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Transcription
Hello, my name is Benjamin Fisher, and I'm a freshman at St. Olaf College that plans on studying environmental science, Spanish, and foreign relations. Hello, I'm Isabella Charter, and I plan on studying biology and environmental studies with a concentration in statistics and data science at St. Olaf College. Today we are going to be discussing the definition and previous functionality of the two-party system in the U.S., which has a long and controversial history that continues to be shown throughout the country's current legislative process through its many inefficiencies and inequalities. For starters, we'll touch on the components of the system and how it doesn't bring the kinds of changes that our world needs to see due to the polarization of the two parties and slow process of passing legislation. We'll then shift to the inadequacies of the two-party system and consider the possibility of reformations for the U.S.'s current system by analyzing Norway's system of government. After considering the various pros and cons of this particular system, we focus on how the United States can do better when enforcing more proactive and just environmental policy. How did we end up with this two-party system? It's so ingrained in American society today that it seems as though it's been in place since the beginning. This is somewhat true. In 1787, 11 years after America won its independence, the Constitution was created. This was the foundation for which the U.S. government's purpose and structure are still set up today. Fast forward several years, between 1824 and 1840, political parties were transforming America. This came from peaceful revolutionary change, including the national economy, technological development, the work of political innovators, demographic and cultural shifts. In this early emergence of the republic, people were apprehensive about the idea of parties. Even President George Washington didn't approve of the two-party system, and he was the president. According to the Center for Legislative Archives, part of the National Archives, before he left office, he warned that the spirit of revenge, natural-to-party dissension, would lead to a frightful despotism in America. Despite George Washington's fears, a two-party rivalry did arise during his second term. This rivalry was between the Federalists and the Democratic-Republicans. Both were led by wealthy white men who made up the social elite and either served in Congress or the executive branch. The Federalists were led by Alexander Hamilton and John Adams. They supported a powerful government where federal institutions, such as a national bank, would play a leading role. The Democratic-Republicans were led by Thomas Jefferson and James Madison. They wanted a weaker government that allowed states, communities, and individuals to have an increase in authority. These parties faced major divisions about their views on the Constitution and government. They also engaged the general public in politics and changed how they felt about their role in national life. There is so much more history leading up to where we are now with America's two-party system, but this is just a plain and simple explanation. To further understand the lack of significant progress in the United States regarding climate change, it is important to address the common attitudes of Americans. To start, only about half of Americans view climate change as a personal risk. This is the classic issue of risk perception, and Americans, in particular, seem to have the biggest problem with it. This phenomenon could be attributed to a couple of different factors. For one, most Americans have a lack of personal experience with climate change. For example, there are no melting glaciers or direct, perceivable effects of warming temperatures. Another thing to consider is that said negative impacts of climate change are perceived to be distant in the future, so whatever effects that might come from climate change will probably not directly affect them, or so they believe. Arguably one of the greatest issues with the American political system in this regard is the intense politicization of climate change, which only drives conflict in climate-related discourse and constrains climate policy. Even further, there is a general overestimation of the polarization in views concerning climate change. This has been coined the spiral of silence, from the article Climate Change in the American Mind, in which people do not talk about climate change because they perceive others to not care about it. This is another case of overestimation. However, it is true that the parties differ in their perspectives and approaches to climate change. Over the years, an increase in concern occurred primarily among Democrats. Indeed, political party and ideology are key determinants of global warming opinions. And while there is relatively strong bipartisan support for environmental policy, support is higher for research than for regulatory policies. This is likely because things like more government regulation and various strict policies conflict with Republican ideologies. On top of the polarization between parties and skewed perception of the climate crisis is the problem of unequal representation and opportunity in the United States legislative process, which connects the opinions of the public to the policy changes that are made on the state and federal levels. As is taught in any high school's civics curriculum, one of the key parts of the United States' legislative process is the electoral college, which was originally created to even the political playing field by giving more representation to smaller states, such as the small district states. This system works by the public's votes being used to select electors from the candidate's respective party, resulting in the presence of a middleman who actually determines