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Breaking the Two-Party Doom Loop: The Case for Multiparty Democracy in America
American democracy is at an impasse. After years of zero-sum partisan trench warfare, our political institutions are deteriorating. Our norms are collapsing. Democrats and Republicans no longer merely argue; they cut off contact with each other. In short, the two-party system is breaking our democracy, and driving us all crazy.
Deftly weaving together history, democratic theory, and cutting edge political science research, Drutman tells the story of how American politics became so toxic, why the country is trapped in a doom loop of escalating two-party warfare, and why it is destroying the shared sense of fairness and legitimacy on which democracy depends. He argues that the only way out is to have more partisanship-more parties, to short-circuit the zero-sum nature of binary partisan conflict. American democracy was once stable because the two parties held within them multiple factions, which made it possible to assemble flexible majorities and kept the temperature of political combat from overheating. But as conservative Southern Democrats and liberal Northeastern Republicans disappeared, partisan conflict flattened and pulled apart. Once the parties fully separated, toxic partisanship took over. With the two parties divided over competing visions of national identity, Democrats and Republicans no longer see each other as opponents, but as enemies. And the more the conflict escalates, the shakier our democracy feels.
Breaking the Two-Party Doom Loop makes a compelling case for large scale electoral reform-importantly, reform not requiring a constitutional amendment-that would give America more parties, making American democracy more representative, more responsive, and ultimately more stable.
Deftly weaving together history, democratic theory, and cutting edge political science research, Drutman tells the story of how American politics became so toxic, why the country is trapped in a doom loop of escalating two-party warfare, and why it is destroying the shared sense of fairness and legitimacy on which democracy depends. He argues that the only way out is to have more partisanship-more parties, to short-circuit the zero-sum nature of binary partisan conflict. American democracy was once stable because the two parties held within them multiple factions, which made it possible to assemble flexible majorities and kept the temperature of political combat from overheating. But as conservative Southern Democrats and liberal Northeastern Republicans disappeared, partisan conflict flattened and pulled apart. Once the parties fully separated, toxic partisanship took over. With the two parties divided over competing visions of national identity, Democrats and Republicans no longer see each other as opponents, but as enemies. And the more the conflict escalates, the shakier our democracy feels.
Breaking the Two-Party Doom Loop makes a compelling case for large scale electoral reform-importantly, reform not requiring a constitutional amendment-that would give America more parties, making American democracy more representative, more responsive, and ultimately more stable.
368 pages, Hardcover
Published January 2, 2020
146 people are currently reading
1586 people want to read
About the author
Lee Drutman
8 books24 followersLee Drutman is a senior fellow in the Political Reform program at New America. He is the author of The Business of America is Lobbying (Oxford University Press, 2015) and winner of the 2016 American Political Science Association's Robert A. Dahl Award, given for "scholarship of the highest quality on the subject of democracy." In addition, he writes regularly for Polyarchy, a Vox blog. Drutman also teaches in the Center for Advanced Governmental Studies at The Johns Hopkins University. He holds a Ph.D. in political science from the University of California, Berkeley.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 76 reviews
June 30, 2020
I have never before read a book that so comically failed to convince me of something I already believe. I have thought that ranked choice voting made sense ever since CGP Grey told me about it, and I've longed for more political parties for longer than that, sensing intuitively the destruction a two-party system can wreak, and not feeling like either one fit my preferences.
Unfortunately, the lack of evidence endemic to this book made it seem like a waste of a read to some degree. In addition, I have read many political treatises in the last 4 years; this is the first one that felt like it was mansplaining. In addition to tone, it seemed a very masculine-centered book. For example, are there no female political scientists? He doesn't quote many. And he offers examples that include things like barbershops, from which women are institutionally excluded.
What I liked about the book was its new (to me) way of thinking about ways that political institutions could be more important than individuals. I did not agree with all of them, but I think it is a worthy conversation.
I think my ire would have been lessened with better editing (or a different editing approach). So many things in this book are repeated over. and over. and over. And it's not as if they were complicated concepts to begin with.
In the end, you could spend hours reading this book, OR you could have fun watching this series of videos (https://www.cgpgrey.com/politics-in-t...). They get you to about the same place in the end.
Here are some notes I took while reading the book:
(Many of these are about the ways that I am different from Drutman's assumed average voter. That was actually an interesting part of reading the book - I have a much different take on things as a voter than he posits.):
In elected officials and in policy, I am looking for competence above all. I love experts and I love data.
