“This country *hic* is falling apart!” gurgled a tipsy political science student in between hiccups on Mill Avenue Saturday night.
“This two-party system is the source of too much hatred! *hic* If America promoted a multi-party system, everyone would be happy!” she yelled out. I decided to bite my tongue.
NPR conducted a survey last year after an Oxford-style debate about the two-party political system. Fifty percent of audience members said they support a two-party system, while 40 percent opposed it. Ten percent remained undecided. A close survey, but the public leans away from the political ideals of a multi-party system.
A democracy where several political parties cater to the diverse opinions of voters sounds pretty good on paper, doesn’t it? Multi-party political systems have been successful in democracies like Japan and the United Kingdom, where two or more parties win seats in government and represent voters in the legislature.
But a multi-party system will never work in America. America’s two-party system is difficult to reform due to its deeply embedded history.
To that end, the parties we know and reluctantly love originated from even earlier coalitions and parties. The Democratic and Republican parties were originally created with certain ideologies and goals in mind, but political parties change and shift their ideologies and goals all the time. Thus, the problem does not lie within the parties and their goals. The problem is America’s voters.
All I ever hear eligible voters talk about is presidential candidates: “I think Obama has ruined this country”; “Mitt Romney is a pompous fool”; “I don’t care who wins, just not Obama!” Have we forgotten that these candidates are running with a party’s ideology behind him or her? It would appear that voters care about choosing the candidate they think will serve their country best. But the problem, I fear, is much more complicated than that. People are voting for personalities – not party platforms.
The two-party system creates a “right” and a “wrong.” In American culture, we’ve been conditioned to love this conflict: to identify the enemy and to know whole-heartedly that our way of thinking is “good” and that the opposition is “evil”. Democrats and Republicans encourage these notions through their candidates, nudging them to verbally oppose the “wrong” party.
These negative emotions fall directly onto voters. The two-party system encourages American voters to “otherize” one another, instead of advocating their platforms and beliefs positively.
It is our responsibility as young voters to change this attitude. Presidential candidates are important to the future of our country, but the political system in America needs to thrive from positive enforcement of our individual beliefs, not aggressive opposition of those around us.
So this upcoming fall, instead of voting for someone on the grounds that they aren’t the candidate you hate, do some research and try voting for the candidate (or party) who will thoroughly advocate your beliefs and ideas.
With advancement like that, they can’t hold back the diversity of our beliefs forever.
Reach the columnist at mschan@asu.edu
Follow the columnist @MorganSukotto
