{"id":561,"date":"2020-07-29T08:53:14","date_gmt":"2020-07-29T08:53:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.commoncause.org\/north-carolina\/articles\/building-democracy-2-0-the-rise-and-function-of-political-parties-setting-the-record-straight\/"},"modified":"2020-07-29T08:53:14","modified_gmt":"2020-07-29T08:53:14","slug":"aufbau-der-demokratie-20-aufstieg-und-funktion-politischer-parteien-klarstellung-der-fakten","status":"publish","type":"article","link":"https:\/\/www.commoncause.org\/north-carolina\/de\/articles\/building-democracy-2-0-the-rise-and-function-of-political-parties-setting-the-record-straight\/","title":{"rendered":"Demokratieaufbau 2.0: Aufstieg und Funktion politischer Parteien \u2013 Eine Klarstellung"},"template":"","class_list":["post-561","article","type-article","status-publish","hentry","article_type-blog-post"],"acf":{"details":{"summary":"This is part 4 in a multi-part series examining ways to build an inclusive democracy for the 21st century.","featured_image":null,"article_type":162,"authors":["{\"site_id\":\"68\",\"post_type\":\"person\",\"post_id\":555}"],"related_issues":[109,417],"related_work":false,"location":null},"sidebar":{"helper_enable_sidebar":false,"helper_media_contact":{"heading":"Media Contact","manually_enter_person":false,"person":null,"name":"","role":"","phone":"","email":""},"helper_links_downloads":{"heading":"Links & Downloads","links":null}},"page_layout":[{"acf_fc_layout":"layout_wysiwyg","_acfe_flexible_toggle":null,"component_wysiwyg":{"content":"Introduction<\/strong>\r\n\r\nAs described in Part I of these essays, democracy arose at a particular moment to address circumstances facing a society tasked with creating a new form of government.\u00a0 While it was the outgrowth of social adaptations that preceded it, democracy marked a profound departure from other governments in place at that time.\u00a0 Instead of viewing individuals as a subject that served more powerful interests, democracy provided a framework that harnessed the intelligence of a collective mind.\u00a0 Instead of viewing conflict as a threat to stability, democracy channeled conflict horizontally among multiple sources to generate competition, exchange and compromise.\u00a0 These two innovations sparked a revolution in human development that ultimately circled the globe.\r\n\r\nTo be clear, the advantage democracy offered centered on the interplay between government and society.\u00a0 In comparison to other forms of government, democracy created efficiency, cohesion, stability and security for members of society.\u00a0 No longer did government have to devote significant resources to stifling threats to its legitimacy and its position of power.\u00a0 It did not demand the relinquishment of freedom in return for security.\u00a0 Rather, democracy invested citizens in its legitimacy by giving them a voice.\u00a0 These attributes of democracy created a self-regulating and self-policing quality to governance.\u00a0 It offered stability and calm without the use of force, and it provided through elections a feedback loop that diverted resources from a few in power to benefit the public.\u00a0 This in turn expanded the productive capacity of citizens, leading to unprecedented material progress.\r\n\r\nAt least, this reflects the best hope for democracy.\u00a0 When our Founding Fathers adjourned in Philadelphia in 1787, it was just an idea written into a relatively brief document:\u00a0 the U.S. Constitution.\u00a0 The practices that gave it life at an operational level did not yet exist beyond the most rudimentary form.\u00a0 Part II of these essays will explore the role of political parties in this process.\u00a0 It will show that political parties arose early on to provide an institutional framework for those practices necessary for democracy to succeed.\r\n\r\nIn particular, political parties solved two critical needs associated with the innovations that gave rise to democracy. First, political parties became the mediating institutions that produced soft competition as described in the last essay.\u00a0 Prior to the rise of modern political parties, those conflicts devolved into destabilizing rivalries for power or disintegrated into divergent factions.\u00a0 Second, political parties solved the question of collective action.\u00a0 If democracy depends on the participation of individuals acting independently with diverse opinions and decentralized information, how do they engage, especially when there is no tangible, direct benefit afforded by participating?\u00a0 Political parties provided an answer to that challenge. Solving these two problems made democracy stable and sustainable.