WHAT FACTORS AFFECT THE “SAUSAGE MAKING”

Picking up on the topic this writer introduced in the last posting – what factors are in play in the process of policy-making – this posting will provide an overall listing of those factors.  This listing is derived from the work of Matt Grossman.[1]  The political scientist describes prior research as more the work of hedgehogs; that is, efforts that become overly entangled with one or two factors – such as interest group involvement – and losing the more robust approach of dealing with a multitude of factors.

          A process that does deal with many factors, he describes as more the work of a fox.  A “fox” relies “on no overarching narrative and assessing multiple possibilities.”[2]  According to Grossman, the fox approach is more accurate; an estimation established by experimental research by economists and political scientists.  To be more foxlike, Grossman relies on the work of policy historians.  It turns out that the histories of policy changes (the term these researchers prefer) is done by historians who dedicate their efforts to such documentation.

          Grossman looked at the compilation of such histories from 1945 to 2012.  The areas of policy his review covers are as follows (with the number of books and articles utilized):  agriculture (14 books, 3 articles), civil rights and liberties (24 books, 4 articles), criminal justice (15 books), education (12 books, 4 articles), energy (13 books, 1 article), environment (18 books, 3 articles), finance and commerce (16 books, 3 articles), health (22 books, 2 articles), housing and community development (11 books, 8 articles), labor and immigration (19 books, 1 article), macroeconomics (21 books, 1 article), science and technology (15 books, 5 articles), social welfare (19 books, 1 article), and transportation (12 books, 1 article).  His research reviewed nearly 2,000 cases of policy change.

          After identifying the factors (independent variables) from these qualitative sources of information, he also qualitatively determined the significance of the individual policy changes (dependent variable).  Grossman readily admits the potential for subjectivity such a process can entail, but assures the reader that the effort was to be objective.  And then, with all the data arranged, prepared, and categorized, he applied suitable statistical analyses to the data.

          The aim here is to give the reader an overall sense of those identified independent factors that seem to more prominently have an influence on policy change processes.  It can be generally detected that there seem to be three general types of policy change efforts by policy-makers:  efforts that result from unplanned events (e. g., the 9/11 attack and subsequent policy initiatives), efforts that are a continuation of long standing efforts (e. g., healthcare as in the Affordable Health Care Act), or renewal or tweaking policy change (e. g., budget legislation).

          Irrespective of the type of change effort, there are, in the Grossman research, 60 factors coming into play among all the policy change efforts he identified.  From his reporting, one can get a sense of what is in play when government officials are entertaining policy change.  While the overall number of factors is large, he detected that some factors are highly recurring.

          This is a listing of the most cited factors in the offered explanations the histories provide and the percent of explanations in which they are offered:  supportive president (42.15%), pressure of advocacy organization (22.54%), extension of previous policy (21.56%), individual Congressperson led (15.23%), focusing event (12.40%), change in power of the two parties (12.05%), Congressional committee chair led (11.89%), pressure from corporations (11.48%), earlier choice made more likely (11.01%), government report issued (10.91%), House and Senate reach agreement (10.86%), new data arise (10.40%), important frame for proponents (9.83%), Congressional lobbying (9.57%), affected by economic downturn (9.32%), general media coverage (9.06%), court ruling stimulated action (7.57%), key Congressional floor vote (7.31%), and Congressional party/leadership led (7.05%).  The number of policy change cases looked at is 1,943.

          The blaring omission in this listing is public opinion.  This writer assumes that it is one of the 60 factors, but from the percents offered above, one can speculate how infrequent public opinion becomes a meaningful factor.  Of course, this can reflect how undemocratic our public decision-making is.

It also reflects how unusual it is for policy-makers to be dealing with issues or policy proposals about which the common person would have knowledge or interest.  Most of the time, these officials deal with the more mundane areas of governance that most people just take for granted or about which they are totally uninformed.  How many citizens care whether the Air Force buys one fighter jet opposed to another?  Yet, such a decision can mean expenditures of billions of dollars.