(Another trend in the book that I found troubling was that of false equivalencies):
On P 144, it bothers me when he equates wealthy liberals who "vote against their economic self-interest" to poor whites who do so. Those wealthy liberals do not do themselves the harm that poor people do. And might even get lifted with the tide and the boats. Voting to have less money is far different than voting to deprive yourself of essential goods and services.
I am a very independent political thinker. For me, there is no us and them, and no sheaf of issues that defines my political identity. I don’t think this book is necessarily wrong, but I don’t see myself in it.
Republicans argue in incredibly bad faith when they suggest any answers to fairness in voting that involve LESS voting. Democrats are not “rigging the system" when they make it easier to vote, they are fairly allowing everyone to vote. I wish he had stated that explicitly. Not a false equivalence, but an invitation to one.
Facts f'ing exist. Don’t ever act like they don’t matter. He does.
Here’s the thing. At this point I have not yet read his solutions chapters, but I was already in favor of ranked choice voting and expanding parties. But he vastly undermines his arguments in advance with me when he fails to present facts alongside poll numbers. It is relevent that Democrats are right to think that there is increased voter suppression, especially targeted at communities of color, and that Republicans are wrong to think that there is rampant voter fraud. You have failed to convince me that a solution does not need to include addressing the actions of individual actors. So far I am not convinced that Rush Limbaugh, Fox News and Mitch McConnell do not need to be addressed. And social media. And a loss of faith in experts. And science. He still has many pages to convince me that his policies would solve these problems, but when he omits facts, it’s an uphill battle.
Figure 8.5 does not impress me. The regression analysis on that line cannot be good. Figures and data in general are inferior/lacking, and the end notes are so copious as to be totally useless, especially since there is not an easy way to know the number of the chapter you are in.
Being different brought a lot of trouble my way as a kid; this book illuminates some interesting ways in which I might be different (like my fck all attitude for the popular opinion - that one makes you particularly popular as a 5th grader). I do care about policy more than partisan loyalty or the charm and charisma of candidates. I also credit my scientific training for making me better than average at identifying some types of my own bias. And by identifying, combat them. I really do not recognize myself in this book. And I know I'm unusual, but I wonder how many other voters are like me. Especially those in math and science.
P 207 “We need not concern ourselves with the trade-offs involved in different statistical counting approaches. The takeaway point is simple.” IMO, that is a terrible way to advise people to look at a figure, especially when your figures are already a bit handwavey to begin with.
I imagine that my Politics 101 professor, Bob Strong, would take issue with the assumption that churning out legislation and oversight is good ("Congress at its institutional height” in the 60s and 70s). He might argue that the founders didn’t want government to move too quickly or easily. Truth?
Drutman failed to convince me that the multiparty democracies of Latin America are not cautionary tales. (Starts on p. 232)
“No party is anywhere close to having a dominant position in American politics, and the pendulum will likely continue to swing back and forth, with more and more damaging force.“
Ok, that’s a satisfying analogy.
**I want to read a better book about this type of electoral reform.
A Reason to Vote: Breaking the Two-Party Stranglehold - and the Remarkable Rise of America's Fastest Growing Political Party by Robert Roth?
Institutions matter - of course they do - but individuals matter as well. I would like this book a lot more if it took both of those into account. On the other hand, having read an article that alleged that sunset times affected Fox News viewership I can’t discount that people are influenced by the strangest factors.
The last chapter, envisioning a future where his mandates are put into place, annoys the crap out of me. It is rainbows and unicorn farts.
Unfortunately, the lack of evidence endemic to this book made it seem like a waste of a read to some degree. In addition, I have read many political treatises in the last 4 years; this is the first one that felt like it was mansplaining. In addition to tone, it seemed a very masculine-centered book. For example, are there no female political scientists? He doesn't quote many. And he offers examples that include things like barbershops, from which women are institutionally excluded.
What I liked about the book was its new (to me) way of thinking about ways that political institutions could be more important than individuals. I did not agree with all of them, but I think it is a worthy conversation.
I think my ire would have been lessened with better editing (or a different editing approach). So many things in this book are repeated over. and over. and over. And it's not as if they were complicated concepts to begin with.
In the end, you could spend hours reading this book, OR you could have fun watching this series of videos (https://www.cgpgrey.com/politics-in-t...). They get you to about the same place in the end.
Here are some notes I took while reading the book:
(Many of these are about the ways that I am different from Drutman's assumed average voter. That was actually an interesting part of reading the book - I have a much different take on things as a voter than he posits.):
In elected officials and in policy, I am looking for competence above all. I love experts and I love data.