\u00a0 Without the advent of political parties, democracy could not have flourished.\r\n\r\nBefore discussing how political parties emerged to meet these challenges, it is important to address a common refrain:\u00a0 that the Founding Fathers disdained political parties.\u00a0 Many commentators make this point whenever discussing the current woes of American politics, particularly relating to polarization.\u00a0 This perception plays well with an audience that increasingly eschews affiliation with either of the two major political parties.\u00a0 In fact, a strong plurality now identifies as independent rather than as a member of a party.\u00a0 Unfortunately, this perception impacts the way we look at parties today.\u00a0 It makes it more difficult to understand those aspects of political parties that are essential to a well-functioning democracy.\u00a0 Therefore, this essay will focus on what the framers actually said about parties to underscore the point that political parties emerged later as an antidote to the concerns they expressed and were not anathema to the constitutional framework envisioned by them.\r\n\r\nFear of Factions<\/strong>\r\n\r\nWhen the Founders launched \u201cthe great experiment\u201d in the late 18th<\/sup> century, there were no political parties in America.\u00a0 The Founding Fathers were united in trying to defeat a powerful foreign nation and to conceive a new government based on representative democracy.\u00a0 They studied closely the weaknesses of prior efforts at democracy.\u00a0 They considered ways to mitigate risks through structures such as a system of checks and balances.\u00a0 Certainly, the framers had deep concerns about groups that placed narrow interests over the broad public interest of a fledgling nation.\u00a0 But many observers conflate the framers\u2019 use of the term \u201cfaction\u201d and \u201cparty\u201d with the modern concept of \u201cpolitical party.\u201d \u00a0Contemporary writers generally cite two main sources for the view that the framers opposed parties:\u00a0 Federalist 10 and George Washington\u2019s Farewell Address.\u00a0 A close look at both of these writings reveals the terms \u201cfaction\u201d and \u201cparty\u201d were used to warn against forces fundamentally different from political parties in a representative democracy.\r\n\r\nMaurice Duverger\u2019s groundbreaking empirical study, Political Parties,<\/u> describes the origins of these terms.\u00a0 He states the word \u201cparty\u201d comes from the term used for the \u201ctroops which formed round a condottiere in Renaissance Italy.\u201d\u00a0 Later, it was used for \u201cthe clubs where the members of the [French] Revolutionary assemblies met, and the committees which prepared the election under the property franchise of the constitutional monarchies.\u201d\u00a0 Duverger continues, saying the term now describes \u201cthe vast popular organizations which give shape to public opinion in modern democracies.\u201d\u00a0 In each case, \u201cthe role of this organization is to win political power and exercise it.\u201d\u00a0 Given the understanding of parties and factions at the time of America\u2019s launching, it is understandable the framers feared them.\u00a0 What they did not know is that political parties in a representative democracy would emerge as a counterweight to the threat posed by factions.\r\n\r\nFederalist 10<\/strong>\r\n\r\nFederalist 10 offers the most extensive discussion of factions and parties in the Federalist Papers.\u00a0 Recall that Madison, Hamilton and John Jay wrote the Federalist Papers in 1787 and 1788 after the Philadelphia Convention to support ratification of the Constitution.\u00a0 Federalist 10 responded to one of the biggest arguments made by opponents of democracy:\u00a0 fear of instability and violence. \u00a0In Federalist 10, Madison acknowledged: \u00a0\u201cthe violence of faction\u201d and the pain inflicted upon \u201ca minor party\u201d by \u201cthe superior force of an interested and overbearing majority \u2026 have, in truth, been the mortal diseases under which popular governments have everywhere perished.\u201d\r\n\r\nHe describes the term faction as \u201ca number of citizens \u2026 who are united and actuated by some common impulse of passion, or of interest, adverse to the rights of other citizens<\/u>, or to the permanent and aggregate interests of the community.\u201d \u00a0Factions, as understood from history, did not operate within a framework of equal rights under the law.\u00a0 Madison describes factions as creditors, debtors, mercantile interest, property owners as well as those with \u201ca zeal for different opinions concerning religion, concerning government, and many other points.\u201d\u00a0 He understood factions represent an aspect of human nature:\r\n