Another way to view the above information is to categorize the more specific factors into types.  Here is such a listing from Grossman’s research:  Congressional (41.17%), executive branch (53.17%), judicial branch (9.47%), interest groups (36.13%), research (24.96%), public opinion (17.04%), media (10.19%), state/local (6.74%), international (5.35%), path dependence – referring to ongoing action – (28.87%), events (26.04%), and ideas (13.84%).  Of course, since these numbers exceed one hundred percent, it indicates that more than one of these categories is affecting policy change in any one case.

Also of note: when one gathers the various factors into types, public opinion gets more attention.  This could be due to how various factors can be interpreted as forms of public opinion.  While 17.04% does not indicate an overwhelming factor or type of factor, it is worth considering when studying any policy change.  This is an encouraging finding.

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[1] Matt Grossman, Artist of the Possible:  Governing Networks and American Policy Change Since 1945 (New York, NY:  Oxford University Press).

[2] Ibid, location 2973-2984 (a Kindle designation).

VARIED VIEWS OVER POLICY-MAKING

One would think that a set of central questions any civics educational curriculum would address is:  what process is used to develop national policy; how does the nation’s public policy get enacted; whose benefits are served by that process of development and enactment?  This posting does not attempt to answer these questions, but will introduce several postings that will look at one of these questions.  That is:  how does that policy get enacted?  It turns out that there is an extensive, political science literature dedicated to this inquiry.

          Matt Grossman’s[1] monograph reports that that research has been responsible for an array of theoretical models that guide this study.  Among those models, one can find views titled public opinion, scientific influence, interest group, and actor success models.  Each of these titles represents more specific perspectives.  For example, actor success models include a chief executive model that looks at the role of president in the development and enactment of policy change.

          The upcoming postings will share Grossman’s judgments of each of these models and culminate with what he thinks is the best way to conceptualize this research topic based on what his analysis of case studies indicates.  Overall, he finds fault with these various models.  He summarizes their deficiencies in the following description:

Some of these ideal types are based in normative premises:  the public opinion literature’s objective is democratic accountability; the scientific influence literature seeks evidenced-based policy.  The interest group literature is instead born of a dystopia, the idea that policy results are bought and sold.  Assessments of these ideal types tend to become searches for confirming or disconfirming evidence for a single theory, rather than investigations of competing alternatives.  Actor success models thus share two problems: (1) they bias the starting point, including only the agenda of potential proposals of concern to each set of actors, and (2) they look for deviations from agreement with the actor in question, assuming that agreement implies influence.[2]

          As a prelude and as hinted at in this above cited quote, Grossman’s research points him toward a wider approach about what influences decision-making in the field of policy change.  His study heavily looks at Congressional processes since most policy change occurs in that branch of government.  This is not to say that the other branches are ignored.  His study does include policy-making in the executive (both at the presidential level and bureaucratic level) and the judicial branches.

          This writer, frankly, finds this diversity of views and approaches a bit disheartening.  That is, given the centrality of this process in any understanding of political behavior or governance, one would think that the discipline of political science would speak to this topic with more certainty than what is indicated by such varied views.  But that is the nature of trying to scientifically study human behavior or human decision-making, especially when that interest is aimed at such a complex endeavor as national policy-making.

          In turn, civics education must accommodate this reality.  If one of this course of study’s aim is to prepare students to be able to actively engage in the processes of government as an active citizen, civics teachers are naturally called upon to convey an accurate depiction of what constitutes the relevant governmental processes.

To do this, educators naturally look to the experts who study this process and whose charge is to, at minimum, convey an accurate general description of how policy is developed and enacted.  That is, civics teachers have a vested interest in the success of such scholarship. In doing so, they are well-served in keeping abreast of what is found in this research.  These upcoming postings will address this concern.

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[1] Matt Grossman, Artist of the Possible:  Governing Networks and American Policy Change Since 1945 (New York, NY:  Oxford University Press).

[2] Ibid, location 2994 (Kindle designation). 

IS THE REPUBLIC BEYOND EXTENSION?

The architecture of the nation’s constitutional structure is a wondrous social and political invention.  A great deal of thought, debate, reflection, and compromising went into its writing and approval.  A glimpse into this foundation is a reading of the Federalist Papers, jointly written by James Madison and Alexander Hamilton with a few entries by John Jay.  Collectively, these writers are known as Publius, the pen name they originally used as they submitted the individual papers back when the proposed constitution was being considered.[1]

          As every civics student is taught, the present-day constitution was written in the summer of 1787 and then submitted to state constitutional conventions for ratification.  It is these representatives in each of the states who are ultimately responsible for the nation’s basic law.  In their deliberations, the constitutional issues were debated and arguments in favor and in opposition were entertained.  It is in this backdrop that the Federalist Papers were published.

