If Americans hate government, why would they value democracy?

The cult of “individual rights” prevents us from appreciating what we have in common, and how government actually helps us as individuals

If our understanding of politics and human nature begins with the idea of each individual human pursuing her or his own self-interest, then government tends to appear as something which restricts their freedom. Under that political philosophy, the justification for government consists in its ability to maintain a condition in which each individual can pursue her or his own interests without fear of being bullied by another individual. Government also is justified for its role in defending individuals against external aggression by another society.

Limited government, in this view, is regarded as a necessary evil -- on the one hand, a kind of referee to facilitate the harmonization of conflicting interests, and on the other hand, a defender of the collection of individuals from foreign attack. Because it is regarded as an instrument in the service of private interests, government appears as something external and alien to the individual.

This view was passed down from the 17th century political philosophers Thomas Hobbes and John Locke to the founders of the young American nation in the late 18th century. Thomas Jefferson's conception of society as a confederation of individual yeoman farmers, each approximately equal in means, rights and freedoms, was the foundation for an agrarian-based, representative democracy in which "the government that governs best, governs least."  This vision was no mere philosophical fancy, it was based on an earthy reality: by 1770, more than three-quarters of the colonial population of 2 million worked in agriculture, and about two-thirds of white male farmers owned their own land.

Individual rights – especially property and religious rights -- was the complementary heads to the tails of a burgeoning free market economy. In The Wealth of Nations (1776), philosopher Adam Smith popularized the idea that an economy should function in a technocratic, self-regulating fashion, driven by individual economic actors guided by an “invisible hand.” Smith’s and Jefferson’s visions of self-regulated equality became animating vectors for a new economy and politics, especially when compared to the divine right of kings, the privileges of the aristocracy, and an imperial mercantilist economy.

Henceforth individual actors, inter-connected to each other by the bonds of a new universal conception of property, rights, commerce, religion, equality and limited government, were the new sovereigns seeking “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.” Every individual was potentially a member of this new über-tribe of “equal among equals.” Everyone, that is, except slaves, women, Native peoples, propertyless whites and other populations that were treated as second class citizens or worse. The white, Christian-based, male owners of property wielded a new and innovative form of limited republican democracy, even as they maintained their gender, racial and class supremacy.

Individuals…as part of the whole

But this fledgling experiment in democratic governance evolved. In the view of other political philosophers, this notion of government as an instrument for the protection of private liberty and interests was too one-sided and inadequate. It left out of the narrative the fact that individual humans have always depended on a group or community – whether kin, tribe, town or nation – to actualize her/his potential. The German political philosopher Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, writing in the early 19^th century, found that only by participating in the life of a greater whole was an individual able to locate one’s true place in the universe. And this greater whole for Hegel was political society, just as it was for Plato, Aristotle and Rousseau.

We can recognize these philosophical tensions even today; in the identities of Republicans vs. Democrats, these late 17th through early 19th century themes continue to play out. It is embedded into our national DNA.

Most Republicans today, both leaders and the party’s voters, trumpet the primacy of the individual and take a dim view of government, which is viewed as somehow taking unfairly from the individual. Whether the taking is in the form of income taxes, gun restrictions or some other individual prerogative, conservatives have mounted an ideological campaign to malign government and portray it as an impediment to a better society. President Ronald Reagan declared boldly in his first inaugural address in 1981, “Government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem.”

Republican speaker of the house Newt Gingrich and President George W. Bush continued this ideological attack throughout the 1990s and early 2000’s, a calculated conservative strategy 30 years in the making. They bent reality to enact huge tax cuts by portraying government as an ineffectual bumbler that stole taxes from Americans’ hard-earned wages, only to turn it over to welfare queens and other wasteful programs.

Bill Clinton signed up the Democrats for this detail when, with one eye on re-election, he declared in his 1995 State of the Union Address that the “era of big government is over.” Like the Republicans, Clinton used the scapegoating of welfare mothers and the poor as a political stepping-stone. Once he did that, there was no longer any major political force defending the role of government or promoting a vision of government as a potential force for good.

