Political Participation In The United States

Changes in Political Participation in the United States Over the last decade political analysts have proposed that Americans are too apathetic in their political participation. John Hibbing and Elizabeth Theiss-Morse represent this view in their book Stealth Democracy: Americans Beliefs about How Government Should Work. They explain that most Americans do not care about enough of the policies and decisions being made and would rather have someone else, such as a politician, deal with them (Hibbing). While this is potentially concerning it should also be noted that several other analysts believe that political participation has not necessarily declined but that apparent losses can be accounted for by an evolution in participation. To begin

In response to the first question Carole Pateman wrote in her book published by Cambridge University, Participation and Democratic Theory, “therefore, for a democratic polity to exist it is necessary for a participatory society to exist, i.e. a society where all political systems have been democratized and socialization through participation take place in all areas... maximum input is required” (Pateman). And most political scientists agree with her, although there is no guarantee that increasing participation would objectively make the government better (Berger). Objectively making the government better requires some form of quantitative measurement that can not be measured in an increase of political participation. Rather increasing political participation would likely increase the quality of representation and would definitely make America more ideologically democratic in

Taken from the Pew Research Center article “The Current State of Civic Engagement in America”.
Type of participation
Percent out of 100
Sign a petition
32
Contact a national, state, or local government official about an issue
30
Work with fellow citizens to solve a problem in the community
28
Attend a political meeting on local, town, or school affairs
24
Contribute money to a political cause, party, organization, or candidate
18
Be an active member of a group that tries to influence policy or government
15
Attend a political speech or rally
12
Send a letter to the editor of a newspaper or magazine
10
Work or volunteer for a political party or candidate
8
Make a speech about a community or local issue
7
Attend an organized protest
4
Total percent of people who participated in any of the above
63

Figure 2
A graphical representation of figure 1.

Figure 3
Graphical representation of political participation by age using data from the Pew Research Center article “The Current State of Civic Engagement in