          The Federalist Papers have been described in this blog, especially Federalist Paper Number 10, by James Madison.  It was described as an argument to convince the ratification delegates to vote for the new constitution on the basis that the proposal established an extensive republic.  By the states and the people coming together and establishing a viable central government, the resulting republic would be one of a large nation instead of a collection of thirteen smaller republics.  In Madison’s opinion, this structural attribute was essential to establish any republic able to survive the vicissitudes of normal political realities.

          Those realities begin with the very nature of human beings in that they, individually, ultimately seek their self-interest.  In doing so, each person is naturally disposed to seek those other citizens whose interests sufficiently are in line with his/her interests to form a faction or a collective of people with similar interests.  A resulting faction poses more political viability than would be the case of an individual seeking his/her desired policies individually.

          In this blog, this writer described this argument as a position that saw smaller republics be susceptible to the control of one or two factions – described as dominant economic entities.  This faction(s) would be able to control the political and governmental policy-making processes to further and/or protect its (their) interests.  The blog summarily described this as “company town” politics.

          In a larger republic, as what was being formed by the new constitution, there would be many other factions and, consequently, there would be competition among them within the political arena.  In such competition, no one faction or combination of factions could run roughshod over policy-makers; any attempt would be seriously challenged.  In other words, factions would have to enlist the support of non-affected factions and citizens who would be more interested in the common good than in furthering the interests of those initiating the proposal.

          While this description can be logically derived from the argument in Number 10, a more accurate rendition of the argument is a bit different.  And here, in line with human nature, one is served by remembering that all governments can be divided into three types:  the rule of the one (usually a dictatorship or monarchy), the rule of the few (usually an oligarchy or aristocracy), or the rule of the many (usually a pure democracy or a representative democracy which the Federalist Papers called a republic).

Whichever form of government a society adopts, the natural disposition is for those in power is to selfishly seek their self-interests even to the point of abusing the common good.  In doing so, those in power sow the seeds for the demise of their system since those who are ill-served will seek relief and eventually work toward disposing of that power that is abusing their interests.  This is even the case with democracies.

Historically, one is also well-served to remember that one important reason the Constitutional Convention was called was the belief that the existing constitutional setup was allocating too much power to the many – the common folk.  Shay’s Rebellion, perceived as demonstrating this condition, was but one source of evidence. 

So, among the founding fathers, there was a general determination to contain the democratic quality that existed then and, while not taking away all remnants of popular sovereignty, to find a way(s) to more responsibly avoid an oppression by the majority – an oppression that can attack the rights of the minority.  The problem with the rule of the one is that the one has the power to oppress the rest; the problem with the rule of the few is that the few can oppress the rest, and the problem with the rule of the many, as was seen to be the case, is that the many can oppress the rest – the minority or the individual.

In their study of the famous republics of the past, they could detect the many or the few – depending on the specific case – exercising oppressive power, and this instructed the founders about the folly of allowing any form of oppression.  Publius’ solution to the problem was to have the rule of the many, but with some provisos.

Hence, the Constitution provides for checks and balances, separation of powers, and a federal structure (with the states retaining certain sovereign powers).  These structural elements were meant to avoid oppression by any political actor.  But underlying those elements, there is the functional aspect of bigness or extension.

How does a larger republic help to minimize the probability of oppression?  For these mechanizations (separation of powers, check and balances, and a federal arrangement) to work, an important assumption needs to be true.  That is, that the many must be doing sufficiently well economically and otherwise, so that it does not see itself as a single faction.

If the economic conditions are not sufficiently prosperous and there are not sufficient levels of income and wealth distribution, then those on the short end of the stick begin to define themselves as belonging to a beleaguered faction.  If this is nation-wide, then there is a significant faction seeing its interests as a singular political and unifying force.

Then the many has the language and means to favor those policies that can oppress others who are part of that faction.  For example, property rights can come under threatening laws, or production might adopt inefficient practices that would result in higher prices.

