Kevin Frazier is a student at the Harvard Kennedy School and the University of California, Berkeley School of Law. Ravel, a former chair of the Federal Election Commission, is a member of the International Comitê Scientifico working on solutions to strengthen electoral justice.
Countries from around the world are rightfully skeptical of learning anything other than what not to do when they come to the United States for the first gathering of the Summit for Democracy this week. When it comes to identifying strategies to make democracies more resilient and inclusive, U.S. officials should take the role of learner rather than lecturer, of attendee rather than host.
By hosting this summit, President Biden must think it’s appropriate for our flawed and floundering democracy to assume the leadership role on the issues facing our democracies. Yet, our nation’s democracy is “ backsliding,” according to the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance. That slide did not stop when Donald Trump left the White House, despite it being a priority for the current administration to restore our democracy.
“Since day one,” according to the State Department, “the Biden-Harris Administration has made clear that revitalizing democracy in the United States and around the world is essential to delivering for the American people and meeting the unprecedented challenges of our time.” To truly revitalize America’s democracy, the Biden Administration should be studying best practices abroad and giving the stage to the nations that are actively implementing those practices.
Attendees to the summit must doubt they’ll learn much given America’s diminished democratic standing. The skepticism that each attendee brings along will determine the value of the gatherings: the first, this December; the second, a year later. After the Capitol attack on Jan. 6, the world’s perception of America’s democracy forever changed. Nothing in the ensuing months has assuaged worldwide worries that America’s democratic health is waning.
It’s wrong to think that American democracy is just going through a head cold. When a country’s elections have rules that prioritize partisan and special interests, when U.S. electoral participation trails behind other countries year after year, and when millions question the legitimacy and authority of their government, more is required than rest and fluids. Democratic nations around the world have rightfully diagnosed that this country needs substantial rehabilitation to ever get close to realizing its democratic aspirations.
By attending, rather than hosting, the proposed summit, U.S. officials will be in a far better place to learn new strategies to remedy our democratic backsliding. Innovative democratic reforms are in place around the world. U.S. officials should see these reforms on the ground to understand how they could translate to a U.S. context. Even going across the southern border and spending time in Mexico would reveal lessons in democratic resilience and improvement.
While the U.S. struggles to make its electorate representative, Mexican officials have gone a step further: ensuring that their legislative bodies, executive branch and courts include the full spectrum and diversity of Mexican society. Thanks to a democratic culture and electoral bodies that insist on assuring “ gender parity in everything,” rather than hoping for diversity, Mexico’s lower house of Congress now includes 250 female officials amid a 500-person body. The U.S. should be studying how a country maligned for machismo could take on the substantive constitutional reform that made gender parity possible, and is striving toward parity for Black LGBTQ and indigenous Mexicans.
Some would say that the upcoming summit could impart these lessons on America, despite being hosted by the United States. In theory, they’re right. In practice, acting as the host inhibits our ability to humbly listen and implement the strategies of other nations. We’re setting the agenda. We’re sending out the invites. We’re finalizing the goals. All of these actions mean that U.S. officials will miss out on doing the hard work of critically assessing and then improving our democratic systems.
These improvements cannot be further delayed. With elections in 2022 and 2024 right around the corner, global residents and Americans themselves are increasingly worried that violence, misinformation and hyper-partisanship will continue to define the U.S. democracy. These worries will not disappear as a result of this summit. The resulting photo ops, reports and press releases will do nothing to create the sort of cultural change required to jumpstart our collective democratic imagination. The revival of democratic spirits in Mexico came about because actual change was on the horizon – the possibility of a truly representative Congress. Americans need to see that substantive change rather than more summits are on the administration’s agenda.
It’s debatable if the U.S. was ever a “city on the hill” with respect to running an inclusive, participatory and pragmatic democracy. Whatever light we emanated has been extinguished: shaded by dark money, blocked by partisan powers and citizens who don’t believe the truth, and hindered by unresolved racial injustices. Rather than perpetuate a narrative of our country as a beacon of democratic hope, despite the world shuddering while watching the insurrection, President Biden should cancel the Summit and examine how the rest of the world is remedying their democracies for “the unprecedented challenges of our time.”
An Independent Voter's Perspective on Current Political Divides
In the column, "Is Donald Trump Right?", Fulcrum Executive Editor, Hugo Balta, wrote:
For millions of Americans, President Trump’s second term isn’t a threat to democracy—it’s the fulfillment of a promise they believe was long overdue.
Is Donald Trump right?
Should the presidency serve as a force for disruption or a safeguard of preservation?
Balta invited readers to share their thoughts at newsroom@fulcrum.us.
David Levine from Portland, Oregon, shared these thoughts...
I am an independent voter who voted for Kamala Harris in the last election.
I pay very close attention to the events going on, and I try and avoid taking other people's opinions as fact, so the following writing should be looked at with that in mind:
Is Trump right? On some things, absolutely.
As to DEI, there is a strong feeling that you cannot fight racism with more racism or sexism with more sexism. Standards have to be the same across the board, and the idea that only white people can be racist is one that I think a lot of us find delusional on its face. The question is not whether we want equality in the workplace, but whether these systems are the mechanism to achieve it, despite their claims to virtue, and many of us feel they are not.
I think if the Democrats want to take back immigration as an issue then every single illegal alien no matter how they are discovered needs to be processed and sanctuary cities need to end, every single illegal alien needs to be found at that point Democrats could argue for an amnesty for those who have shown they have been Good actors for a period of time but the dynamic of simply ignoring those who break the law by coming here illegally is I think a losing issue for the Democrats, they need to bend the knee and make a deal.
I think you have to quit calling the man Hitler or a fascist because an actual fascist would simply shoot the protesters, the journalists, and anyone else who challenges him. And while he definitely has authoritarian tendencies, the Democrats are overplaying their hand using those words, and it makes them look foolish.
Most of us understand that the tariffs are a game of economic chicken, and whether it is successful or not depends on who blinks before the midterms. Still, the Democrats' continuous attacks on the man make them look disloyal to the country, not to Trump.
Referring to any group of people as marginalized is to many of us the same as referring to them as lesser, and it seems racist and insulting.
We invite you to read the opinions of other Fulrum Readers:
Trump's Policies: A Threat to Farmers and American Values
The Trump Era: A Bitter Pill for American Renewal
Federal Hill's Warning: A Baltimorean's Reflection on Leadership
Also, check out "Is Donald Trump Right?" and consider accepting Hugo's invitation to share your thoughts at newsroom@fulcrum.us.
The Fulcrum will select a range of submissions to share with readers as part of our ongoing civic dialogue.
We offer this platform for discussion and debate.