(Another trend in the book that I found troubling was that of false equivalencies):
On P 144, it bothers me when he equates wealthy liberals who "vote against their economic self-interest" to poor whites who do so. Those wealthy liberals do not do themselves the harm that poor people do. And might even get lifted with the tide and the boats. Voting to have less money is far different than voting to deprive yourself of essential goods and services.
I am a very independent political thinker. For me, there is no us and them, and no sheaf of issues that defines my political identity. I don’t think this book is necessarily wrong, but I don’t see myself in it.
Republicans argue in incredibly bad faith when they suggest any answers to fairness in voting that involve LESS voting. Democrats are not “rigging the system" when they make it easier to vote, they are fairly allowing everyone to vote. I wish he had stated that explicitly. Not a false equivalence, but an invitation to one.
Facts f'ing exist. Don’t ever act like they don’t matter. He does.
Here’s the thing. At this point I have not yet read his solutions chapters, but I was already in favor of ranked choice voting and expanding parties. But he vastly undermines his arguments in advance with me when he fails to present facts alongside poll numbers. It is relevent that Democrats are right to think that there is increased voter suppression, especially targeted at communities of color, and that Republicans are wrong to think that there is rampant voter fraud. You have failed to convince me that a solution does not need to include addressing the actions of individual actors. So far I am not convinced that Rush Limbaugh, Fox News and Mitch McConnell do not need to be addressed. And social media. And a loss of faith in experts. And science. He still has many pages to convince me that his policies would solve these problems, but when he omits facts, it’s an uphill battle.
Figure 8.5 does not impress me. The regression analysis on that line cannot be good. Figures and data in general are inferior/lacking, and the end notes are so copious as to be totally useless, especially since there is not an easy way to know the number of the chapter you are in.
Being different brought a lot of trouble my way as a kid; this book illuminates some interesting ways in which I might be different (like my fck all attitude for the popular opinion - that one makes you particularly popular as a 5th grader). I do care about policy more than partisan loyalty or the charm and charisma of candidates. I also credit my scientific training for making me better than average at identifying some types of my own bias. And by identifying, combat them. I really do not recognize myself in this book. And I know I'm unusual, but I wonder how many other voters are like me. Especially those in math and science.
P 207 “We need not concern ourselves with the trade-offs involved in different statistical counting approaches. The takeaway point is simple.” IMO, that is a terrible way to advise people to look at a figure, especially when your figures are already a bit handwavey to begin with.
I imagine that my Politics 101 professor, Bob Strong, would take issue with the assumption that churning out legislation and oversight is good ("Congress at its institutional height” in the 60s and 70s). He might argue that the founders didn’t want government to move too quickly or easily. Truth?
Drutman failed to convince me that the multiparty democracies of Latin America are not cautionary tales. (Starts on p. 232)
“No party is anywhere close to having a dominant position in American politics, and the pendulum will likely continue to swing back and forth, with more and more damaging force.“
Ok, that’s a satisfying analogy.
**I want to read a better book about this type of electoral reform.
A Reason to Vote: Breaking the Two-Party Stranglehold - and the Remarkable Rise of America's Fastest Growing Political Party by Robert Roth?
Institutions matter - of course they do - but individuals matter as well. I would like this book a lot more if it took both of those into account. On the other hand, having read an article that alleged that sunset times affected Fox News viewership I can’t discount that people are influenced by the strangest factors.
The last chapter, envisioning a future where his mandates are put into place, annoys the crap out of me. It is rainbows and unicorn farts.
January 12, 2021
This book is for anyone disenchanted with the current state of our government and partisan politics. Good history of how we got to where we are and real solutions suggested (ranked choice voting, creating multi-member districts, elimination of primaries, etc). But the problem remains that change cannot and will not occur until there is a high demand from the electorate and until our elected representatives would also benefit by enacting the change. Let’s hope we can see some of these suggestions come to pass in the not too distant future. This book should appeal to voters across the political spectrum who want to feel as if their vote counts for something.
January 2, 2021
I wanted to like this book, and the recommendations Drutman puts forward--ranked choice voting (RCV) for the Senate, and 3-5 seat multi-member districts + RCV for an expanded House--still seem compelling enough, but he just doesn't make a case that is as strong as it could be.
One subjective, personal issue: the writing style was frustrating to me. It's clear that Drutman is a knowledgeable person, yet the writing itself feels like it has a low ratio of information to length. Not exactly, but in the direction of platitudes and overly simple summaries of references and thoughts that could have been explored in more depth.