President Obama initially tried to reassert the role of government in his ambitious health care plan, as well as in his administration’s bailout of banks, the financial industry, and auto companies in the aftermath of the economic collapse of 2008. But in the face of a furious counterattack by conservatives, Obama backpedaled. By the time of his 2012 reelection, he had dropped most mentions of the salutary benefits of good government.

So for some time now, political opportunists of all stripes have been scapegoating government to win elections, even if it means undermining government itself. At the same time, they have promoted the individual as the essential actor, culminating in George W. Bush’s atomistic conception of individuals fending for themselves in an “ownership society.”

If government = bad, then does democracy = useless?

As public confidence in government has waned, the widespread appreciation for representative democracy itself has atrophied, shriveling like grapes on a vine. If the American people don’t have much use for government, then what use is democracy, which is the means by which we elect government?

What does it matter if voting-equipment failure or a poorly designed “butterfly” ballot causes the wrong candidate to win the presidency, as it did in the 2000 election? And what does it matter if minority voters are facing increasing levels of harassment, disenfranchisement and voter suppression? Or if there is so little competition in congressional races, or voter turnout has declined to single digits in some races, or our legislatures are polarizing with fewer moderate bridge-builders getting elected?

If people don’t value or respect government, then breakdowns in the democratic process are greeted with a collective shrug. Or an attack on the nation’s democratic citadel, the US Capitol, is viewed through a partisan lens of acrimony instead of as a treacherous strike against our nation’s hallowed traditions.

Thus, this attack on government has formed the ideological underpinnings for an attack on representative democracy itself. In the face of perceptions of government inadequacy, some Americans cry out for a strongman who isn’t encumbered by the hard patient work of forging consensus and democratic deliverance. Better to allow super-empowered and wealthy individual leaders to manipulate and dictate policies that “get the job done.”

At this point in our nation’s trajectory, the reputation of government is suffering from a massive public relations crisis. It gets no credit for the good things it does, and all the blame and scorn for its mistakes. How is it that some Americans perplexingly demand “Keep your government hands off my Medicare,” bizarrely unaware that Medicare is a federal program? Or that one of the two major parties is once again threatening to shut down the national government rather than raise the debt ceiling to allow our democracy to pay its bills, a pro forma administrative practice that has been used 78 times since 1960, including 49 times under Republican presidents?

“Government Is Good for You”

Most of the Founders and Framers, while steeped in a foundation of individual rights against overbearing monarchical rule, begrudgingly accepted government as a necessary evil. James Madison, in a backhanded defense of government, stated:

“It has been said that all Government is evil. It would be more proper to say that the necessity of any government is a misfortune. This necessity however exists; and the problem to be solved is, not what form of government is perfect, but which of the forms is least imperfect.”

By the 1830s, Americans were no longer so skeptical of government. With a little democratic experience under their belts and the benefits of a growing and prospering nation, Americans viewed their government more as a useful instrument. Commenting on our 19th-century predecessors, Alexis de Tocqueville observed in 1832:

“Everyone takes as zealous an interest in the affairs of the township, his county, and the whole State, as if they were his own. The citizen looks upon the fortune of the public as his own, and he labors for the good of the State.”

More recently, Americans can point to many public-sector achievements. Whether the service is mail delivery, the care of seniors via Social Security and Medicare, the construction of roads and highways, telecommunications, hospitals, schools, defense, scientific research, national parks, railroads, airways and waterways, environmental protection, the Internet, and much, much more, government has been the leading player, oftentimes partnering with America’s businesses, other times restraining business from doing harm to workers, communities, and the environment.

Government has been the driving force behind regulating the economy, interest rates, and inflation, as well as creating policies that grow and maintain the middle class, such as pro–home ownership programs, worker protections, the forty-hour workweek, a decent retirement pension, and paid vacations and holidays. And the federal government has been there many times in the past to shoulder the burden following natural disasters or economic crises or both, such as the economic collapse that resulted from the public space shutdowns during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Despite recent setbacks, the United States is still acknowledged around the world as the leading superpower, the wealthiest and most powerful nation that is defending Ukraine against a Russian dictator’s aggression – how could we have achieved that status if the US government was such a bumbler?

