Where did citizenship and political discourse go? by Wendy Lawrence

The streamers that marked the victory are swept off the floor. The calenders that counted the days until November 6th are wiped clean. The newspaper clippings are thrown away. The volunteers have gone home. Once Election Day in America comes and goes, an entire national circus of television ads, mailings, phonebanks, doorbelling, and partying abrubtly ends. And while the winners prepare for the next step - actually governing - the public takes a breather from politics to step back into normal, everyday life. But what needs to be examined is just what exactly it means to have Americans step back into their normal, everday lives. Americans today switch from voter to civilian, but never spend any time in the crucial role of citizen; citizenship, as I shall define it, is the missing link in modern-day American society. America has entered an era where civic duty doesn't matter, the government is an enemy who won't help the voter, and no single individual could ever hope to make a difference. The result of this mistrust and apathy is that we don't talk to each other. Every other year, when American government takes a brief rest from reelecting itself, Americans go back to their daily lives as what I have termed "civilians." At that point, politics means little. Congress has been sent away to D.C. - why worry about them? Political discourse, such as it exists beyond the scope of the intellectual class of Ph.D.'s and their journals, is restricted to ethical scandals and bills that show up once in a while on the nightly news. As a civilian, then, the American is very unaware of the political arena, or at least too removed from it. The aura of Washington as a self-perpetuating and outwardly-expanding institution spreads to the common man in the street, making our Capital seem like a distant city with no bearing on our lives. And what does trickle down from the city of monuments and deal-making is filtered through politics, journalism, and, finally, individual minds until any substance these ideas once had has disappeared. But then, come an even-numbered year, there is a sudden transformation from civilian to voter. This transformation is not in the identity of Americans, but in the function. They are no longer supposed to simply go about their daily jobs, working to keep the economy strong, the traditions alive, the generations educated. Now, all of the sudden, Americans have a new role. They're supposed to evaluate what has happened in America over the past two or four years, and then apply those judgments to names on a ballot. An interesting aspect of this transformation is that the changes involved are not so much in how Americans view politicians as how politicians view Americans. Time to sell yourself, folks, so start thinking of the catchy slogans, raising funds, and coming up with a winning message. The politicians' plan inevitably backfires somewhere in the media, although the media is not fully not to blame. The information the media is fed is so message-oriented, spin-centered, and wrought with broad, meaningless comments that the media has little choice but to report on the horse race. With every major political candidate making meaningless statements on such controversial issues as the need for a healthy economy and their desire to lead American into the future, the press is forced to ignore what it is fed and search out what makes the candidates different- namely, their strategies. Controversies such as who is doing what, what works for whom, who is popular where, and who, finally, will have the winning strategy become more important than the issues supposedly being debated. Isn't that what politics is all about? It would certainly seem so to the random onlooker of American society during an election year.   Is there anything more to democracy than the horse race?   The transformation from civilian to voter involves politicians finding the connection between their national platform and the real lives of civilians who have to work, save, and take care of their kids. It also involves asking civilians to turn themselves into voters for just a few minutes. They must simply absorb a few television commercials, glance at a couple of direct mail pieces, and punch the ballots on election day. Fulfilling civic duty, which many consider simply voting for the lesser of two evils, is at most deciding which of a group of politicians, differentiable only by their campaign strategies and media image, will get to go to D.C. and do things that don't matter to most people. Being a citizen, however, is not a state one reluctantly enters every other year. The citizen votes, but not in the same way as the voter. The citizen votes for a change or the status quo, for one side of an issue or another, but never out of a feeling of guilt or obligation like the voter who takes on his "civic duty" sometimes. Being a citizen doesn't mean being a policy wonk or a Washington insider. The citizen is not required to read the New York Times on a daily basis. She doesn't have to discuss foreign policy over her Frosted Flakes, nor solve the Medicare crisis at a cocktail party. In fact, being a citizen really only involves two things: making intelligent voting decisions and engaging in substantive political discussions with other citizens. A citizen doesn't have to change the world, but she does vote to make a difference. A citizen need not wax on about the future of Cyprus, but she will exchange opinions with his neighbor about a recent newspaper article. The citizen, then, knows how to talk. When true political discouse takes place, citizens learn not about the personalities and politics of their leaders, but the ways in which the issues and policies that our leaders debate affect them as individual members of a society. Some blame the media, especially television, for the downfall of political discourse in our society. Others blame politicians and their negative, image-ridden campaigns. But does this make sense? Politicians have, after all, found through the trial and error of history that this is the only way to win campaigns. Candidates have adopted these ugly techniques as a method of adapting to the civilian-voters to which they must appeal. I'm not looking to place blame here, however. I want to start solving problems. If we want to call ourselves a respectable democracy, we must start looking for the political discourse that should occur between citizens to make government relevant and effective. Fundamentally, it is American civilians who must make the change from civilian-voters to citizens. Only then can we find real solutions to the problems that plague us. It isn't about institutions. It isn't about laws. It isn't about money. It's about us, as Americans, and what we want to do with our country.

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