Such a condition of unbalanced income and wealth, unfortunately, is affecting too many today.  Due to the financial crisis of 2008 and the steady stream of diminished numbers of industrial jobs, less and less of the nation’s income is going to the middle class and more of it is ending up in the pockets of the upper classes.

To quote the popular, former presidential candidate, Senator Bernie Sanders, "’The top one-tenth of 1 percent’ of Americans ‘own almost as much wealth as the bottom 90 percent’."[2]  This reality is being defined as oppression by politicians who are ready and willing to so define it.  This last presidential election shows how this language was used to determine the result of the election.

Whether the results of the election address the imbalance in income and wealth, time will tell.  As for now, though, these realities show that the insight Publius expressed over 200 years ago was prescient.  The problem is that so far, the extended republic is failing.  It is up to the nation’s policy-makers to realize what is at stake and to issue the policies that address the imbalance.  It is the opinion here that there is a time element.  The nation – the republic – is facing a serious challenge.

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[1] Martin Diamond, “The Federalist,” in History of Political Philosophy, Third Edition, eds. Leo Strauss and Joseph Cropsey (Chicago, IL:  University of Chicago Press, 1987), 659-679.  The argument outlined in this posting is based on the analysis of Mr. Diamond.  This article is highly recommended.

[2] Tom Kertscher, “Bernie Sanders, in Madison, claims top 0.1% of Americans have almost as much wealth as bottom 90%,” Politifact, accessed January 6, 2017, http://www.politifact.com/wisconsin/statements/2015/jul/29/bernie-s/bernie-sanders-madison-claims-top-01-americans-hav/ .

HAIL TO A LEADER OR A MANAGER

We are getting ready for a new leader.  January 20^th is fast approaching.  Whom did we elect to be president of the nation:  a leader or a manager?  This writer believes that it is a useful distinction for voters and, in terms of this blog, for high school students to make through their civics instruction.

          A manager is someone who takes existing aims and goals and goes about directing an organization or some sub portion of an organization to achieve those aims and goals using the most efficient method possible.  This aspect of administrating is concerned mostly with short-term goals and processes.

It is, for example, trying to make sure the best person available is placed in the various positions within the organization.  The manager makes relatively small changes in how things are being carried out.  It is the manager whom one looks to for the day-to-day decisions.

          A leader is not so constrained in his or her perspectives.  A leader does not look at carrying out aims and goals, but more about what those aims and goals should be.  John Kotter[1] identifies three basic processes he attributes to leadership:  he/she sets the direction for the organization, he/she organizes the personnel to carry out that direction, and he/she motivates personnel to strive toward the direction or vision he/she has set out.

          What is more important:  managing or leading?  Of course, both are and even if it takes more than one person to fill these positions, an organization needs to have both an overall leader and an overall manager.  What did we get for our presidency?  Since the nation elected a non-politician to run things, the citizenry is ill situated to pass judgement.  It only has reputation to go by without much evidence.

          This lack of knowledge is not new.  Barack Obama was a first term US senator when he ascended to the highest post.  It is the opinion of this writer (the reader might disagree) that this lack of experience was on display during the trying, early days of his administration – quite a few rookie mistakes (a topic for another time).

Presently, the new incoming president does have extensive experience, but it was all in the private sector.  To date, he has been reluctant to share evidence of his business acumen.  Yes, there are a bunch of buildings and resorts with his name on them, but these are mostly the trappings.  The public doesn’t know how profitable all that is.  It is still waiting for those tax returns.

Without that information, the citizenry will wait and see how he does.  Is he a leader or a manager or both?  If he is one and not the other, does he have underlings who can fulfill the missing attribute (although if it’s leadership, that is nearly impossible for an underling to fulfill)?  The public does know how he campaigned; he promoted his candidacy as being a leader without equal.  His management skills were communicated more by implication; that is, anyone who has been so successful in business needs to be a great manager as well.  But the question remains:  how successful has he been?

Two questions arise with this type of inquiry.  One, is leadership or management the same in the private and public domains?  This writer just read an account of how Jack Welch transformed GE, a company that had been very successful throughout most of the twentieth century.  His changes were multiple and profound and he pulled it off.  But he had the ultimate say on what structurally and procedurally would transpire at GE.  This is not the case for a president.

