By Jeanie Johnson
The definition of the word democracy as stated in the American Heritage Dictionary is: 'social and political equality and respect for the individual within the community'.
What strikes me more than anything else in this definition is the word community. It is within this word that I believe the framers worked the shape of governmental structure. They were dreaming a whole new way of thinking. These men knew the ancient rule of monarchy. They wished for the individual to be free from the vassalage that characterized life in Europe. They wished also for communal life to protect and encourage individuals as well. If these wishes had not been high on their list as they pondered their new creation they would not have sat with the Seneca grandmothers appreciating their mode of governance. They wished for participatory government because they had not seen the like in their lives. They wished for representation by the common people because seldom had the common person been able to make a voice heard, to effect change or to feel the burden and responsibility of shared political life unless it came at high cost through the agency of revolution. These men wished for politics with a small p, that communal experience that enlivens the common cause and infuses the population with ownership to provide for the good of all. They were businessmen, true enough, but they had other, higher goals in mind as they put up the support beams for a unique edifice.
Where are we now in this process? Do we now have a government that advances social and political equality and respect for the individual within the community? Have we created a framework of community where equality is truly honored? I believe we have a somewhat sentimental vision of what we think is shared belief; God, country, patriotism and a propaganda-fed sense of who is our enemy. But in terms of a profound respect for the individual within the community I do not believe we have government that has yet arrived at that place. Our social equality is suspect. Our health care system struggles under a governmental bureaucracy that allows drug and insurance companies to determine both what health services many of us are able to access as well as what we will will pay for those services. Wages continue to be unlivable if you are on the bottom and obscene if you are receiving tax cuts at the top.
Political equality is perhaps more difficult to evaluate. If we address that in terms of small p, I believe we are short there as well. Political is a communal word. It is about the daily business of the community. Many of us have become complacent regarding our participation in our government and therefore, in our larger community. Additionally, that small p is being challenged by the government shutting out voices of dissent. But those voices are what should keep democracy sharp and illuminate for the rest of us in the community questions we need to ask if we are to have a vibrant and fully participatory government. If the community is afraid to challenge the elected, or worse, too busy to do the same, then we will put our experiment in danger.
Our government is supporting the wealthy and the wealthy have a louder voice, while the rest of the community is falling behind. That is the truth of things. We are involved in a war that was the brainstorm of men who have not had the interests of the community at heart.
Social and political equality are about community. The community is about the life of the people. Government is a member of the community not an entity standing outside the communal circle. Since humans took up an agrarian lifestyle we have had to discuss and ponder the continual flow of issues regarding governance and community. They have been difficult conversations. Two hundred years ago the conversations resulted in this experiment. The government, which is community, now needs to engage in social and political discourse to remain healthy. Our particular experiment requires that.
Democracy as our own very personal experiment carried out in the larger context of both a republic and a dangerous global environment, is yet to have a final evaluation. As has been the case since the beginning of the experiment, we have much to live up to. We also have many serious matters that must constitute the talk among us all. These matters have consequences for the continuance of not only our community in the United States but in all of the Earth's communities. Social and political equality, ideals spelled out in small letters, so much the hallmarks of strong communal life, calls us to hard work.
Jeanie Johnson resides in Janesville. She has just published a children's book on Alzheimer's Disease.
