Tribalism Is Destroying American Politics | Lura Forcum

You talked about in, in this article that we read tribalism versus competitive politics.

Talk a little bit about the, the difference and what that says about our, our current state of politics.

Yeah.

So I mean, if you think about politics, especially, you know, in, like, earlier administrations, like pre-2000, right? Um, there is a concerted effort to take those voters in the middle who might swing left for an election, swing right, were gettable voters, and to compete to understand them and deliver a p- platform, right, that spoke to their concerns.

And that type of competition I think is really good for creating spillover benefits, right? Because you could...

It's almost like, you know, the parallel is, like, marketing a product, right? Where everybody's trying to serve this market, so they're making the product as good as they can, the price is as low as it can be.

We're all competing for these voters or these consumers.

That's changed.

So-

Mm

... tribal politics really says, "This is our group.

Our group must win and hold power." And the underlying assumption of tribes is that the tribes are gonna share the resources and exclude everybody else from the resources, and that doesn't make any sense in representative democracy.

You know? Like, there is no excluding.

There are no goodies for your tribe to give to you.

I realize that recently, like, we've had political moves that kind of- Are looking at like, well, could we change that? Could we make it so that you don't have full rights if you're not a member of our party? Um, could we make it-

Mm-hmm

...

so that you don't get as many goodies? And so far, we haven't gone that route, but it's a very different style of politics, and it's one that kind of asks people to prove their membership in the party, right? Like, prove that you belong in the group and that you should get the, the goodies.

Um, and, and like sh- really demonstrate that you fit in.

And, and one of the things that I think is also really problematic is that instead of the parties listening to voters and saying, "We should do what is important to these voters," what you end up with is the opposite direction, where they say, "You need to listen to us."

Mm-hmm.

Mm.

"We will tell you what the rules are, what is right, what is good, and you do what we say," which I think is completely backwards.

Right.

Laura, when do you think that started? It hasn't always been this way, has it?

You talked about in, in this article that we read tribalism versus competitive politics.

Talk a little bit about the, the difference and what that says about our, our current state of politics.

Yeah.

So I mean, if you think about politics, especially, you know, in, like, earlier administrations, like pre-2000, right? Um, there is a concerted effort to take those voters in the middle who might swing left for an election, swing right, were gettable voters, and to compete to understand them and deliver a p- platform, right, that spoke to their concerns.

And that type of competition I think is really good for creating spillover benefits, right? Because you could...

It's almost like, you know, the parallel is, like, marketing a product, right? Where everybody's trying to serve this market, so they're making the product as good as they can, the price is as low as it can be.

We're all competing for these voters or these consumers.

That's changed.

So-

Mm

... tribal politics really says, "This is our group.

Our group must win and hold power." And the underlying assumption of tribes is that the tribes are gonna share the resources and exclude everybody else from the resources, and that doesn't make any sense in representative democracy.

You know? Like, there is no excluding.

There are no goodies for your tribe to give to you.

I realize that recently, like, we've had political moves that kind of- Are looking at like, well, could we change that? Could we make it so that you don't have full rights if you're not a member of our party? Um, could we make it-

Mm-hmm

...

so that you don't get as many goodies? And so far, we haven't gone that route, but it's a very different style of politics, and it's one that kind of asks people to prove their membership in the party, right? Like, prove that you belong in the group and that you should get the, the goodies.

Um, and, and like sh- really demonstrate that you fit in.

And, and one of the things that I think is also really problematic is that instead of the parties listening to voters and saying, "We should do what is important to these voters," what you end up with is the opposite direction, where they say, "You need to listen to us."

Mm-hmm.

Mm.

"We will tell you what the rules are, what is right, what is good, and you do what we say," which I think is completely backwards.

Right.

Laura, when do you think that started? It hasn't always been this way, has it?