A president is not a dictator.[2]  He/she is the chief executive, but with meaningful restraints on his/her power.  There are both checks and balances and separation of powers the reader learned about in school and hears about daily in the news accounts describing the political realities at any given time.  The rhetoric during a campaign is carried out as if these attributes don’t exist – given the promises being made – but they do.  And, as such, the ability to be a leader, as opposed to a manager, is consequently much more difficult.

The second question is:  can one say either leadership or management is more important than the other regardless of the conditions the CEO faces or is this demand dependent on conditions – sometimes one needs a leader and at other times one needs a manager?  What one knows for sure is that both are needed to varying degrees all the time.  What one also knows is that leadership is more “sexy” than management.

In this vein, one can judge that Hillary Clinton lost the election when she decided to run on more of a management image than a leadership image.  She decided that her candidacy would communicate the following:  as president she was going to further the Obama legacy and secure it from Republican efforts to dismantle it.

Donald Trump ran on a leadership agenda; that is, he was going to make profound changes, in terms of direction, staffing, and spirit, that would regain for the US its lost greatness.  This language is what appealed to those 70,000 (over three states) voters who made the difference.  This blog has already described this dynamic in its explanation of why the election turned out as it did.  The lesson from this election is:  run as a leader, not as a manager.

This distinction will play out over various issues over the upcoming years.  The first will be over what to do with healthcare.  And, on the table, there is not just Obamacare (which has varying levels of support among the populous), but also Medicare and Medicaid.  These other programs, products of the Great Society legislation of the 1960s, are widely popular.  To date, Trump has said he does not want to touch these other programs, but a Republican congress has indicated it does.

These issues are important and affect most Americans.  Do Americans really want leadership today; that is, an executive who seeks such an extensive new direction in our governance?  Or does it want better management of what exists?  Upon reflection, one should be careful about what one wants.  This is especially true when one has the power of the vote.

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[1] John Kotter, Leading Change (Boston, MA:  Harvard Business Press, 1996).

[2] A CEO of a private corporation is not either.  He can be fired at any time by a board of directors assuming they are willing to buy out his contract.  On the other hand, a US president cannot be fired unless he is engaged in illegal activity and is impeached and convicted by Congress.

YOU SAY WHAT?

An aim of this blog, in large measure, is to convince the reader to believe two claims:  one, that federation theory is the best available mental construct to guide the nation’s civics curriculum, at least in terms of content, and two, that the reader should actively engage in the promotion and implementation of this construct.  The blog has dedicated a lot of space to describe and explain federation theory (one can see above the introductory remarks for an overview of the theory) and has attempted to give practical advice about how to change curriculum.

          In terms of this latter attempt, the blog has pointed out that change in how an organization thinks and functions is difficult, complicated, and a long-term project.  This is true if the change is fundamental and what is sought is what is known as transformational change.  Transformational change is not what most politicians such as Donald Trump are after; they speak in terms of transactional change. 

Transactional change is based on external motivation.  That is, a person agrees to change his/her behavior in exchange for something the person wants – a higher paycheck, higher status, a better parking space in the parking lot.  On the other hand, transformational change relates to people changing some behavior not for a reward (or to avoid a punishment), but due to an internal motivation, some change in attitudes or values.  That makes it hard to accomplish.

There is some recent research that sheds light on an aspect of such a dynamic.  The New York Times reports on the work of Robb Willer and Matthew Feinberg,[1] two sociologists who study what it takes to succeed in convincing people to support specific policy proposals, especially if the proposals are associated with an opposing political ideology.  For example, how does one convince a conservative to support same-sex marriage or convince a liberal to support increased military spending?

Actually, this aspect is not complicated, but it is difficult to pull off.  Per these researchers’ findings, what is needed is presenting arguments that frame the newer policy choice in terms of the subject’s, not the proponent’s, values and attitudes.  Here is what one of the researchers had to say:

In one study, we presented liberals and conservatives with one of two messages in support of same-sex marriage.  One message emphasized the need for equal rights for same-sex couples.  This is the sort of fairness-based message that liberals typically advance for same-sex marriage.  It is framed in terms of a value – equality – that research has shown resonates more strongly among liberals than conservatives.  The other message was designed to appeal to values of patriotism and group loyalty, which have been shown to resonate more with conservatives.  (It argued that “same-sex couples are proud and patriotic Americans” who “contribute to the American economy and society.”)[2]

          On the other side, liberals were swayed to support military spending with arguments that point out the role the military plays in offering opportunities, education, and training to low income, minority enlistees.  With a larger military, such offerings can be extended and taken advantage of by more low income individuals.  This is very much in the liberal “wheelhouse.” 

