Participation In America

Citizens Participation- becoming informed, debating issues, and voting in elections. Document

People have to take a stance against larger issues regardless if they have an “interest” in politics. After Mueller comes a different author, Paul Rogat Loeb and The Active Citizen. Paul’s work represents the opposite ideal of Mueller. He talks about how more people need to be involved, and why there aren’t more already involved. He offers an explanation to this anomaly with Learned Helplessness, a condition in which a person suffers from a sense of powerlessness, arising from a persistent failure to succeed. Loeb argues that this is from American culture persistently putting down ideas and making citizens doubt themselves and their ideas particularly relating to politics and I agree. There are so many great thinkers that are demoralized by the idea that what they have to say is not true and I don’t think society should be that way. People’s economic circumstances also play a role into both author’s philosophies. If someone is born into a poorer community then they are going to have less options to read about news or watch things on TV, or even have enough time to keep up with politics because of working two or three jobs. When Mueller says people aren’t involved in politics because they are not interested he’s not telling the whole truth. The economic divide is also prominent in the portrayal and interests in

Paul Loeb is the author of Soul of a Citizen: Living With Conviction in Challenging Times. In 2008 Loeb founded the Campus Election Engagement Project, a national nonpartisan student engagement effort that helped 500 colleges and universities engage their students in the election. Paul Rogat Loeb has spent thirty-five years researching and writing about citizen responsibility and empowerment. This book, more so a handbook, enables anyone who desires to make a change in the environment around them, leading them to get involved in larger communities. The book acknowledges that “it’s easy to feel overwhelmed and to become

This chapter reviews the much-discussed low voter turnout and the poor percentage of other forms of political participation in the United States. After reading and reviewing the material in this chapter, the student should be able to do each of the following:

The movie Mr. Smith Goes to Washington is a good example of how a political participation can help that state to achieve their goals. In the movie, Smith Jefferson is the main character that is appointed by the state governor Hopper to replace a Senator who died recently. The movie presents a society in which the people are fully practicing their rights by involving themselves in the political process. However, compared to the movie, present-day societies are more involved in political participation; because people are more willing to learn about politics, and can be much more educated than the people presented in the movie. The similarities between contemporary political participation and the Jefferson movie are that people’s participation

Verba and his co-authors examine the import of participation, both voting and non-voting, in our American society. According to their argument, the typical citizen activist “tend[s] to be drawn disproportionately from more advantaged groups–to be well-educated and well-heeled and to be White and male” (Verba et al., 1995: 231). Indeed, Verba et al. explore participation along both gender and racial lines and concludes that both women and minorities are comparatively less active than men, especially white men, who stand peerless both in terms of affiliation with a political organization, contributing to a campaign, contacting their Representatives, and more direct forms of participation like voting.

Indeed, gender and racial differences in participation in U.S. democracy have long been noted. For example, African Americans report feeling disengaged from the political process and frequently believe that their civic activities make little to no difference to their

There are many more ways people can participate in politics other than by voting. In the United States, the second highest form of activity is by participating in community work in local communities. The

As politics and government becomes more complex and involved, more effort is required to keep up with and understand it. As a result, many Americans have lost touch with current events and happenings. Therefore, when election time rolls around, many people lack enough information to develop an educated opinion and support a candidate with their vote, so they just do not vote at all. This lack of information is also related to the belief that one vote will not matter. People believe that their vote will not count, and are therefore following the news less and becoming out of touch with public affairs and politics (Is the System Broken?”). This lack of information is also more strongly apparent among the younger voting population. When interviewed

As Americans, we must get involved in our government. This means, exercise you right to vote and voice your opinion when you don’t agree. Being a real American does not require one to agree with everything the government does, but actually promotes analytical questioning. If you sit passively by and do not participate, you are just saying that you do not care.

Many scholars believe that falling civic organization membership and the general decline in our Social Capital has negatively impacted voter turnout.” (Kaufmann. 145) To summarize, people in the United States are “less involved” with other groups and other people as a whole, so it is only logical to feel they would be less involved or interest in our political and governmental future.

Political inactivity on the part of young Americans stems from one fundamental source -- a general cynicism of the American political process. This disdain for politics is further perpetuated by a lack of voter education and a needlessly archaic voting procedure that creates barriers to voting where they need not exist. While many of these existing problems can be rectified with relative ease through the implementation of programs such as Internet voting and better voter education, such programs create only a partial solution.

Stimson identifies campaigns as a flow of information in which candidates are displaying the facts about the current state of the nation and delivering their campaign messages to the public. Not all citizens pay attention to politics all year round, but during campaigns, most people keep themselves updated. Stimson divides citizens into three categories: the passionate, the uninvolved, and the scorekeepers (Stimson, p.163). The passionate citizens are the people who always pay attention to politics and they are committed to their preferences. Because of their commitment, they provide the balance in an election. They are concerned about politics, so they contribute to the primary elections and when the

As time goes on fewer and fewer people between the ages of 18 and 24 are paying attention to government activity. Many young people do not have an active participation in government. They are unaware, unsure, and uninterested in what’s going on with today’s governing body. This is a problem considering that those people are a large part of the future of this country. To solve this issue, modifications need to be made... changes that can start right here on Trine’s campus. Students cannot be expected to vote if they do not understand how the whole process works. They need to be made more aware of the government’s actions and how it actually works. The lack of involvement could be due to a lack of knowledge and therefore a lack of participation.

Let’s face it. Everyone has more to do than time within which to do it. But just as we make time to do the things that we really want to do, we can make time to do what’s right! Doing what’s right means actively participating in the democratic process. This has nothing to do with joining or being a member of any particular political party. What it has to do with is learning how public policy impacts the quality of your life and that of your family. How?