Determining The Level Of Democracy In America

For some, it may be hard to answer the question “How Democratic is America?” for others, it might be one of the easiest questions to answer. You could ask a fifteen year old what they thought, and you probably wouldn’t get the answer that you were looking for. If asking a politician the same question, I could almost guarantee that your answer would be what you were looking for, or something very similar. Howard Zinn, Sidney Hook, and Kenneth Janda all have their own arguments on what they think about the democracy of America is at. The three of them make several points that coincide with their arguments. Through this, we will look at each of their arguments and the points that were made and come to the conclusion of just how democratic America is.

It may be difficult to answer the question of “How Democratic is America?” if you don’t understand what the definition of democracy in the first place. This is exactly how Howard Zinn begins his arguments, but defining democracy. He makes different points to describe it but one thing he says ties in with his overall argument. Zinn states, “If ‘democracy’ refers to the condition of masses of people, and if we as the assessors belong to a number of elites, we will tend to see the present situation in America more benignly than it deserves”. Zinn explains this as if we look to democracy as a group of people then as a country we are ‘doomed. ’ After explaining this, Zinn begins to explain his ten item list of criteria. The way that Zinn measures how well democracy is doing, by evaluating how well the criteria is filled.

In his list of criteria, Zinn first begins to explain the importance behind participation in decision making. He explains that higher people in government make all our major decisions when it comes to our tax structure, armed forces, war, crime, and certain limitations we have. Zinn believes that representation government is closer to democracy. Zinn says, “If representation by its very nature is undemocratic, as I would argue, this is an important fact for our evaluation. Representative government is closer to democracy than monarchy, and for this reason it has been hailed as one of the great political advances in modern times; yet, it is only a step in the direction of democracy at best”. If we break this down, Zinn is saying that by having representation in government we are in the process of becoming more democratic. We don’t have a monarchy since we have people to make our major decisions for us. This is ultimately a good thing for us as a country. However, just because this step is one of the successful ways we are becoming more democratic, does not mean that each step of the criteria are as successful as this one.

Throughout the reading, Zinn gives more examples about how the government should begin to start listening to citizens more. Citizens are able to participate in government, however the government doesn’t listen to them as much. The seventh point of Zinn's criteria list he begins to question our ability to have freedom of speech. Zinn also questions rich and poor people and how rich people are available to more resources. Zinn believes that someone with more power, wealth, and status than they are able to reach more people and express how they feel about decisions being made in our country. Comparing this to people who don’t have as much money they are not able to reach an audience to the extent of someone with more wealth. Zinn then states that the president has the most freedom when it comes to speech because of the amount of people he can reach and how quickly he can. Zinn says, “The government has much more freedom of expression than a private individual, because the president can command the airwaves he wishes, and reach 60 million people in one night”. Zinn’s point is, yes everyone has freedom of speech but if you are in a position of power and have money then what you want to get across will ultimately be gotten across. As to oppose if you weren’t in a position of power it would be much harder for people to hear what you had to say.

Sidney Hook begins her argument very powerfully. She starts the argument by basically attacking Zinn on the way he perceives the word democracy. Reading her argument, Hooks spends the majority of it disagreeing and tearing apart just about everything that Zinn was saying. In the beginning, she starts off by saying, “His criteria admittedly are neither necessary nor sufficient for determining the presence of democracy since he himself admits that they are applicable to societies that are not democratic”. Hooks’ starts off by disagreeing with Zinn and his criteria list. If we break it down what she’s saying, she believes that his criteria list in unnecessary when determining if America is democratic or not. However, she later goes on and starts to agree that America is not democratic enough but not for the reasons that Zinn believes. She writes, “He overlooks the crucial difference between the procedural process and the substantive issues. When we writes that democracy is devoid of meaning if it does not include “equal access to the available resources to the society,” he simply is abusing the language”. Hooks is pushing the point that not everyone is equal because some people require more than others. Even though Hooks is agreeing with Zinn, she is saying that his methods are not the right approach when determining if America is democratic or not.

Kenneth Janda’s, “Does Government Do What People Want?”, Janda mainly focuses on two major studies. One study done by Alan Monroe, and the other one done by Robert Shapiro and Benjamin Page. These studies both focused mainly around comparing public opinion on major government policy issues. Alan Monroe's study found that 63 percent of government policy conformed to public opinion out of 327 cases. However the other study was different and found, “They found 231 instances when opinion moved up or down at least 6 percentage points between two surveys and when government policy changed in keeping with opinion”. The reason that Janda used these studies because he was trying to determine if America was democratic or not. The studies that he provided and the numbers that he used showed differently. The studies are showing that the public really does not have much opinion on policies. Janda closes by saying that America should make their own judgements about the democracy in America.

To conclude, each author made several points determining whether or not how democratic America is. Zinn and Hooks both agreed that America is not democratic enough, but for different reasons. Zinn had a criteria list that consists of reasons that he believes if follows that America will be at peak democracy. However, Zinn also believes that since his solutions aren’t being used that they have failed and we are becoming less of a democratic society. Hooks claims that Zinn overlooks the crucial aspects of what actually makes us a democratic society, although she believes some of the criteria list is good, it’s his approach that’s the problem. Janda’s approach was different because he used actual research from political scientists to back up his reasonings to determine the democratic state. This is important because unlike Zinn and Hooks giving just their opinions, Janda had evidence to back up what was being said. After reading each argument, it’s hard to determine how democratic America is. Each author made their own points on what they think makes a democratic society. To answer the question of how deomocratic is America, the answer depends on your opinions and how you look and perceive it.