          What is the lesson here?  The lesson is that when one wants to convince others of a behavior or policy shift that on the face of it counters existing values and attitudes, if one frames the change in terms of existing values and attitudes by those who are to be changed or convinced of the change, success is more likely to happen.  When this premise was tested against external rewards, reframing did better.

          As mentioned, this sort of strategy is difficult to implement.  One reason for this is reflected by another finding of this research.  Liberals and conservatives alike were found to be reluctant or unable to think of arguments and presentations that solicit values and attitudes of those who initially opposed the proposed change.  In other words, liberals think liberally, not conservatively, and conservatives think conservatively, not liberally.  These two claims seem to be true even when the subjects are asked to do otherwise.

          This research used a variety of policy change proposals.  It was found that not all liberal or conservative policy positions were amenable to such reframing; some did not lend themselves to these language manipulations.  This writer can speculate that a national healthcare program such as the Affordable Care Act is such a policy area.

So, perhaps what one can say with the new administration coming in is that Democrats, who wish to cooperate with it, should see what areas the Trump team wants to pursue that they also want to advance (infrastructure spending) and which ones Democrats want and can be reframed in language that touts Republican values and attitudes.  For those latter proposals, part of the strategy should be to frame the debate, at least in part, in Republican language.  For the rest, from the Democratic perspective, game on!

As for changing a curriculum in a school, one similarly is confronted with people who initially are disposed to disagree with what is being proposed.  This research by these sociologists suggests certain steps a change agent needs to take if he/she hopes to be successful.

First, he/she needs to discover the values and attitudes the target subjects have.  The agent not only needs to know what these dispositions are, but also gain a sense – an accurate sense – of how much vitality they have, how centered they are to the person being asked to change.

Second, these values and attitudes need to be considered and the language by which they are or can be expressed must be discovered or developed.  Sometimes, these values and attitudes are held at a subconscious level or they are opaque.  This language task is difficult to achieve, but unaddressed commitments do not disappear or lose their influence.

And third, an appropriate language needs to be formed and, where possible, employed to voice the desired aim or goal with words that are amenable to the listener.  Here, the communicator might be tempted to be dishonest and manipulative.  If he/she is, untold damage can be done to the whole project.  Dishonesty is seldom forgiven or forgotten.

As the Times article points out, this research points out an almost obvious message that people are more apt to agree with what they already agree.  The challenge is in the implementation.

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[1] “The Key to Political Persuasion,” The New York Times (November 11, 2015), accessed December 30, 2016, http://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/15/opinion/sunday/the-key-to-political-persuasion.html?_r=0 .

[2] Ibid.

UNAVOIDABLE BIAS

A topic that all civics teachers will confront at one time or another is:  should he or she convey to the students his/her political beliefs, his/her ideology? It is a safe bet that a civics teacher will have an “attitude” about politics; why would he or she choose to teach civics or any of the social studies if his/her interests were not so engaged?  And if he/she has an interest, as is the case with most things that spur one to have an interest, the person’s attitude(s) will probably not be neutral.

          It is basic attitudinal theory that as one’s interest in a topic or subject becomes more intense, the person will tend toward attitudes that will be more pronounced, either in a positive direction or a negative one or, in some cases, both directions.  That’s why one can love and hate someone at the same time; as a matter of fact, if we love someone who gives us reason to hate him or her, the hate tends to be more intense.  But that’s another angle to this question.

          Here, the topic is civics and political interest and bias.  Above, all social studies were mentioned.  Another field that tends to be political is literature.  A lot of literature has been motivated by political issues.  In college, this writer took a social issues-literature course and the class was assigned such classics as The Prince, 1984, The Grapes of Wrath, Fahrenheit 450, The Fountainhead, and others.  Each of these books argued through its stories and descriptions definite political positions.