It's clear that Drutman is more of an Americanist than comparativist, and this is where the books biggest weaknesses come from. In his exploration of the benefits of multipartyism, made on the basis of comparison to other wealthy democracies, Drutman essentially glosses over the role of executive-legislative structure. Countries like the Nordic states, Germany, the Netherlands, or New Zealand, do not just have multi-party systems, they are also parliamentary democracies in which parties have to obtain majority support in the legislature--likely via a multi-party coalition--in order to form a government at all.
The US on the other hand, as a presidential system, has an independently elected executive that does not depend on a majority in the legislature. This doesn't mean that the US wouldn't benefit from changes to the electoral system to foster a multi-party system, but it's not immediately obvious why and how the supposed benefits of multiparty-ism like cooperation, coalition formation, and compromise, would occur in the US, where one of the major incentives for compromise is not present. I would have expected a more in-depth exploration and defense of the resulting dynamics than Drutman provides.
We do have a body of systems that could serve as the starting point for such an exploration, Latin American countries that had presidential regimes with multi-party systems. Even more importantly, the experience there was on the whole not very positive, which maybe should spur some caution. Drutman does acknowledge this potential avenue of criticism, but essentially dismisses it out of hand, spending a grand total of 4 pages on it.
The book is based on interesting and solid fundamental ideas. Parties are an essential element of modern democracies, and this is something the founding fathers just got plain wrong. The US needs stronger, not weaker parties, and a multi-party system that would enable smaller but more coherent parties sounds compelling enough. Based on what we know about the relationship between electoral systems and party systems, the reforms he proposes sound like they would achieve that. I just wish he would have spent more time than he does exploring the resulting dynamics in the House and Senate, and arguing why the dysfunctions that historically occurred in Latin American presidential democracies with multiparty systems would not be a concern in the US context.
One subjective, personal issue: the writing style was frustrating to me. It's clear that Drutman is a knowledgeable person, yet the writing itself feels like it has a low ratio of information to length. Not exactly, but in the direction of platitudes and overly simple summaries of references and thoughts that could have been explored in more depth.
It's clear that Drutman is more of an Americanist than comparativist, and this is where the books biggest weaknesses come from. In his exploration of the benefits of multipartyism, made on the basis of comparison to other wealthy democracies, Drutman essentially glosses over the role of executive-legislative structure. Countries like the Nordic states, Germany, the Netherlands, or New Zealand, do not just have multi-party systems, they are also parliamentary democracies in which parties have to obtain majority support in the legislature--likely via a multi-party coalition--in order to form a government at all.
The US on the other hand, as a presidential system, has an independently elected executive that does not depend on a majority in the legislature. This doesn't mean that the US wouldn't benefit from changes to the electoral system to foster a multi-party system, but it's not immediately obvious why and how the supposed benefits of multiparty-ism like cooperation, coalition formation, and compromise, would occur in the US, where one of the major incentives for compromise is not present. I would have expected a more in-depth exploration and defense of the resulting dynamics than Drutman provides.
We do have a body of systems that could serve as the starting point for such an exploration, Latin American countries that had presidential regimes with multi-party systems. Even more importantly, the experience there was on the whole not very positive, which maybe should spur some caution. Drutman does acknowledge this potential avenue of criticism, but essentially dismisses it out of hand, spending a grand total of 4 pages on it.
The book is based on interesting and solid fundamental ideas. Parties are an essential element of modern democracies, and this is something the founding fathers just got plain wrong. The US needs stronger, not weaker parties, and a multi-party system that would enable smaller but more coherent parties sounds compelling enough. Based on what we know about the relationship between electoral systems and party systems, the reforms he proposes sound like they would achieve that. I just wish he would have spent more time than he does exploring the resulting dynamics in the House and Senate, and arguing why the dysfunctions that historically occurred in Latin American presidential democracies with multiparty systems would not be a concern in the US context.
September 16, 2021
This book provides excellent context for Ranked Choice Voting and Proportional Representation reforms.
It answers questions like: why has politics gotten so toxic recently? Was it always this bad? One interesting perspective Drutman brings up: we used to have a “hidden” four-party system within our two-party system. The focus on national politics and national talking points has reduced that to a true two-party system.
I learned a lot from this book, though I agree with some of the other reviewers that it often dragged on. I blame that on the format: there’s no great way to publish a 100-page book. Seems like all editors are pushing a book to fill 300 pages these days, even if a book only warrants 50 or 150. This has stopped bothering me: if you get the point, just read on a little faster.
It answers questions like: why has politics gotten so toxic recently? Was it always this bad? One interesting perspective Drutman brings up: we used to have a “hidden” four-party system within our two-party system. The focus on national politics and national talking points has reduced that to a true two-party system.
