The consumer walks into a store and gives the order and the orders go up. These two mechanisms have very different characteristics and are suited to handle very different problems.

“Market mechanisms,” the force coming from the bottom to the top is what grassroots action refers to. We sometimes hear of a low budget movie, for example, becoming a great success because of word of mouth enthusiasm. We could ascribe the success of such a movie to the power of a “grassroots movement,” because its success happened through a bottom up process.

In an effective democracy, ideally, in the market of ideas, the interests of ordinary citizens, in a bottom up process, would guide the formation of public policies. Ordinary citizens, in a sense, in Friedman’s phrase, should give the orders and the orders should go up. An effective democracy should be all about a vitalized and fully engaged grass roots. Obviously, our democracy falls far short of this ideal.

Vitalizing The Grass Roots

My conclusion is that what we are trying to accomplish, the purpose that should guide The Plan, generally speaking, is the vitalization of the grass roots. The grass roots is not just the 30% of voters who have identified themselves as Democrats, but the grass roots consists of all potential voters. A vitalized grass roots is one that is informed and engaged. To be engaged means much more than simply voting, but the simple gauge of voting gives an indication of the magnitude that grass roots action may involve. A vitalized grass roots in this county easily could translate to 50,000 more votes cast in each election. To seek to vitalize the grass roots, by any measure, is to seek to actualize a huge goal.

The election of Democrats will be a byproduct of a vitalized grassroots, because an educated and engaged grassroots will discover that it is the Democratic party that is inviting ordinary citizens to meaningful participation and it is the Democratic party that is focusing on representing the interests of the grass roots.

Vitalizing Our Democracy

The cynicism, apathy , distrust and even hostility that is directed toward our political system by ordinary citizens is a phenomena that needs to be carefully considered. The cynicism of the electorate reflects a contempt of the political process and a general mistrust of political parties. As a party we should do whatever is possible to address the reasons for cynicism in any way that we can, and, by our actions, gain public trust.

We need to take this attitude: Our point as a political party is not to elect Democrats -- in the sense that we have Democrats on the shelf, ready to go, ready to be marketed -- our point as a major political party is to create opportunities and structures that will facilitate the working of democracy.

As a major political party we have a huge and special responsibility to nourish our democracy. We have the opportunity to engender and inspire leadership that will be truly reflective of and responsive to the grass roots, leadership that will represent a bottom up phenomena. As a major political party, in my judgment, in fact, we have a huge responsibility to encourage and develop effective, responsible, and creative leadership at all levels -- and the most important level to do this is at the grass roots.

Developing Leadership

My basic thought is that transformation at the grass roots level can only happen by transformation at the individual level, more specifically, by the development of and commitment to leadership at the individual level. What is clear is that the vitalization of the grass roots will depend on the efforts of many grass roots leaders. How these many leaders could emerge is a key question.

The commitment to leadership often comes through vision, through inspiration. I remember in 1968 when Robert Kennedy inspired many to individual leadership. What we can offer to inspire grassroots leadership is a powerful idea that should find support in all quarters: the vitalization and the practice of democracy.

Summary

Our Plan of Action has two questions to answer:

1. What are we trying to accomplish?
   
2. What does accomplishment look like?

In this Part 1 of this analysis, I suggest that the goal we should seek to accomplish initially may look impossible: an imminent Democratic landslide. I suggest when the grass roots become informed and engaged, such a result will inevitably happen .

Time, place, and circumstance favor the Montgomery County Democrats. This advantage will be short-lived, however, if we fail to implement a long term strategy that centers on building authentic grass roots leadership and that centers on building authentic grass roots community.

My conclusion is that The Plan that we should create and implement, should see as its purpose, its goal, the vitalization of our democracy. Such a purpose should gain widespread grass root support. Working to fulfill such a purpose would mean working to fulfill our mission as a major political party. Advancing such a purpose would result in also advancing the election of Democrats because Democrats have a key advantage: the more that potential voters are educated, enlightened and engaged, the more likely they will vote Democratic.

Achieving the huge goals outlined in this paper will require a commitment of leadership from many people. Part 2 of this analysis will attempt to deal with the key question of leadership: What leadership is and how individuals can be motivated to leadership.

Achieving the goals outlined in this paper requires that we think through workable details of actions so that we can then advance a practical vision of action, The Plan, as a means to recruit, inspire and motivate individuals to leadership. Part 3 of this analysis will attempt to outline ideas for specific actions that The Plan should include, and will give one answer to the question that The Plan must answer: “What does details of The Plan look like? What does accomplishment of The Plan look like?”