          Now today, with issues such as climate change, pollution, nuclear weapons, and others, science teachers are faced with many political concerns.  Again, should a science teacher portray what his/her political beliefs are?  Of course, in the case of science, the mere presentation of such issues says something.  It says:  here is a condition that is bad for us and the implied message is that the nation or the world should do something about it.  That is a political discussion which is directly addressed or implied.

          In this blog, this writer has argued that in choosing a fundamental mental construct that serves to guide civics instruction, a political bias is being expressed by such a choice.  What one can say about that choice is that it does not usually rely on a conservative or liberal bias as is the case with most of our political debates. 

          The blog has further argued that today, civics is guided by the natural rights construct.  This construct has elements that can be associated with conservative arguments but, at the same time, it has elements that can be associated with liberal arguments.  That construct’s reliance on individualism, quantitative research, and systems analysis of social (including political) arrangements tends to have a conservative-libertarian bent.  While that is true, its rejection of traditional/historical strains of argument tends to move its purview to a more liberal bias.

          The one mental construct which this blog has explained that has a left of center – in some cases an extreme left of center political view – is the critical theory perspective.  With its reliance on Marxian thought, one would not accuse critical theory of espousing reactionary political arguments.

          As for the favored construct of this blog, federation theory, it tends to be more conservative than liberal, except for one important aspect.  This construct is basically a collectivist view, albeit with a strong respect for the individual entity that makes up the collective.  That individual is recognized as having a definite set of rights as defined either by the US Bill of Rights or the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.  This along with its collectivist slant can be considered liberal elements of Federation Theory.

          The blog made the claim that a teacher cannot fully hide from students his/her political bias.  There is a multitude of ways a teacher does this, some quite straightforward and others subtle.  It is useful for civics teachers and other teachers (history, biology, English lit teachers) to be conscious of the several ways that espousing political beliefs are communicated.

          But before listing these ways, it is also useful to review why this is an issue of importance.  Are students sent to school to be “brainwashed;” to be exposed to propaganda of a political ideology?  Most would say no.  Yet, is it unavoidable?  This writer believes that it is.

          Why – because of the different ways that a teacher’s or curriculum’s bias is espoused.  The most subtle way a bias is communicated occurs when a teacher expresses an opinion not of a political idea, but a social one that has political implications.  That could occur when a teacher repeatedly expresses messages attacking laziness, for example, and how it is because of laziness that so many people find themselves deprived or in poor situations.  In trying to get his/her students to be more energetic, he/she expresses a basic conservative assumption that can be questioned on empirical grounds.  That is, poverty is caused by laziness.

          In a less subtle way, a teacher can espouse a bias by the questions he/she asks students about the content they are studying.  Here is where a mental construct functions to tilt the content.  If the content, for example, is consistently asking about how individuals are affected by social policy or events and never how the group or community is affected (a tendency using the natural rights construct), then individualism is promoted and that, in turn, can be political.  This writer believes that is exactly what happens too often in our classrooms today.

          Then there is the case in which, usually in small monocultural communities, teachers simply espouse the accepted political beliefs of that locality.  Those beliefs are transmitted with little or no reservations.  They become the accepted dogma of political thought and students naturally grow to further adopt them as their own.  The home offers little resistance to such indoctrination because what their children is being taught reflects what the family believes to be true and proper.

          So there, one has three levels of transmission that communicate political beliefs with their commonality.  All students are exposed to “propaganda” at one time or another.  What is one to do if one is concerned with this sort of indoctrination?  This blog has argued that recognizing the inevitability of this promotion and adopting strategies that have students question the beliefs they are being given is a responsible way to deal with this issue.  This is done with teachers who are self-aware of their biases and also of the biases of the curriculum they are teaching – and perhaps can see local biases as being just that – biases. 

          Once a teacher is so aware, then he or she can proactively ask the challenging questions about espoused beliefs, not only emanating from themselves but from other sources as well.  By asking such questions, students will more actively approach their subjects (not only civics, but subjects like history, biology, or English lit).  And in the bargain, that teacher might be able to generate the class that is lively and interactive among students and between students and teacher.

DEAL OR OBSTRUCT?