I learned a lot from this book, though I agree with some of the other reviewers that it often dragged on. I blame that on the format: there’s no great way to publish a 100-page book. Seems like all editors are pushing a book to fill 300 pages these days, even if a book only warrants 50 or 150. This has stopped bothering me: if you get the point, just read on a little faster.
December 7, 2022
The best political book I've read in a long time. Convincingly argues that much of the toxic polarization that has spread from electoral politics and social media into everyday life -- creating what the Art of Manliness has entitled "the Straight-Ticket Personality" -- is due not only to deep underlying trends in American society and the economy, but simply to the accident that the US currently hosts only two viable political parties.
In the past it was different. From the 1940s to the 1980s, the presence of both liberals and conservatives in both major parties made them act for all practical purposes as four parties. But once they were hounded out of their respective parties, and Democrats became pure liberals while Republicans became pure conservatives, then polarization kicked in, with many baneful consequences, leading to Trump and his Capitol insurrection.
That won't be the end of America's problems if the two-party doom loop continues to spiral down. With an even worse challenge to democracy than Jan. 6, perhaps next time checks and balances won't save us, and we'll face the end of our democratic experiment.
It doesn't have to be this way. The solution is surprisingly simple: add more political parties. And to do that, all we need is procedural changes in voting and the composition of Congress. Start with both ranked choice voting, so that third- and fourth-parties won't be spoilers anymore. Then enlarge Congress to 700 members. Finally, make Congressional districts multi-member.
Some of these types of changes have been tried in the US in the past or are even current today, as RCV is in both Alaska and Maine. Others have been implemented for a long time in democracies in Europe or the South Pacific.
The good news of this book is that these changes may be challenging to get passed politically, but they're not impossible. We've accomplished harder changes in the past. The book made me want to get active on these sensible, simple and potentially powerful reforms.
In the past it was different. From the 1940s to the 1980s, the presence of both liberals and conservatives in both major parties made them act for all practical purposes as four parties. But once they were hounded out of their respective parties, and Democrats became pure liberals while Republicans became pure conservatives, then polarization kicked in, with many baneful consequences, leading to Trump and his Capitol insurrection.
That won't be the end of America's problems if the two-party doom loop continues to spiral down. With an even worse challenge to democracy than Jan. 6, perhaps next time checks and balances won't save us, and we'll face the end of our democratic experiment.
It doesn't have to be this way. The solution is surprisingly simple: add more political parties. And to do that, all we need is procedural changes in voting and the composition of Congress. Start with both ranked choice voting, so that third- and fourth-parties won't be spoilers anymore. Then enlarge Congress to 700 members. Finally, make Congressional districts multi-member.
Some of these types of changes have been tried in the US in the past or are even current today, as RCV is in both Alaska and Maine. Others have been implemented for a long time in democracies in Europe or the South Pacific.
The good news of this book is that these changes may be challenging to get passed politically, but they're not impossible. We've accomplished harder changes in the past. The book made me want to get active on these sensible, simple and potentially powerful reforms.
September 21, 2020
As a systems guy, I love to see a systems solutions. Go Ranked Choice Voting!
March 4, 2021
Another reviewer said that they'd "never found a book that so thoroughly failed to convince me of something I already believed," and that describes it well for me, too.
For such a well-endnoted book, there are a number of factual errors that creep in, and they do so starting very early on. Really basic stuff that should have been caught by an editor, like saying that Madison (rather than Hamilton) wrote the majority of the Federalist Papers. Mistakes like that really lower reader confidence in the facts and analysis in the rest of the book.
Note to future readers: not all the endnotes are bibliographical; you'll want to flip/tap/click on each one to make sure it's not essentially parenthetical text instead of a citation. Indeed, some of them drastically improve the case the referring sentence or paragraph makes.
The historical section, a ponderous ⅔ of the book, could have been compressed into half its length, and could have been put to much better use in bolstering the case that a two-party system is inevitable in our current electoral system. Instead, it uses lots of words to say that "actually it was a hidden four-party system in the past", which somewhat undermines the author's thesis. A skeptical reader might ask, "Well why weren't there just four parties then?" and the author has no answer. The mathematical foundation of the inevitability of a party duopoly under the current electoral system -- plurality single-winner elections with public polling and largely national, largely non-ideological parties (regional parties can also form in such a system) -- is omitted entirely, despite being a very simple exercise in game theory and induction. Instead we're given 8 slogging chapters of history that eventually leaves the reader with the mistaken impression that our two-party system is a historical accident. Only 1-2 sentences are spent on the core problem, which is that if people know how other people are going to vote in plurality single-winner elections, a vote for anyone other than the top two in polling is, absent certain special circumstances, pointless.
