Functioning Democracy: Mutual Toleration And Institutional Forbearance

Levitsky & Ziblatt begin by accounting for the rise of other authoritarian leaders in the past such as Hitler, Mussolini, and Hugo Chavez and they explain that many people incorrectly believe that we can keep democracy safe by having the people hold democratic values but that in reality, political parties are democracy’s gatekeepers’. They must look out for particular behavioral warning signs that can help identify authoritarian leaders and that mainstream parties must isolate and defeat extremist forces through a process called “distancing”. However, they emphasize that constitutional safeguards are not enough, and, rather, unwritten rules or “norms” must be widely known and respected for successful democracy.

The two norms that are crucial for a functioning democracy are mutual toleration and institutional forbearance. Mutual toleration refers to the idea that as long as our rivals play by constitutional rules, we accept that they have an equal right to exist, compete for power, and govern. They should be treated as legitimate opposition. Furthermore, institutional forbearance refers to avoiding actions that, while respecting the letter of the law, obviously violate its spirit. Public officials must use their institutional prerogatives judiciously. The authors argue that now these critical features are being compromised which is causing “democratic backsliding” or, in other words, diminishing our democracy.

The major critical feature they see as establishing this instability by destroying these democratic norms is extreme polarization. They explain that healthy political rivalry is devolving into partisan hatred and that parties come to view each other not as legitimate rivals but as dangerous enemies, compromising mutual toleration. Losing becomes a catastrophe rather than an accepted part of the political process. This leads politicians to be tempted to abandon forbearance and not use their institutional prerogatives judiciously, to win at any cost, thus compromising American norms of democracy. This theme of abandoning forbearance is seen in the proliferating use of filibustering, the congressional refusal to raise the debt limit as well as Obama’s use of executive actions to bypass Congress. The result of a lack of these norms is a democracy without guardrails.

Ultimately, the authors note that these features are so seemingly new because polarization has been increasing since the 80’s at a rapid rate and parties are more polarized right now than at any time during the last century. They conclude with a concerning caveat that the norms sustaining our political system rested to a considerable degree on racial exclusion and thus more recent racial inclusion that began after WWII and culminated in the 1964 civil rights act and 1965 equal voting rights act seemed to democratize us but it also led to immense polarization which has since threatened our democracy. Thus, they argue that the roots of today’s polarization are racial and cultural and have given rise to two fundamentally different parties, the Republican party that is predominantly white and Christian and the Democratic party that is more ethically diverse and increasingly secular.

I am hopeful that American democracy is likely to survive this latest threat as there are many longstanding features of American democracy that have previously served to counter this instability and that I believe will maintain our federalist system of checks and balances. To be transparent, the features I will discuss were briefly mentioned in a recent article written by Levitzky & Ziblatt that I came across while studying but I will expand on their importance here and why they work to maintain our democracy which the authors did not elaborate on.

The first feature of American democracy is our “robust judiciary and rule of law”. For example “judicial review” was established in the court case Marbury v. Madison in 1803. It established a process under which executive and legislative actions are subject to review by the judiciary and gives them the power to declare actions of the branches invalid or unconstitutional. Judicial review is important because it gives the courts more power in the form of anti-majoritarianism. I believe this authority held by the court will be crucial for continuing to fostering our system of checks and balances. The second feature is our “vibrant media”.

A fundamental American right is the right to free speech and I believe our growing connectedness via media and our ability to share ideas and organize interests in the form of nonviolent protests and the like is especially salient today and is an effective way of requiring that the government acknowledge the desires of the majority. The issue attention cycle theory put forth by Downs is relevant here as it helps us understand the interaction between the media and social movements. I believe our vibrant media and civil society has recently been and will continue to be especially important for keeping the majority’s interests within the cycle and to make sure they are recognized by people in power who are supposed to represent us.