There is a big question among Democrats these days.  Should they in Congress cooperate with the new president if he, in turn, is championing something they want –  federal spending on a large infrastructure program – or should they mimic the Republicans and oppose anything the president attempts to initiate as they did with President Obama?  Deal or obstruct?

          Of course, even if they choose to cooperate, the details of any negotiations are very important.  But before such a strategy would be put in place, more generic questions need to be asked.  With whom should one seek a deal?  What assets would one be willing to give up?  What is a sought-after gain worth to him, her, or them?  What are the time elements of any negotiations and their subsequent consequences?  What third parties are involved and what are their claims, liabilities, assets, and other pertinent interests in any pending deal?

          Most of these questions – and those who deal in this sort of thing could probably think of other queries – while being generic, are concerned with situation specific conditions, but the first one is not.  Negotiations call on participants having trust among them – at least to some level. 

One remembers President Reagan’s famous quip:  “trust, but verify.”  But in most of these cases, verifying happens only after the fact, once the agreement is struck.  For example, the negotiations in North Carolina the other day are a case in point.

          In a one-day special session of the North Carolina Legislature, the Democrats of the state offered to have Charlotte, the state’s biggest city, overturn a city ordinance allowing everyone to use bathrooms in accordance to their gender – how an individual defines him/herself sexually – in return for the Republicans to drop House Bill 2.

House Bill 2 mandates everyone to use the bathroom that anyone’s birth certificate states the person’s sex designation is – a person’s biological designation.  Charlotte dropped its ordinance, but the Republicans, who control both houses of the legislature, did not meet their end of the deal.

So, one can question those lawmakers’ trustworthiness.  Of course, Charlotte can reestablish its ordinance, but one can imagine how the episode damaged the levels of trust among the different political actors in the political arena of North Carolina.  Having to take the time and expense to meet for the one day session will not be soon forgotten.

          Is there a lesson in the North Carolina case?  One can see that it is not only important to know what the other party holds important, but also to know the source of that concern and how, in the priority of concerns, those particular ones are held.  Often, and usually due to representative language that is used to initiate negotiations – made by representatives of one side or the other – the importance of a concern is downplayed.

One needs to be sensitive to this possibility.  It seems to be the case that in North Carolina there is a general sense of betrayal.  In addition to this backtracking on the deal, the legislature just stripped the new incoming, Democratic governor of important appointment decision powers.  The deal breaking is just more salt on the wound.

          Of course, the consequences of this failed deal are that North Carolina is apt to be further punished by national organizations that have been boycotting the state for different functions such as sporting events, business considerations, and entertainment concerts due to its “bathroom” policy.

The fallout from the law, which the General Assembly passed in March, has been impossible to miss. The National Collegiate Athletic Association stripped North Carolina of its right to host seven championship events this academic year. The Atlantic Coast Conference pulled its football championship from Charlotte, and major companies, including PayPal, abandoned or paused plans to expand in the state. Cultural figures like Bruce Springsteen and Ringo Starr canceled concerts, and the United States Department of Justice brought a civil rights lawsuit, which is still pending.[1]

This account indicates why Republicans were motivated to deal; the existing law was costing businesses significant revenues and promises to keep doing so.

          But back to the national scene and the pending question Democrats are asking – should they deal or obstruct? – it is easy to judge that “dealing” is the more patriotic thing to do.  To obstruct is merely a partisan move; it caters to the party’s base and energizes it to support and, when the time arrives, vote.  Given the last voter turnout numbers, this would be a good thing for Democrats. 

          On the other hand, dealing and finding common ground would more likely further the national interest.  But in judging whether the strategy followed is one or the other – deal or obstruct – a person is well-served to remember all that goes into such decisions.

These politicians, the ones who will decide the strategy – are pros at the political game.  They are the ones whom the president-elect promised are fools.  He has stocked his team with pros from the business world, so one will see what will happen.  A prudent sentiment by which to leave this topic would be to point out that trust should be earned, not foolishly bestowed.  This is true even among federated citizens.  

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[1] Richard Fausset and Alan Blinder, “North Carolina Fails to Repeal Bathroom Law That Prompted Boycotts” The New York Times (December 21, 2016).  Accessed December 23, 2016, http://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/21/us/north-carolina-fails-to-repeal-bathroom-law-that-prompted-boycotts.html?_r=0 .