the selection of president and vice president via majority vote by each state's electors. As you can probably guess, this system is currently under scrutiny due to the possibility of electoral inversion. This occurs when the selected political candidate is not the one that had the most votes, leading to decreased election legitimacy and inversion penalties, more so in Democrats than Republicans. A study published in the British Journal of Political Science shows these trends by analyzing the opinions of individuals on certain scenarios based on selection of a potential candidate that either won or lost the popular vote in the 2020 election. Further analysis shows that Republicans have fewer magnitudes of inversion penalties, which is attributed to the Republican Party benefiting from the electoral inversion in 2016. Paired with the issue of election legitimacy and function of majority vote is the inequalities that the electoral college causes between races. A study published in Public Choice uses a model to show the differences in voting power with and without the electoral college system. Using survey data for the five presidential elections between the years 1956 and 1972, the results from the probability of criticalness power calculations show that the abolishment of the electoral system would redistribute political power, resulting in increased power to Black individuals and decreased power to Native Whites. While the electoral college has its pitfalls in sustaining the integrity of democracy in presidential elections, more issues plague this democratic system that so many depend upon. The U.S.'s current legislative system is far from democratic, making it significantly harder for certain races, party affiliates, and age groups to voice their opinions on a variety of topics such as climate change. This presents policies that don't show the whole scope of public opinion, leading to inaccurate policy prioritizations in the continuation of oppressive voting processes and the climate crisis. Now let's talk about the role of courts in developing environmental policy. Climate change stresses legal doctrines and raises difficult questions about the legitimacy and role of courts. For example, as stated by Katrina Fisher in the article, The Legitimacy of Judicial Climate Engagement, judges have found ways to decline jurisdiction over extraordinary claims for relief because of jurisdictional anxieties provoked by climate change litigation. This is known as sidestepping doctrines. The same article also states that unelected judges possess the power, by declaring legislation unconstitutional, to override majoritarian will. This is clearly a huge problem because key stakeholders in processes such as these are not represented by present-day majoritarian policies. In other words, public opinion is seldom represented in our courts. This leads to an even bigger problem, one in which these unelected judges are not sensitive to the impending consequences of major current events such as climate change, which frees them from the consideration of children and future generations. Elected officials, however, face a different kind of pressure and are often encouraged to address the issues of climate change in order to gain public support. This is a clearly flawed system because the American Constitution inherently values participation and representation. Environmental values can and must influence climate policy either by changing the electoral incentives or personal beliefs of politicians. Now that we have a better understanding of how the political systems in the U.S. affect climate change, we want to shift a bit to look at how a similar legislative process works in a different part of the world. One example of this is Norway, one of the greenest countries in the world. We spoke to Sylvia, a St. Olaf student, to help us understand how climate change is addressed in Norway. Hello! When I started thinking about Norway and climate change, I assumed they must have a government where everyone gets along and agrees on everything. But it turns out, that is not the case. As I began researching climate policy in Norway, I found that most of what makes Norway look so good actually happened in the past. The geography of Norway actually led them to use mostly renewable energy sources from the very beginning. Norway has lots of natural waterways, including waterfalls and rivers, which made hydropower the easiest and cheapest option when electricity was just beginning. In fact, the first electrical lights in all of Northern Europe were in Hammarfest, Norway, in 1891, and they were powered by a hydropower plant. And according to an article from the Norwegian government, in 1892, the year after the first hydropower plant opened in Norway, the former Norwegian prime minister sent a famous letter to the parliament, laying out the industrial potential of hydroelectric power. By doing so, he initiated an important and long-term political effort to secure a role for the Norwegian state in the ongoing electrification of the country, and ensure that the hydropower resources would benefit the nation as a whole. That same article states that after receiving this letter, the Norwegian parliament responded quickly by issuing laws for concessions and reversionary rights. These reversionary rights only let the hydropower companies rent the land and water rights from the Norwegian government, which allowed the government to keep the production of hydropower in Norwegian hands. This has remained important in Norway, and the state, counties, and municipalities today own 90% of the production capacity for electricity. So a lot of Norway's renewable energy was implemented a long time ago, but what is Norway doing now to encourage a greener future? Yeah, so currently Norway is not dependent on fossil fuels for its domestic electricity production, which means that a lot of their efforts now are focused more on an individual