There's also a chapter describing a report from the 50s describing how and why the US needed more partisan politics. The line between the author's POV and the report's POV breaks down considerably, leaving a reader with the impression that the author is particularly well-disposed towards the report's conclusions. It's still not clear to me whether the author really likes this report and thus does a mediocre job with the thesis, or if the editing of this section was just poor.
These chapters do provide a reasonable explanation for why the reader should care about breaking the two-party "doom loop" (and why must the author use "doom loop" everywhere anyone else would use "vicious cycle"? There are a number of such language choices that seem like the author only cared about sounding novel), but it could have done so much quicker, and an appeal to history is only one option here.
The last 3 chapters are where the meat and potatoes of the book are: a comparison of alternatives to the current electoral system and how we get to one, plus an almost maudlin epilogue that describes a hypothetical state of politics in 2030 were the necessary reforms to pass. I don't have much to say about the last. The comparison is decent, if incomplete. It omits several voting systems entirely, most egregiously Approval and Score voting. I think this is because the setup of the previous 8 chapters actually lays a better foundation for Approval voting than it does for its ultimate conclusion, Single Transferable Vote. It largely ignores the differences between parliamentary and presidential systems, which is largely correct, but it lacks a compelling explanation of why it's fine to do so. In comparing party list Proportional Representation to STV, one gets the sense again that the author is more strongly in favor of the former (driven by the desire for strong parties), which makes this section feel very out of touch with American tradition. The author eventually concludes that STV should be the objective for reform, albeit reluctantly.
The explanation of STV is overly short and actually fails to prove that it would lead to multiparty democracy. It should, of course, but you wouldn't necessarily know that from reading it. There's no discussion of the math or game theory behind it, providing only empirical results to back the assertion (which is why it should have spent some time on explicitly dismissing parliamentary vs. presidential systems differences) and only one footnote dedicated to the difference between the Hare and Droop quotas, that basically amounts to "don't worry about the math."
This book has some interesting history, and eventually comes to the right conclusions, but the reader would be well-advised to read with a skeptical eye towards its facts, and rely on other sources for arguments for STV. Honestly, CGP Grey's videos on YouTube about this explain the problems better than this book does (if not quite as rigorously as I'd like either, but at least it gets to the heart of the problem) and with a much smaller amount of time invested. I highly recommend them. Here's a link to a playlist of all of them.
For such a well-endnoted book, there are a number of factual errors that creep in, and they do so starting very early on. Really basic stuff that should have been caught by an editor, like saying that Madison (rather than Hamilton) wrote the majority of the Federalist Papers. Mistakes like that really lower reader confidence in the facts and analysis in the rest of the book.
Note to future readers: not all the endnotes are bibliographical; you'll want to flip/tap/click on each one to make sure it's not essentially parenthetical text instead of a citation. Indeed, some of them drastically improve the case the referring sentence or paragraph makes.
The historical section, a ponderous ⅔ of the book, could have been compressed into half its length, and could have been put to much better use in bolstering the case that a two-party system is inevitable in our current electoral system. Instead, it uses lots of words to say that "actually it was a hidden four-party system in the past", which somewhat undermines the author's thesis. A skeptical reader might ask, "Well why weren't there just four parties then?" and the author has no answer. The mathematical foundation of the inevitability of a party duopoly under the current electoral system -- plurality single-winner elections with public polling and largely national, largely non-ideological parties (regional parties can also form in such a system) -- is omitted entirely, despite being a very simple exercise in game theory and induction. Instead we're given 8 slogging chapters of history that eventually leaves the reader with the mistaken impression that our two-party system is a historical accident. Only 1-2 sentences are spent on the core problem, which is that if people know how other people are going to vote in plurality single-winner elections, a vote for anyone other than the top two in polling is, absent certain special circumstances, pointless.
There's also a chapter describing a report from the 50s describing how and why the US needed more partisan politics. The line between the author's POV and the report's POV breaks down considerably, leaving a reader with the impression that the author is particularly well-disposed towards the report's conclusions. It's still not clear to me whether the author really likes this report and thus does a mediocre job with the thesis, or if the editing of this section was just poor.
These chapters do provide a reasonable explanation for why the reader should care about breaking the two-party "doom loop" (and why must the author use "doom loop" everywhere anyone else would use "vicious cycle"? There are a number of such language choices that seem like the author only cared about sounding novel), but it could have done so much quicker, and an appeal to history is only one option here.
