Derailing Democracy

The US elections: a vibrant democracy or a very interesting horse race?

While to outside observers the US presidential election is a somewhat mundane affair, this election year has been different compared to others. Interest in the election in places such as Hungary is such that the primaries are frequently covered by the mainstream media. Commentators can’t help but to note the peculiarities of the American electoral system and try their best to explain what a primary is and how a caucus works.

Yet complexity shouldn’t be used as an excuse for ignorance; undoubtedly, the Hungarian electoral system is just as strange and incomprehensible to an American with its two rounds of voting, different lists (individual candidates and parties), and a five percent threshold. Even more incomprehensible is the mathematics of it all, and to explain how a person who repeatedly fails to get elected in their own electoral district (such as the leader of the conservative MDF, Ibolya David) is still able to get a seat in parliament. Indeed, perhaps stranger still is how Ms. David is always portrayed by the media as the one of Hungary’s most popular politicians despite being unable to get elected directly to parliament.

Comparative politics aside, there is no question that many both within the US and without are taking a keen interest in this year’s presidential election. The main reason is because not only is there hope for real change in the direction of US foreign policy with the end of the Bush era, but that this election year is one in which there are no incumbents and no front runner.

Despite these misleading appearances, the US elections appear to be more of the same. The election isn’t being fought in the streets of small towns and big cities, but in the newspaper pages and television screens of the mass media. What is more, even though both major parties have a large number of candidates vying for power, the political and media establishment in the US has already short listed the two (at most three) that will participate in a dash to the finish in what promises to be a truly interesting horse race.

Hillary Clinton and Barrack Obama had already been chosen as the Democratic Party favorites long before the defining moment of Super Tuesday. They had been selected by the political and media establishment - not the grassroots voters - because they pose the least threat to the status quo. Their views on crucial issues such as the war in Iraq are not controversial to the political elites in the US. Moreover, for conservatives both Clinton and Obama give the Republicans the best chance for a victory. No matter how much America says it’s ready for a woman or a non-white head of state, racism and sexism in the US is still very widespread, especially along the Bible belt of the Deep South.

An elaborate form of gambling

Aside from this, however, the US elections are proceeding in much the same way as they always have. Sadly, politics in western democracies continue to be dictated by the results of polls, even though time and again polls have been shown to be way off the mark. When an anomaly does occur, the media is then left asking what went "wrong" with the numbers; rather, what should be asked is what was wrong with the media. As one observer noted, "not only do journalists and pundits devote far too much attention to covering the horse race aspect of campaigns, but when they cover the horse race they generally do a poor job of it."

All this something that is not peculiar to US elections; the Hungarian media experienced the same sort of mistakes and subsequent soul-searching during the national elections of 2002. In many ways, the monitoring of a candidate’s poll numbers is nothing more than an elaborate form of gambling, much like following the numbers on the stock market. Yet as a report in Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR, www.fair.org) recently noted, "journalists should not be gamblers, betting that they will be vindicated by voters' choices that are inherently unpredictable. Reporters should strive for coverage that holds up no matter what the results are."

This over-reliance on poll numbers fostered by the media encourages a stagnant political discourse, one that prioritizes strategic consideration and tactics over substance. As a result, voters in a modern democracy are exposed to a "who's up, who's down" type of campaign coverage, with little time devoted to what is actually being said by the candidates. Campaign journalism thus focuses primarily on the tactical dimensions of a race (like poll results and fundraising) and not on the actual policy differences between candidates. Hence, in the US a good president is judged primarily on how well they ran their campaign and not the issues they campaigned on.

Yet the problem of media coverage of elections in the US and elsewhere is not simply that the focus is on tactics instead of substance. The media also sets the tone for much of the campaign, laying out expectations for various candidates and making editorial decisions about which candidate is the most "viable" contender. As a result, the media plays an active role in determining which candidates make it to the top and which get discarded by the wayside.

"Spoilers" should get out of the way

A prime example is with the campaign of the Democratic candidate John Edwards. Edwards is one of the few candidates to have consistently attacked corporate interests. At one rally, he underscored this with the following statement: "One of the reasons that we've lost jobs, we're having trouble creating jobs [...] is because corporate power and greed have literally taken over the government."

The problem for Edwards is that not only has corporate power and greed taken over the government, but that these same corporate interests are also the media's owners and sponsors. Thus, it should come as no surprise that the media will provide anything but a level playing field to a candidate who consistently attacks their interests. In the case of Edwards, he was already dismissed as a serious contender after the Iowa caucuses and New Hampshire primary despite a strong showing. Instead, much attention was made of his $400 haircut.

What candidates such as Edwards and others like him highlight is not only how the media determines who is likely to be a contender and who is not, but the apparent hostility which exists towards so-called "second-tier" candidates. This hostility toward candidates which are not deemed to have much of a chance of winning not only further diminishes the likelihood of an outsider winning an election; it also betrays the undemocratic views and attitudes which are entrenched within the media and political establishments.

Essentially, the view of many toward candidates which are not considered as frontrunners is that they have a duty to get out of the way; failing to do so they are regarded as "spoilers". Such was the case with Ralph Nader during the US presidential election in 2000. To this day many Democrats loathe Nader because they feel that because of him Al Gore lost the election in 2000 to George W. Bush.

The question of which candidate is viable and which is not is usually determined long before a campaign even starts. If such a candidate nevertheless joins the race, they are usually shunned by the media: their name is mentioned only a few times in passing and they are usually not invited to take part in any high-profile debates. Such was the case this year in the US with Kucinich.

Unfortunately, in most democracies of the western world where a two-party system dominates the treatment of second-tier candidates is recognized as a real problem. Indeed, this issue was also raised during the 2006 election in Hungary. Still, little has been done to solve the problem. The media continues to not focus on them, spending more time instead on front-runners in their day to day coverage. This is because the prevailing view of the media establishment is that only when second-tier candidates start showing some form of resonance with voters will they then get the same kind of coverage. In many ways it’s a catch-22 situation: they are promised media coverage if they show some form of popularity, but how can they demonstrate their popularity if they don’t receive any coverage?

Ultimately, what the role of the media in the US elections clearly shows is how a democracy is actually being run by a group of unelected people who are not accountable to the public. A relentless, yet subtle form of conditioning has developed without the public even knowing about it. The public is bombarded with hidden messages via the media - the radio, the television, newspapers, and the Internet - that in turn shape the vast majority of perceptions.

It's no secret that there is an enormous body of information being used in order to control the way people think and act - even vote. Politicians and the mass media will all seek to implant their message in the minds of voters, whether it's for their good or not. Thus, if an individual doesn't take responsibility for what goes into their minds, someone else will.

Ironically, the average person somehow thinks that they can never be manipulated. This is perhaps the most serious challenge that a democracy can face: when the media can manipulate how a person thinks and votes, that person no longer lives in a democracy.