This post is also available in: Português Español
Some 130 million US citizens will participate in today’s presidential elections. Small numbers of voters in New Hampshire, Nevada and Iowa may decide the matter. Control of the Senate will be also very tightly contested. Regardless of the outcome, the next American president will govern a polarized country, its divisions exacerbated by the bruising campaign. Economic downturn, worsening inequity, demographic changes, and challenged competitiveness have contributed to these divisions: between the coasts and the heartland, rural and urban, religious and secular, immigrants and anti-immigrants, and among citizens of different income levels, genders and age cohorts.
With the consolidation of media enterprises and the fragmentation of media markets, many citizens are exposed only to the arguments they favor. Civic discourse has been overtaken by confrontational rhetoric. The once-enviable political institutions of the United States have become increasingly dysfunctional. Political institutions of all kinds are in disrepute: Congress, the presidency, parties, the media, and even the courts. Underlying these difficulties are a number of grim realities. The United States has suffered a lost decade as household income has declined. Unemployment has risen sharply. The concentration of income has greatly intensified. The top 1% of US income earners in 1980 garnered 10% of national income; by 2007, the top 1% accounted for 30%. With taxes revenues down and deficits high, public services are starved and the once-vaunted infrastructure is crumbling.
The quality of primary and secondary education has been declining in comparison with other industrial nations. The United States ranks in the middle of OECD countries on tests of reading skills and science, and well below the OECD average in mathematics.
The United States now has unsustainable levels of debt, massive fiscal imbalances, and irresponsible policies pushed by special interests and the cultivation of political advantage. The looming prospect of the “fiscal cliff” that will occur at the end of the year if Congress cannot agree on tax and budget policy epitomizes this dangerous tendency. Relative to several other important countries, the United States has unquestionably been declining. Neither presidential contender was willing to talk candidly to the American people about this fact, but whoever wins the election will have to face it.
One should not underestimate the capacity of the United States to renew its energies and reverse deterioration. It still has the enormous assets it has long enjoyed: continental scope, vast natural resources (including oil and natural gas, and abundant agricultural productivity) and a large and broadly educated population. It also has a relatively open society and educational system that absorbs talented people from throughout the world; offers increasing equality of educational and employment opportunities to women, ethnic minorities and immigrants; the world’s best research universities; a stunning capacity for technological innovation, drawing on unique cooperation between business, universities and government; military prowess; and a degree of underlying social cohesion that makes class divisiveness hard to sustain.
The key question is whether the president chosen in today’s elections will be able to help the United States capitalize on these assets, restore dynamism to the economy, and return moderation and pragmatic cooperation to US public policies. Here the frustrating election campaign may obscure a silver lining: the more radical tendencies in US politics, the Tea Party Republicans and the ultra-liberal Democrats, both lost ground in this year’s contests.
The opportunity is at hand to strengthen centrist tendencies, break legislative logjams, and thrust the United States forward.