The last 3 chapters are where the meat and potatoes of the book are: a comparison of alternatives to the current electoral system and how we get to one, plus an almost maudlin epilogue that describes a hypothetical state of politics in 2030 were the necessary reforms to pass. I don't have much to say about the last. The comparison is decent, if incomplete. It omits several voting systems entirely, most egregiously Approval and Score voting. I think this is because the setup of the previous 8 chapters actually lays a better foundation for Approval voting than it does for its ultimate conclusion, Single Transferable Vote. It largely ignores the differences between parliamentary and presidential systems, which is largely correct, but it lacks a compelling explanation of why it's fine to do so. In comparing party list Proportional Representation to STV, one gets the sense again that the author is more strongly in favor of the former (driven by the desire for strong parties), which makes this section feel very out of touch with American tradition. The author eventually concludes that STV should be the objective for reform, albeit reluctantly.
The explanation of STV is overly short and actually fails to prove that it would lead to multiparty democracy. It should, of course, but you wouldn't necessarily know that from reading it. There's no discussion of the math or game theory behind it, providing only empirical results to back the assertion (which is why it should have spent some time on explicitly dismissing parliamentary vs. presidential systems differences) and only one footnote dedicated to the difference between the Hare and Droop quotas, that basically amounts to "don't worry about the math."
This book has some interesting history, and eventually comes to the right conclusions, but the reader would be well-advised to read with a skeptical eye towards its facts, and rely on other sources for arguments for STV. Honestly, CGP Grey's videos on YouTube about this explain the problems better than this book does (if not quite as rigorously as I'd like either, but at least it gets to the heart of the problem) and with a much smaller amount of time invested. I highly recommend them. Here's a link to a playlist of all of them.
April 30, 2020
I rated it low because it is only a stealth attempt to move to being a more socialist state than we already are. The title is just false advertising.
We are divided because we have ceased following the Constitution, which specified LIMITED government, and the author of this book is just trying to convince people to vote for "less division" with the uninformed on both sides falsely believing their votes will have more power if we go his way.
Wrong ... his ideas are intended to give THE GOVERNMENT more power ... "the power to the voter" is just cover.https://beingbeliefbehavior.blogspot....
We are divided because we have ceased following the Constitution, which specified LIMITED government, and the author of this book is just trying to convince people to vote for "less division" with the uninformed on both sides falsely believing their votes will have more power if we go his way.
Wrong ... his ideas are intended to give THE GOVERNMENT more power ... "the power to the voter" is just cover.https://beingbeliefbehavior.blogspot....
July 21, 2020
Drutman captures the political moment we are in, but more importantly offers some big thinking on how we get out.
He's laid the case for multiparty democracy in America, and the solution to get us there: ranked choice voting and multimember districts. Now, it's up to elected officials, practitioners, volunteers, and donors to make it happen.
He's laid the case for multiparty democracy in America, and the solution to get us there: ranked choice voting and multimember districts. Now, it's up to elected officials, practitioners, volunteers, and donors to make it happen.
October 19, 2020
If something feels "off" about the American voting system, that's because it's fundamentally flawed and serves to only exacerbate growing partisan cleavages in the populace. Drutman does a fantastic job breaking down what brought us to where we are today, what the biggest issues are, what the available solutions are, and (most importantly) how we can achieve them and reform our electoral system. I finished it feeling a sense of both foreboding dread and hope that we can get ourselves back on the right path. Highly recommend, especially as we are entering the eleventh hour of an ugly and divisive election campaign. My only nit-pick is that there were a few glaring typos throughout that took me out of the book, albeit slightly.
March 14, 2023
Mr. Drutman does an excellent job describing the biggest problem facing the political system of the United States: the two-party system. He describes how we got here, how it's harming the nation, and how we can break out of it. I already supported his position, but he makes a compelling argument regardless.
January 27, 2025
With American politics on a dangerous collision course, Drutman offers a necessary blueprint to fixing our political system, doing so in a cogent, convincing manner. If you’re dissatisfied with American politics, you must read this book.
August 9, 2024
While I like a lot of what Drutman said, there were so many moments where it felt like he was touching a good point and then backing away for fear of being seen as going too far. He tried too hard to play the centrist, even though his admission at the beginning of the book that he's a Democrat would likely turn those that he's trying to appeal to sharply away.
Also, when he described the many dimensions of politics, I found it nuts that "racially conservative" was his choice of dancing around the word racism. This book was just a rough read overall.
Also, when he described the many dimensions of politics, I found it nuts that "racially conservative" was his choice of dancing around the word racism. This book was just a rough read overall.