\"So strong is this propensity of mankind to fall into mutual animosities that where no substantial occasion presents itself the most frivolous and fanciful distinction have been sufficient to kindle their unfriendly passions and excite their most violent conflicts.\"<\/p>\r\nMadison argued a representative democracy could tame this natural tendency that plagued prior efforts at democracy.\u00a0 He noted that to operate, a direct democracy must contain fewer citizens \u201cwho assemble and administer the government in person.\u201d\u00a0 Its smaller size makes it susceptible to factions which wield greater influence relative to the overall participants, resulting in \u201cspectacles of turbulence and contention.\u201d\u00a0 A republic, on the other hand, delegates government to representatives, which allows a \u201cgreater number of citizens and greater sphere of country over which the latter may be extended.\u201d\u00a0 The larger republic can override factions by encompassing a diverse population spread over a large territory so that \u201cthe public voice \u2026 will be consonant with the public good.\u201d\u00a0 In other words, the narrow viewpoint of any one faction could never dominate the diverse opinions of multiple competing factions.\r\n\r\nIn sum, Madison saw factions as groups \u2013 small and large \u2013 that put limited interests ahead of the broad public interest.\u00a0 These groups did not advance a platform.\u00a0 Their success did not depend on democratic elections. \u00a0They did not operate according to rules that respected the rights of competing groups. \u00a0Factions were a source of violence and conflict because the system in which they operated was limited in size or, more likely, hierarchical.\u00a0 Whenever a faction gained power, it used that power against the interests of those it opposed. \u00a0\u00a0In response, the Founding Fathers designed the new republic in such a way as to guard against this pattern by distributing authority broadly.\r\n\r\nWashington\u2019s Farewell Address<\/strong>\r\n\r\nEight years later, George Washington addressed the nation after serving two terms in office.\u00a0 By this time, the divisions among political leaders were clear.\u00a0 Washington had hoped American democracy could operate as a virtuous and ongoing debate by leaders who put the national interest ahead of more narrow agendas.\u00a0 What he did not anticipate was that rival leaders would develop and organize around fundamentally different ideas of national interest.\u00a0 These leaders fought for independence.\u00a0 They fervently supported the new nation and believed their views were consonant with it. \u00a0They did not desire to dominate minority interests. \u00a0They simply believed policies advocated by their political opponents threatened their vision of the new republic.\r\n\r\nA close look at Washington\u2019s Farewell Address delivered in 1796 echoes similar concerns expressed by Madison in Federalist 10.\u00a0 Washington describes two types of threat posed by factions or parties.\u00a0 The first type of threat related to parties which divide people by \u201cgeographic discriminations.\u201d\u00a0 He understood how easy it was \u201cto misrepresent the opinions and aims of other [geographic areas].\u00a0 You cannot shield yourselves too much from the jealousies and heartburnings which spring from these misrepresentations; they tend to render alien to each other those who ought to be bound together by fraternal affection.\u201d These misrepresentations are used in order to \u201csubvert the power of the people and to usurp for themselves the reins of government, destroying afterwards the very engines which have lifted them to unjust dominion.\u201d\u00a0 In other words, Washington warned against factions that appeal to natural divisions within society such as geographic ones.\u00a0 These types of divisions threaten to fracture the Republic into its constituent parts.\r\n\r\nNext, Washington described another type of threat. \u00a0This comes from rival factions within government that spin out of control.\u00a0 He notes this spirit is \u201cinseparable from our nature.\u201d \u00a0It exists in all governments, \u201cbut, in those of the popular form [such as the United States], it is seen in its greatest rankness, and is truly their worst enemy.