Every now and again I see or read something that reminds me how lucky we are to live in a modern western democracy like the UK.
Earlier this week, the UK government promised more support to speed up the adoption process for prospective parents. It's a positive but hardly revolutionary announcement and I probably only gave the story a passing glance when I first read it.
Then today, in a completely unrelated story, Russia announced that it would no longer allow Americans to adopt Russian children. What a bizarre concept! Reading further it turns out that this is actually just one part of a tit-for-tat series of isolationist measures between Russia and the US.
Still, seeing this reminded me of the UK announcement and really drove home to me the importance of the incremental but progressive reforms that we excel at in this country. We don't move forward by leaps and bounds, but we do always seem to be heading in the right direction.
Showing posts with label USA. Show all posts
Showing posts with label USA. Show all posts
Wednesday, December 26, 2012
Monday, September 18, 2006
What's the matter with Kansas?
An article in the Guardian looked at an peculiar quirk in Americans' voting habits. In 2004, the 10 states with the lowest household income all voted Republican. The 5 states with the steepest falls in income also all voted Republican. Curious, because aren't poor people supposed to vote Democrat? A book by Thomas Frank, called What's the Matter with Kansas?, blames this phenomenon on "values" voting (gay rights and abortion). The poor, he says, have been hoodwinked into voting against their economic interests.
Well, actually, Mr Frank is wrong. The problem is not that poor people are voting Republican, but that they aren't voting at all. According to CNN polls, 63% per cent of those who earn less than $15,000 a year and 57% of those who earn between $15,000 and $30,000 voted Democrat. But the turnout for those earning less than $20,000 was only 48%.
The reason that the poorest states all vote Republican has nothing to do with the poor, because they aren't voting. Something else is going on. According to the Guardian, it's the rich people that you need to look at. In wealthy states, the rich split their votes between Republicans and Democrats. But (and this is the important bit), rich people in poor states always vote Republican. So the poor states always turn out red.
If the Democrats want to win an election, the answer is quite simple. Develop policies that appeal to the poor. There's a whole load of them just waiting to vote for you if it looks like it's worth it. According to US census figures, since 2000 poverty has risen by 7%, and median household income has fallen by 3%. As everyone surely knows by now, the question is not What's the matter with Kansas?, but What's the matter with the Democrats?
Well, actually, Mr Frank is wrong. The problem is not that poor people are voting Republican, but that they aren't voting at all. According to CNN polls, 63% per cent of those who earn less than $15,000 a year and 57% of those who earn between $15,000 and $30,000 voted Democrat. But the turnout for those earning less than $20,000 was only 48%.
The reason that the poorest states all vote Republican has nothing to do with the poor, because they aren't voting. Something else is going on. According to the Guardian, it's the rich people that you need to look at. In wealthy states, the rich split their votes between Republicans and Democrats. But (and this is the important bit), rich people in poor states always vote Republican. So the poor states always turn out red.
If the Democrats want to win an election, the answer is quite simple. Develop policies that appeal to the poor. There's a whole load of them just waiting to vote for you if it looks like it's worth it. According to US census figures, since 2000 poverty has risen by 7%, and median household income has fallen by 3%. As everyone surely knows by now, the question is not What's the matter with Kansas?, but What's the matter with the Democrats?
Monday, September 11, 2006
Superpowers
Amid the many articles about the fifth anniversary of 9/11, I notice the news that China has increased its censorship of the media by banning foreign agencies from distributing their own reports. From now on, the state-owned Xinhua news agency has the power to censor foreign reporting.
Obviously, this is a bad development. It struck me because I've used Xinhua myself to get news about China, and I've always been impressed by its constructive criticism of the Chinese government. On second thoughts, I suppose I've never seen anything there about Taiwan, ethnic minorities or human rights.
David Cameron today spoke against "anti-Americanism", which he says "represents an intellectual and moral surrender". It has often been remarked that America's unilateral approach to the "War on Terror" has lost it much of the worldwide sympathy it gained after 9/11. Certainly there is much in American foreign policy that deserves criticism. On the other hand, if we must have a world superpower, I think I would rather it be America than anyone else, so I'm inclined to agree with Cameron on this one. Previous superpowers, from the Roman Empire to the Mongols to the British, respected other societies far less than the Americans have done. I am grateful the Soviet Union lost the Cold War.
As China grows in confidence, it is worth asking ourselves what sort of superpower it might become. I am no great lover of America, but I know who I would prefer exercising world dominance. Today, as we reflect on the last five years, I hope that anti-Americanism isn't the abiding legacy of 9/11.
Obviously, this is a bad development. It struck me because I've used Xinhua myself to get news about China, and I've always been impressed by its constructive criticism of the Chinese government. On second thoughts, I suppose I've never seen anything there about Taiwan, ethnic minorities or human rights.
David Cameron today spoke against "anti-Americanism", which he says "represents an intellectual and moral surrender". It has often been remarked that America's unilateral approach to the "War on Terror" has lost it much of the worldwide sympathy it gained after 9/11. Certainly there is much in American foreign policy that deserves criticism. On the other hand, if we must have a world superpower, I think I would rather it be America than anyone else, so I'm inclined to agree with Cameron on this one. Previous superpowers, from the Roman Empire to the Mongols to the British, respected other societies far less than the Americans have done. I am grateful the Soviet Union lost the Cold War.
