MOSCOW, April 16 (RIA Novosti), Lyudmila Chernova - US policy outcomes are more often shaped by the preferences of the rich, while ordinary citizens’ ability to influence their government is very limited, says Martin Gilens, a professor at Princeton and co-author of a new research on American elites.
“The democracy in America is failing at allowing ordinary citizens’ voices have sway in the policy outcomes,” Martin Gilens, Professor of Politics at Princeton University, told RIA Novosti Tuesday. “Moreover that influence is almost completely restricted to the well-off and to the business interests groups.”
The study titled “Testing Theories of American Politics: Elites, Interest Groups, and Average Citizens” was conducted jointly by researchers at Princeton and Northeastern Universities.
Martin Gilens says that today the United States is a democracy only to a modest degree. Even worse, it is one that is not functioning well in its limited function.
Although the US has relatively free elections, voters’ influence is only a slight.
“The role of money in elections is one of the main reasons why the American policy makers respond much more to what the preferences of the rich,” the professor asserted.
The research was conducted and the data collected over a period of approximately twenty years between the early 1980’s and the early 2000s.
The purpose was to assess the extent to which different actors are influential in shaping policy outcomes at the federal level in Washington. The researchers concluded that the power of average Americans is diminishing.
“The preferences of the affluent Americans, people who earn more than 90 percent of the American public are tended to align with the decisions of the government,” said Gilens, adding that there are two distinct kinds of actors that appeared to be influential in shaping policy.
“These organized groups mostly represent business and industry, and affluent individuals who shape politics. And we believe their role is in donating the money the politicians need to get elected and stay in office.”
The range of their effect can be seen in many different policy spheres.
“The outcomes we were looking at were actual policies that were either adopted or could have been adopted by the US government, including tax policy, minimum wage, foreign and military policies, abortion and gay rights,” the researcher said.
The wants of these groups show some marked differences, according to Gilens. For example, elite groups prefer less intrusive government involvement especially in the markets. They also, the Princeton study concluded, generally like a more free market approach with low taxes and less government regulation, as well as free trade regime with low trade barriers.
However, while the “rich” tend to take conservative positions when it comes to business and economics, on the social side Gilens found a different approach. He says they tend to be more liberal in America than ordinary citizens on social issues like abortion or gay rights.
The divide in influence is only likely to widen. Recent Supreme Court decisions including McCutcheon is granting the rich more power to contribute money further and wider than ever before meaning that while the affluent will be given a megaphone for their wishes, others will only be able to whisper.
