Why Election Integrity Is the Whole Ballgame

If the Democratic debates told us anything, it’s that some of our would-be leaders don’t see the proverbial forest for the trees.  

So many signs indicate that our democracy is not working. The infrastructure of our electoral system is failing, the Supreme Court just Ok’d gerrymandering for political gain, Russians keep interfering in our elections, climate change is an existential threat, kids are afraid to go to school for fear of being shot, China is on the verge of controlling the next generation of our communications, and the global world order that held things together since the end of World War II is tottering. 

Our guest on this week’s WhoWhatWhy podcast is Larry Diamond, a Princeton professor and author of Ill Winds: Saving Democracy from Russian Rage, Chinese Ambition, and American Complacency. A longtime student of democratic processes around the world, he says that nothing short of a radical transformation can save our system.

Diamond rejects the notion, put forth last month by our podcast guest, Yale professor Ian Shapiro, that we need to revitalize political parties. He says it’s unrealistic to think we will ever return to the era of party bosses and smoke-filled rooms. 

Indeed, he believes that the old standard of simple “majority rule” elections is an antiquated model which is being abandoned by most progressive democracies around the world. In its place, he argues that ranked-choice voting — where voters list multiple candidates in order of preference — can reenergize democracy.

Putting our problems in a larger context, Diamond talks about the impact of climate change and global migration, as well as the escalating conflicts with Russia and China — and how any solutions to these problems must involve the US.  

If we are to contribute to this effort, we must first put our own house in order, says Diamond. In other words, reforming the American political system is an indispensable first step toward saving the world.