level. Recently, the Norwegian government has provided electricity certificates, as well as subsidies, to encourage individuals to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Electricity certificates are kind of complicated, but basically the government provides these certificates to power producers based off the amount of electricity they produce, and then they sell them to power suppliers who are required by law to purchase these certificates based off their consumption. But in the end, individuals end up paying for this renewable energy in their electric bill. In addition to this, the Norwegian government provides subsidies for electric vehicles, smart meters, which allow individuals with solar panels on their house to sell their excess electricity back to the electrical company, and other new technologies. So what does this mean for the U.S.? Are there things we can learn from Norway? I think the big lesson from Norway is that they focus on the big things, like sourcing most of their power from renewable energy sources at the beginning, and are now working on a more individual level. The U.S. definitely provides some incentives for going green, but most of it is on an individual level, and we haven't done much in terms of a large-scale shift to renewable energy. And I think a lot of that has to do with our political system. In the U.S., the nature of the two-party system is one group versus the other. The parties are often more focused on fighting against each other and disagreeing with the other side than on doing what is best for the country. Members of each party vote on things that they are supposed to support, which are the things the other party doesn't support. In Norway, where they have a multi-party system, there are members of ten different parties who currently hold seats in parliament. The members of parliament are more focused on governing the country and supporting the legislation their constituents want, because they aren't as concerned with what the other side is supporting. And because of this, it is easier for Norway to pass legislation, as their government is supporting what the people want, instead of what they are supposed to be supporting. According to a case study published by the Natural Resource Governance Institute, Norway's use of a coalition government promotes cooperation in inter-party dialogue, leading to more compromises and respect between parties. According to Merit Ernstedt, a member of its center party, the political culture is not always that of agreeing, but that of negotiating, and then committing to the negotiated result, which is necessary to achieve broad agreement. One example of this is in 2013, when the Green Party proposed the reduction in the use of oil. While the stance wasn't adopted by all, it was by the Socialist Left Party. This system also ensures that the voices of minority parties can be heard by allowing them to propose arguments and points of view that the other parties have to consider and present to the public. This process drastically differs from that of the United States two-party system, as there's less polarization and more compromise, making it easier to hear the perspectives of the public, as well as easier to pass environmentally-minded legislation due to the increased connectivity. After getting a better understanding of Norway's political system, let's take it back to a proposed solution for the U.S. system that partners with Norway's application of inter-party dialogue and process of compromise. Within the U.S., a proposed solution to establish a more equitable legislative process is the U.S.'s use of its Spending Power Clause to incentivize states to participate in a pre-clearance program that confirms or denies the passing of laws related with the voting process. In a paper by Katherine Donner, a law clerk at the University of Texas, she states that this clause, which allows Congress to tax and provide grant programs, will work with the Help America Vote Act, which is another grant program that incentivizes states to make voting system reforms via increased administration and assistance. This program will replace Section 5 in the Voters' Rights Act, which was absolved in 2013 in Shelby County v. Holder due to its proposed infringement on state powers and it no longer needed due to its reformations, with the equality in the voting system at the time. However, after its dissolution, the new voting laws that enforced voter ID restrictions and a decrease in the availability time to vote resulted in significant inequalities for Black and Latino residents. These types of laws were implemented by 14 states between 2012 and 2016, leading to a skewed view of the popular vote in 2016 that didn't represent the total population. By incorporating the proposed program, a county will be able to mimic the effects of Section 5 while not taking away too much of the state's constitutionally given power, resulting in less conflict and more carrot than stick. Despite everything we've shared, this is only the tip of the iceberg on the fallacies and shortcomings of the United States' two-party political system, and there will for sure be many new issues to come as the climate crisis continues and political tensions rise as a cause of environmental sustainability. Norway's use of a collaborative coalition government presents a possible solution to the U.S.'s lack of full representation and intense polarizations in its two-party system. As citizens of the United States, we all have the power to advocate for voting reforms and for more inter-party dialogue. While there's many ways to do this, a very simple solution would be to make sure to see both sides of each party and be willing to compromise for a better future. This podcast was directed by Isabella, the script was produced by Ben, and written by Ben, Sylvia, and Isabella, and the editing was done by Ani. Thanks for watching! That's all I have to say!
