Writing for The Atlantic, Jonathan Rauch defined chaos syndrome as "a chronic decline in a political system 's capacity for self-organization". Rauch writes that chaos syndrome starts with the weakening of the institutions and brokers (parties, career politicians, congressional leaders and committees) that have traditionally held politicians accountable to one another and stopped everyone in the system from using it for naked self-interest all the time. As these intermediaries ' (we 'll call them middlemen) power fades, politicians, activists, and voters become more self-centered and unaccountable. The system fragments. Chaos becomes the new norm in both campaigns and government. A second virus was initially identified in 2002, by the University
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Starting in the 1970s, large-dollar donations to candidates and parties were subject to a tightening web of regulations. The idea was to reduce corruption (or its appearance) and curtail the power of special interests—certainly laudable goals. Campaign-finance rules did stop some egregious transactions, but at a cost: Instead of eliminating money from politics (which is impossible), the rules diverted much of it to private channels. The result has been the creation of an array of private political machines across the country: for instance, the Koch brothers ' Americans for Prosperity and Karl Rove 's American Crossroads on the right, and Tom Steyer 's NextGen Climate on the left. Private groups are much harder to regulate, less transparent, and less accountable than are the parties and candidates, who do, at the end of the day, have to face the voters. Because they thrive on purism, protest, and parochialism, the outside groups are driving politics toward polarization, extremism, and short-term …show more content…
The political trend in Europe has been away from establishment politicians, and toward far-right populists. The British referendum on exiting the European Union was only the most recent example, but across the continent anxieties over the Syrian migrant crisis and economic difficulties facing the European middle-class have fueled a populist trend away from the establishment. Part of the solution to this comes from the Italian political art of trasformismo. Trasformismo was a form of politics that sought to create a flexible centrist government to alienate the extreme left and extreme right, and ensure political stability. By mixing the upper echelons of the Italian government with moderate liberals and moderate conservatives, Italian prime minister Giovanni Giolitti was able to ensure that Italian politics remained stable throughout his five terms as prime minister. A stable political system in the United States is critical to ensure that our political system is not weakened by populists. There are challenges, however. The biggest obstacle is the general public 's reflexive, unreasoning hostility to politicians and the process of politics. Neurotic hatred of the political class is our country 's last universally acceptable form of bigotry. Because that problem is mental, not mechanical, it really is hard to
Starting in the 1970s, large-dollar donations to candidates and parties were subject to a tightening web of regulations. The idea was to reduce corruption (or its appearance) and curtail the power of special interests—certainly laudable goals. Campaign-finance rules did stop some egregious transactions, but at a cost: Instead of eliminating money from politics (which is impossible), the rules diverted much of it to private channels. The result has been the creation of an array of private political machines across the country: for instance, the Koch brothers ' Americans for Prosperity and Karl Rove 's American Crossroads on the right, and Tom Steyer 's NextGen Climate on the left. Private groups are much harder to regulate, less transparent, and less accountable than are the parties and candidates, who do, at the end of the day, have to face the voters. Because they thrive on purism, protest, and parochialism, the outside groups are driving politics toward polarization, extremism, and short-term …show more content…
The political trend in Europe has been away from establishment politicians, and toward far-right populists. The British referendum on exiting the European Union was only the most recent example, but across the continent anxieties over the Syrian migrant crisis and economic difficulties facing the European middle-class have fueled a populist trend away from the establishment. Part of the solution to this comes from the Italian political art of trasformismo. Trasformismo was a form of politics that sought to create a flexible centrist government to alienate the extreme left and extreme right, and ensure political stability. By mixing the upper echelons of the Italian government with moderate liberals and moderate conservatives, Italian prime minister Giovanni Giolitti was able to ensure that Italian politics remained stable throughout his five terms as prime minister. A stable political system in the United States is critical to ensure that our political system is not weakened by populists. There are challenges, however. The biggest obstacle is the general public 's reflexive, unreasoning hostility to politicians and the process of politics. Neurotic hatred of the political class is our country 's last universally acceptable form of bigotry. Because that problem is mental, not mechanical, it really is hard to