I’ve done a fair amount of research on political accountability. PeopleCount is based on some thinking about accountability that seems to be new. Let’s call it: The PeopleCount Theory of Political Accountability.
It seems unlikely that I would have stumbled upon a whole new theory of political accountability. But it’s possible. I’m new to political science so could bring a fresh way of looking at it. And I’m a professional problem solver.
Thinking outside the box
Plus I have unique education in distinguishing cultural contexts. Politics is a very emotionally charged subject, plus is a critical foundation in people’s world-view. So our cultural contexts in this area are very strong. Strong underlying contexts easily limit our thinking.
In other words, cultural contexts are “the box”. Strong contexts make the box seem large, roomy, able to hold everything that’s possible. They very deceptively limit our thinking. In an area with strong cultural contexts, “outside the box” thinking is rare.
The PeopleCount Theory of Political Accountability
Politicians are not very accountable to citizens in America because we think accountability is about elections. True, elections are both structures of support for accountability and they contain lots of accountability procedures. But when it’s truly present, it happens elsewhere.
Consider: In these superior/servant relationships there is a lot of accountability:
- boss/worker
- teacher/student
- parent/child
- spouse/spouse
Elections in politics are akin to firing, failing, punishment and divorce in these other relationships. Accountability occurs mainly in other ways.
- The superior guides, prioritizes and expects results, communicates them and gets buy-in (and counterproposals) from the servant.
- The inferior works and then reports to the superior.
- The superior judges the report, and communicates the judgement, possibly with more back-and-forth communication.
- Finally, there might be firing, failure, punishment or divorce.
Summary: Day-to-day accountability mostly happens in the first 3 steps. Yet politics is missing procedures with which to carry out these parts of accountability and is missing structures of support for them. So political accountability in our culture is weak and often missing.
A likely remedy is first to define procedures for political accountability in politics. And create structures of support to make them possible, efficient and powerful.
This is exactly what PeopleCount.org intends is doing. Hopefully we’ll succeed. But even if we don’t, this opens up a whole new area for effort- defining other ways for people and politicians to behave in a relationship of accountability, and create new and better structures of support.
If you’re a political science expert or student, and know of people who’ve written about this, please send me a reference. If you’d like to research or publish about this, I’d be happy to speak with you.
And for everyone else, please add your email address to our mailing list.