Attendees at the 2013 AFL-CIO Convention's action session, “This Is NOT What Democracy Looks Like! The Democracy Initiative,” heard hopeful solutions to large problems with our democratic process. The coalition created to correct these problems of political inequality was the topic of the session: the Democracy Initiative. The executive director of the Democracy Initiative, Marissa Brown, summed up the group’s task: “We are about making government function for people who voted for a government that functions.”
The Democracy Initiative’s core mission is to establish political equality. To accomplish this, it has narrowed its focus to what they see as the three driving causes of political inequality. They strive to: stop recent and future efforts to disenfranchise voters while expanding voter access as much as possible; take big money out of the political process, particularly elections; and change Senate rules to end the wild obstructionism that we have seen during the Obama administration.
One major endorser of the Democracy Initiative is the public policy group Demos. Miles Rapoport, president of that group, was outspoken at the session in his praise of the Democracy Initiative. He particularly is optimistic about gains that can be made fighting voter suppression, which particularly affects communities of color and seniors. “The emergence of the Democracy Initiative in an environment where people are taking issues [of suppression] seriously is an enormously significant development,” says Rapoport.
Some 51 million Americans are simply not registered to vote. Since 2011, there have been more than 200 bills introduced in 41 states that aim to restrict access to the ballot box. And we all know about Citizens United. The Democracy Initiative sees a clear pattern: slowly but surely, there is an erosion of franchise. In response, they have targeted groups on the state and local level to ensure one person does indeed equal one vote.
Just as dangerous as one voice being squashed is the threat of one very powerful voice having undue influence. You’ve heard about the 1%. Well, only 1% of that 1% account for one-quarter of all political contributions. This is not a group at all representative of America's working families. Instead, corporate executives and the wealthiest among us are giving money that ensures the continuation of the same consolidation of power and influence.
After the majority of America's workers voted for President Obama, there was great hope—especially in the labor world. Communications Workers of America (CWA) is one of the original convenors of the Democracy Initiative (along with NAACP, Greenpeace and the Sierra Club), and their president, Larry Cohen, spoke at the session. He described this optimism—and then the frustration of watching a Senate that refused to act except when finding new ways to actively obstruct. The 391 cloture motions in 2012 almost double any time during the previous decade. Up from zero instances as recently as 1964. The filibuster is now an instrument of common stoppage, not rare delay—it’s a way to kill democracy.
That’s where Democracy Initiative comes in. Cohen detailed the CWA’s most important issues but pointed out, “We can’t fix anything…if we don’t fix the Senate rules.” As part of a solution to this problem, the Democracy Initiative has launched the Fix the Senate Now campaign.
The AFL-CIO is one of a growing number of organizations to endorse the Democracy Initiative. The goal is to get 80 such endorsements from diverse organizations, organizations that might not agree on everything but need democracy to function in order to give voice to their issues. Cohen put it this way: “I think we can all agree that if we don’t create a clear path to social change, then we don’t ever have any chance to fix [our issues].”
If you can get organizations together on core issues, you have a massive movement. Then you can see bigger change. This is the hope. Brown says, “The Democracy Initiative is about different ways of talking, thinking and interacting with each other.”