Americans’ myopia on this point is perplexing. This is not to excuse the mistakes that government makes, which at times have been considerable. But the same ideologues who portray government as evil usually portray the private sector as a shining example of competence and virtue. In the aftermath of the 2008 economic meltdown, that position is much harder to justify. In this 49–49 nation, the discourse about the role of government has become entangled in the partisan war, with both Democrats and Republicans scoring points using government as a scapegoat.

Both major political parties leapfrog each other to win votes from fiscally conservative swing voters living in key swing districts and battleground states who want smaller government, tax cuts, and less money for government programs (though many of these same voters live in red conservative states that are subsidized by tax revenue from blue liberal states like New Jersey, California, Illinois, and New York).

As a result, Americans have lost much of their sense of social solidarity, as the US has become the ultimate “free lunch society” where no one’s government program or subsidy is more deserving than your own. While demanding tax cuts, many well-off home owners are more than willing to pocket their home mortgage deductions that do not benefit the poor, which amounts to many thousands of dollars per year per recipient. Likewise, subsidies for sports stadiums, symphonies, ballets, operas, and other amenities often benefit the well-to-do but not many poorer Americans. Tax loopholes on capital gains, carried interest, inheritance and other dodges, which are government subsidies via the tax code, mostly benefit the top 10 percent of wealthiest Americans.

Bragging about Government

Part of the solution to counteracting this anti-government bias entails simply communicating better with the public about the good that government does. It’s a public relations challenge that needs to be waged. But how?

We can learn something from the government of Sweden. A few years ago I was on a speaking and research tour in Stockholm and other Swedish cities, and I was tickled to see advertisements on the commuter trains and buses that blared: “Your Health Care System, Working for You,” with accompanying photos of female and male doctors, nurses and health care personnel taking care of smiling patients. OK, it was a bit mawkish, yet by its mere presence effective, I thought. The government-run health-care system was advertising and promoting its services and accomplishments!

Other ads also advertised other accomplishments of the Swedish government, which has fostered the eighth most competitive economy in the world while providing premium health- and social-care systems that have resulted in a broadly shared prosperity.

So part of the solution is to use an old-fashioned, conventional method:  product advertisement.

As any successful business knows, advertising is essential to marketing and branding your product. Government should advertise its accomplishments just like a business does, through TV, internet and radio ads, reminding the public of the good things it accomplishes. Corporations do this, why shouldn’t government?

A potential advertising theme could be “Government Is Good for You,” with the ads showing the many ways that government does good things for individuals, families and communities. Imagine ads showing the scientific breakthroughs funded by government, or the transportation and communication advances, or the volume of mail moved every day through the US Postal Service? How about an ad extolling the virtues of the forty-hour workweek and paid vacations and holidays to spend time with your family, all legislated by the government? How about an ad showing the breathtaking beauty of our national parks, or ads illustrating the government lending a hand to people struck by natural disasters or personal catastrophes and medical emergencies? Or the massive federal bailout that kept the economy from going over the fiscal cliff during the Great Recession of 2008-9?

Yes, in all these areas and more, government has done a lot to help individuals, as well as families and communities, and businesses and entrepreneurs. Government should have clear bragging rights over big business or corporations, yet government never does the bragging. It’s the unsung hero. Compare those sorts of positive ads to the constant negative litany coming from the government-bashers, running down government and echoing Ronald Reagan that government is the problem, despite so much evidence to the contrary.

Such advertisements would prod Americans to reflect on the proper role of government. Political scientist Douglas Amy has created a marvelous website dedicated to nudging Americans to think objectively about the role of government in their lives. He also has written a book that acts as a catalyst to such discussions.

If we want US democracy to flourish, and if we want Americans to mobilize to implement badly needed reforms such as proportional representation, ranked choice voting, public financing of campaigns and universal voter registration, then Americans will have to reawaken their imaginations to the positive role that government has played – and could play – in their lives. We exist simultaneously as individuals and as participants in this ongoing social experiment in self-governance.

We need to want better democracy because of the better things it will yield to us personally, in part facilitated by local, state and federal representative agencies. The alarming trajectory of the last seven years has shown that we can take nothing for granted. Democracy is fragile, like a beautiful flower that needs to be nourished and re-watered on a continual basis.

Steven Hill @StevenHill1776