\u201d\u00a0 He continues:\u00a0 \u201cThe alternate domination of one faction over another, sharpened by the spirit of revenge, natural to party dissension, which in different ages and countries has perpetrated the most horrid enormities, is itself a frightful despotism.\u201d\u00a0 \u201cIt serves always to distract the public councils and enfeeble the public administration.\u00a0 It agitates the community with ill-founded jealousies and false alarms\u2026.\u201d\r\n\r\nThis passage reflects Washington\u2019s observations during his two terms as president.\u00a0 Nascent political parties were emerging.\u00a0 After refereeing rivals within his administration for eight years, Washington warily observed the pernicious effects of personal ambition that caused leaders to form factions as a way to expand their power.\u00a0 Interestingly, Washington did not identify factions driven by competing policies or principles as the problem.\u00a0 Since formal, organized parties did not yet exist, his observations were limited to geographic divisions and the jealous rivalries by those in government \u2013 those who put personal ambition ahead of the interests of the Republic.\u00a0 Like Madison, Washington\u2019s understanding of faction was shaped by the danger posed by self-interested groups in societies that predated the United States\r\n\r\nConclusion<\/strong>\r\n\r\nA close look at Federalist 10 and Washington\u2019s Farewell Address shows a keen awareness of the risks associated with democracy.\u00a0 Without a central authority to quash threats to its power, it is easy to see how narrow interested factions could seek to fill a vacuum.\u00a0 This had happened so many times before.\u00a0 Instead of channeling conflict in a productive manner, these groups used conflict to advance a narrow, self-interested agenda, leading to violence and destruction of the government.\u00a0 What the Founding Fathers did not understand is how groups might operate when authority was distributed.\u00a0 Further, this process would take several decades to evolve so that political parties functioned as we understand them today.\r\n\r\nUnfortunately, when political organizations first arose in the United States to advance a broad agenda by electing like-minded members, a new term did not stick.\u00a0 Some referred to these early groups as \u201ccaucuses\u201d and \u201ccommittees of correspondence.\u201d\u00a0 But once formed, they received the moniker of \u201cpolitical party\u201d forever linking them to a term fraught with historical baggage as noted by Madison and Washington.\u00a0 This is particularly unfortunate given the critical place parties played in channeling conflict productively through the use of soft competition.\u00a0 The next essay will examine how that happened.\r\n\r\n

\r\n\r\nMack Paul is a member of the state advisory board of Common Cause NC and a founding partner of Morningstar Law Group.<\/em>\r\n\r\nParts in this series:\r\n\r\nIntroduction: Building Democracy 2.0<\/a>\r\n\r\nPart 1: What Is Democracy and Why Is It Important?<\/a>\r\n\r\nPart 2: How the Idea of Freedom Makes the First Innovation Possible<\/a>\r\n\r\nPart 3: The Second Innovation that Gave Rise to Modern Democracy<\/a>\r\n\r\nPart 4: The Rise and Function of Political Parties \u2013 Setting the Record Straight<\/a>\r\n\r\nPart 5: How Political Parties Turned Conflict into a Productive Force<\/a>\r\n\r\nPart 6: Parties and the Challenge of Voter Engagement<\/a>\r\n\r\nPart 7: The Progressive Movement and the Decline of Parties in America<\/a>\r\n\r\nPart 8: Rousseau and \u2018the Will of the People\u2019<\/a>\r\n\r\nPart 9: The Dark Secret of Majority\u00a0Voting<\/a>\r\n\r\nPart 10: The Promise of Proportional\u00a0Voting<\/a>\r\n\r\nPart 11: Majorities, Minorities and Innovation in Electoral\u00a0Design<\/a>\r\n\r\nPart 12: The Misdirected Attempts at Electoral Reform in\u00a0the\u00a0U.S.<\/a>\r\n\r\nPart 13: Building Democracy 2.0: The Uses and Abuses of Redistricting in American Democracy<\/a>\r\n\r\n "}}]},"yoast_head":"\nBuilding Democracy 2.0: The Rise and Function of Political Parties \u2013 Setting the Record Straight - Common Cause North Carolina<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.commoncause.org\/north-carolina\/de\/artikel-2\/aufbau-der-demokratie-20-aufstieg-und-funktion-politischer-parteien-klarstellung-der-fakten\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"de_DE\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Building Democracy 2.0: The Rise and Function of Political Parties \u2013 Setting the Record Straight\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" 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