The Fulcrum is committed to nurturing the next generation of journalists.
We asked Alejo Cruz, a Fall Fulcrum Fellow, to share what democracy means to him and how he sees its current health.
Every election cycle, we the people are subject to different takes on democracy. It’s essentially become America’s favorite mad-lib — each new phrase stitches something new onto the idea of democracy for the people to rationalize in their minds. Democracy is [x], democracy is [y]. But the word “democracy” was originally a byproduct of two concepts. The root words being “demos,” meaning “the common people” and “kratos” meaning “power/rule”. The word itself is simple, yet the idea has become complex… and beastly.
Democracy does not need another definition; It doesn’t need another pundit, politician, or podcaster to overcomplicate it. Just as poets cannot debate their interpretation of a poem before agreeing on its prose, new interpretations of democracy will keep misdirecting discussion unless we agree on what democracy means. By minimizing democracy to its simplest terms, we can then begin to make sense of our differences. By cutting away the connotations that have turned “democracy” into a beast of a word, we learn the debate is not with democracy itself. But rather with the people it governs.
The beast created by ancient Athens was a simple creature. Combined, democracy meant that the common people have power. Every other characteristic we associate with democracy (i.e., electoralism, liberalism, egalitarianism) was added after years of people trying to make sense of the word. That’s not to say that these characteristics are invalid– equal rights, individual freedoms, and free and fair elections have been the basis on which American progress has been founded. These are the cornerstones of our democracy that make the United States so desirable.
But American democracy has been reduced to a chimera, with each generation of politicians stitching a new part onto a beast so distorted it exists for us as a distant dream.
Somewhere along the line, democracy became more of an idea rather than a practice.
Disillusioned, the American people don’t know what to make of a beast with the ears of a donkey, the trunk of an elephant, and the wings of an eagle, all stitched onto the body of a buffalo we were told could fly.
As the U.S. grew, so did our democracy. Westward expansion gave our beast the arms of a grizzly and tail of a scorpion, turning our democracy into the stuff of legends. But in creating a powerful democracy, we gave life to a beast that is a mere echo of what we had at the start. Unrecognizable and ravenous, we’ve set our democracy loose on the world — and it’s out for blood. From the jungles of Latin America to the islands of Southeast Asia, we’ve let the beast roam free under the pretense of spreading “democracy.”
The American chimera is sick and hungry. But how do we, as a nation, feed the beast? How do we satiate the democracy we so quickly defend? And how will we justify creating a creature that consumes without end? We feed it our tired, our poor; turning our backs on the homeless with barbed wire at the door.
All that to say that our democracy is not well. One can point to our civil rights, liberties, and elections and claim that our democracy remains robust. But how can a country pride itself on a system that gives power to the people, when its people are at the mercy of power? Instead, the power has been consolidated amongst the ones with the time and resources to participate.
Participation is a prerequisite to a sound democracy, yet it’s taken historic political polarization in the U.S. for voter turnout to rise. And even at our peak, elections have only reached about two-thirds of the American population. And while that may be cause for celebration, whose voices are being left out of the conversation? Who are the Americans being fed this idea of democracy, but hunger for something of sustenance?
An overworked mother may “have” the resources, but little time. An unhoused man may “have” time, but little resources. How are either expected to participate in a democracy that does not consider them members of the people Capitol Hill is supposed to represent? It’s far too easy for the opposition to blame those who have not had the privilege of participating in democracy. Lack of civic engagement is often framed as a personal shortcoming, rather than a systemic issue. But as someone who has watched my mother be drained of her youth and my father stripped of his humanity, no one can convince me that their existence is a flaw in our democracy. When it is our flawed democracy that has neglected their existence.
We’ve reached a point in our democracy where people are priced out of power. And that’s because those in power do not view certain Americans as the people our government is meant to represent. The beast we’ve created feeds on the marginalized to protect those that can afford to be regarded as people. It’s time we strip the beast of its power and see it for what it is: a fantasy. If we are to cure our democracy of its ailments, we must reduce it back to its simplest terms. America must return to the buffalo and begin again.
Alejo Cruz is a student at Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism at CUNY. Cruz draws on his experience growing up in an immigrant household and his reporting with unhoused people and asylum seekers to center human rights and community voices in his journalism, a commitment he hopes to deepen through solutions‑focused reporting with The Fulcrum.