As China grows in confidence, it is worth asking ourselves what sort of superpower it might become. I am no great lover of America, but I know who I would prefer exercising world dominance. Today, as we reflect on the last five years, I hope that anti-Americanism isn't the abiding legacy of 9/11.
Tuesday, September 05, 2006
Why PR makes sense
I'm interested in American politics. It works very differently from politics here in Britain, or so I thought. Americans seem to split every issue into 'conservative' or 'liberal'. Every newspaper or news channel is either 'conservative' or 'liberal'; every person is either a 'conservative' or a 'liberal'; and every policy is either a 'conservative' policy or 'liberal' policy.
Strangely enough, in Britain we do have a Conservative and a Liberal Party! But, to me, those words don't mean the same things they do in America. My impression in America was that a person's entire political mindset could be extrapolated from any one issue. If you admitted to being anti-abortion, this automatically means that you are also anti-gay rights, anti-taxation, pro-Iraq war and countless other things I know nothing about. But here in Britain, I thought, that doesn't happen. I could quite happily have a discussion with a stranger about abortion while giving him no clues about my political leanings.
Last night, I tested this theory on a French and an English friend. To my surprise, the English friend disagreed. She said that moral, social and economic issues were just as polarised here as in America; that being anti-abortion was inextricably linked to adherence to the Conservative Party, pro-abortion with the Liberals or Labour, and so on. Perhaps she is right; perhaps I have just wilfully ignored the political landscape. Or perhaps British politics is polarised, but just not to such a great degree as American politics. However, the real surprise for me was hearing about politics in France.
The political situation in America and Britain is caused by the electoral "first past-the-post" system, in which only the top candidate in each region is represented in congress/parliament. This stops minority parties getting any power and forces a two-party system (Britain is unusual in that a third party, the Liberals, consistently attracts a sizeable portion of votes, but on the whole it is still a two-party nation).
In France, on the other hand, there is proportional representation. The number of votes equals the number of representatives. This has one significant consequence: minority parties are worth voting for. There are about ten parties in France that get over 5% of the vote: the biggest party only gets about 20%! The problem is that they have to form coalitions before they can govern the country, but think of the advantages! In France, if you care about the environment you don't have to vote Democrats, you can vote Greens. If you are patriotic, you don't have to vote Republican, you can vote Rally for the Republic. If you are socialist, you can vote Socialist or even Communist, and so on. And your vote will count.
Bipolar politics is bad politics. It averages out countless viewpoints into two groups. No-one can vote for the issues they care about without supporting numerous others they don't. Some people say at least it keeps extremism out of politics. On the contrary, the best thing you can do with extremism is keep it in the open. In France, the National Front polls about 12% of votes, but at least everyone knows they'll never actually get in power and they'll never contaminate the moderate parties. In Britain and America, extremism seethes under the surface. Conservatives and Republicans are forced to court right-wing nationalists. It makes me reluctant to vote for the parties I really like. That's not good enough. When will our governments realise the best democracy is genuine, proportional representation?
Strangely enough, in Britain we do have a Conservative and a Liberal Party! But, to me, those words don't mean the same things they do in America. My impression in America was that a person's entire political mindset could be extrapolated from any one issue. If you admitted to being anti-abortion, this automatically means that you are also anti-gay rights, anti-taxation, pro-Iraq war and countless other things I know nothing about. But here in Britain, I thought, that doesn't happen. I could quite happily have a discussion with a stranger about abortion while giving him no clues about my political leanings.
Last night, I tested this theory on a French and an English friend. To my surprise, the English friend disagreed. She said that moral, social and economic issues were just as polarised here as in America; that being anti-abortion was inextricably linked to adherence to the Conservative Party, pro-abortion with the Liberals or Labour, and so on. Perhaps she is right; perhaps I have just wilfully ignored the political landscape. Or perhaps British politics is polarised, but just not to such a great degree as American politics. However, the real surprise for me was hearing about politics in France.
The political situation in America and Britain is caused by the electoral "first past-the-post" system, in which only the top candidate in each region is represented in congress/parliament. This stops minority parties getting any power and forces a two-party system (Britain is unusual in that a third party, the Liberals, consistently attracts a sizeable portion of votes, but on the whole it is still a two-party nation).
In France, on the other hand, there is proportional representation. The number of votes equals the number of representatives. This has one significant consequence: minority parties are worth voting for. There are about ten parties in France that get over 5% of the vote: the biggest party only gets about 20%! The problem is that they have to form coalitions before they can govern the country, but think of the advantages! In France, if you care about the environment you don't have to vote Democrats, you can vote Greens. If you are patriotic, you don't have to vote Republican, you can vote Rally for the Republic. If you are socialist, you can vote Socialist or even Communist, and so on. And your vote will count.
Bipolar politics is bad politics. It averages out countless viewpoints into two groups. No-one can vote for the issues they care about without supporting numerous others they don't. Some people say at least it keeps extremism out of politics. On the contrary, the best thing you can do with extremism is keep it in the open. In France, the National Front polls about 12% of votes, but at least everyone knows they'll never actually get in power and they'll never contaminate the moderate parties. In Britain and America, extremism seethes under the surface. Conservatives and Republicans are forced to court right-wing nationalists. It makes me reluctant to vote for the parties I really like. That's not good enough. When will our governments realise the best democracy is genuine, proportional representation?
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)