From class discussions, and the readings so far, the idea of representation has struck me as being fundamental to a civic society. In this entry, I will talk specifically about political representation in the United States. Although a seemingly never ending crisis historically and globally (I haven’t read enough critical political theory to know if there have been any real examples of “pure representation”) I find that in the United States today there is an interesting phenomena where there is an increasing concentration of powerful special interests– bound legally–with increasing citizen participation online, outside of traditional political organizations to raise awareness, increase transparency, start movements, and write petitions. Which raises two questions. Who is the government really representing and do citizens need to be represented by the government to have influence?

I remember when I was in 8th grade, I was obsessed with the 2000 presidential election. It was the first election I had ever paid attention to. It was exciting to witness American democracy at work even if I was too young to vote. And then everything I learned in social studies up to that point, made me totally unprepared for what happened next. Election day came and there was no winner. The weeks that followed were full of anxiety trying to understand the difference between the electoral college and the popular vote, as well as the Florida recount. And then eventually the Supreme Court made the decision for us. In a 5-4 vote, they ultimately decided that Bush won the election. My confusion led to distrust, and I ended up grabbing a marker and wrote on a plain white t-shirt, “the Supreme Court shouldn’t decide the election, the People should” and I wore it to school the next day.

Fast forward to the 2012 federal election and the most recent 2014 state elections. Although the Supreme Court didn’t decide elections like in 2000, they made an important ruling that may have implications for elections to come. In 2010, The Supreme Court ruled in “Citizens United vs the FEC that “the First Amendment prohibited the government from restricting independent political expenditures by a nonprofit corporation.” Basically it gave Super Pacs, 501 C4 charitable organizations, the ability to spend an unlimited amount of money as independent expenditures on elections without having to disclose their contributors. A loophole in the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002 that “prohibited corporations and unions from using their general treasury to fund “electioneering communications” (broadcast advertisements mentioning a candidate) within 30 days before a primary or 60 days before a general election.

The reason this is important is because when a politician is funded by a specific organization, they tend to have to make sure they represent the interests of the organization, perhaps over their own constituents’ interests. To put it more simply, money talks. However at the same time, there are examples of citizens using their own initiative to make those financial contributions and interests more transparent to the general public. Take the example of a browser plugin created by 16 year old Nicholas Rubin, a “designer, developer, and photographer” from Seattle. Rubin’s plugin called Greenhouse, works for safari, firefox, and chrome.

After downloading Greenhouse, whenever you are on a web page where a Senator and Representative’s name is mentioned, the name is highlighted and you can hover over it to see what industries have financially backed them and how much money they received.

Take this article: Mass. Senators Elizabeth Warren, Ed Markey call for release of additional $34 million in low-income heating assistance funds.

Elizabeth Warren and Ed Markey are both Democrats from Massachusetts but have different financial contributions.

There is even a list that ranks politicians in terms of the % of small contributions that make up their total contributions. Small contributions make up 44.8% of Elizabeth Warren’s total contributions and only 1.3% of Ed Markey’s.

Rubin, although just a high school student, has more tools at his disposal than a marker and a white t-shirt. He can turn frustration into activism on the internet. He is also a board member of an online community/campaign called represent.us which is attempting to mobilize support for the American Anti Corruption Act:

Model legislation that sets a standard for city, state and federal laws that prevent money from corrupting American government. It fundamentally reshapes the rules of American politics and restores The People as the most important stakeholders in our political  system. An Anti-Corruption Act has three primary outcomes:

• Stop political bribery by overhauling lobbying and ethics laws

• End secret money by dramatically increasing transparency

• Give every voter a voice by creating citizen-funded elections.

Maybe the better question is, is there such a thing as a common good? Can the government truly represent the interests of everyone? It’s certainly not new that some interests are more powerful than others, but I’m not sure if there has ever been a time where there has been such concentrated power in special interests, along with, as Nancy Fraser would call it, multiple participatory public spheres. What is not yet known, is if these multiple participatory public spheres can compete against the more powerful interests.