September 17, 2024
Book #53 of 2024. "Breaking the Two-Party Doom Loop" by Lee Drutman. 3/5 rating. 271 p.
I hear all the time about voting for the "lesser of two evils" in elections ranging from the most local to national politics. This comes about because almost no one loves every single position supported by either party. We contain multitudes and our top concerns may be very different than either the Republicans' or Democrats'.
"The solution is multiparty democracy, through modest proportional representation."
Along with this, Lee proposes:
- Single-winner ranked-choice voting in the Senate
- Multi-winner ranked-choice voting in the House
- A larger House
- Removing congressional primaries
Ranked-choice voting is a process where you put candidates in order, ranking them by your favorite to least. If after tallying all voters's first choice, there is not someone with over 50% (for single-winner), then they remove the candidate with the lowest totals, and the votes for that person go to the voter's second-choice. The system is quite simple, though can seem hard to grasp at first glimpse.
Lee believes (and supports) that if we were to implement the above changes, they would allow for parties besides simple Democrats and Republicans to gain some power, and give people much more choice in their voting.
"By removing the winner-take-all nature of American elections and ending the two-party system, the electoral reforms proposed in this book would break the toxic zero-sum dynamic at the root of so many of today's political problems."
Especially the last chapter of this book made me hopeful that these changes could actually make a really positive impact! That being said, I had it ranked as a two for a long time just because it got very slow and boring in the middle and into most of the second half. I think the simple idea of his proposals are incredibly important, but read the sparknotes, and you'll be fine!
Additional Quotes:
"Two-party winner-take-all politics is fueling a calamitous zero-sum toxic partisanship. But there's a way out. America can become a multiparty democracy and break the destructive binary."
"A fully divided two-party system without any overlap is probably unworkable in any democracy, given what it does to our minds. It leads us to see our fellow citizens not as political opponents to politely disagree with but as enemies to delegitimize and destroy. It turns politics from a forum where we resolve disagreements into a battlefield where +we+ must win and +they+ must lose."
"But perhaps the most important discovery is that multiparty democracy performs better than two-party democracy on a wide range of indicators. Multiparty democracies are more stable. They are more responsive. They represent diverse interests better. Economic inequality is lower. Parties are stronger. Voter turnout is higher. Compromise is more valued. Citizens who live in them are happier, and more satisfied with the state of democracy."
"When experts have advised on constitutional design for developing democracies, they've never recommended the American system of government."
"We need some division for parties to provide meaningful alternatives and to give voters power to send strong signals. But too much division and the stakes start to feel too high. Politics becomes toxic. Partisan conflict overwhelms every issue, spreading even beyond politics, and democracy deteriorates."
"Compromise is an essential value. Politics is the place where we collectively resolve the issues on which we disagree (again, issues where we agree are not political). That means politicians must be ready to compromise to reach a deal everyone can live with."
"And indeed, as unions declined, the white +working+ class became the +white+ working class. Without an organizational affiliation to stress economic identity, race filled the identify void."
"Starting in the 1980s, however, and especially since the 1990s, voting across all issues collapsed into a single, predictable left-right dimension. More than ever before, today almost all (97 percent) of congressional voting is purely partisan."
"In the 1992 presidential election, more than a third (1,096) of America's 3,113 counties went for one party or the other by less than ten points. In 1992, only ninety-three counties (fewer than 3 percent) were true landslides (that is, decided by fifty points or more). By contrast, in 2016, fewer than one in ten (303) were decided by ten points or less, and almost four in ten counties (1,196) were true landslides."
"The partisan balance of states and districts also impacts the kinds of representatives who go to Congress. As a general rule, the more one-sided the district or state, the more likely it is to send an extreme representative to Congress. In one-party dominant districts and states, representatives devote most of their energies to taking positions on polarizing, national issues. Mostly, they're concerned about staving off a potential primary challenge, which means they need to make sure they remain in good standing with their district's or state's most dedicated partisan voters. This means being a stalwart partisan fighter, not a squishy bipartisan compromiser."
"According to a recent comprehensive survey of county-level party leaders, local Republican Party leaders prefer nominating extreme candidates to centrists by a 10-1 margin, while local Democratic Party leaders prefer extremists to centrists by a 2-1 margin."
"But when partisanship turns toxic, thinking your party is right turns to thinking the other party is not only wrong, but dangerously wrong - so dangerously wrong that should they ever get into power, their policies would pose an existential threat to the nation. When loyalty is absolute, parties can mislead voters they supposedly represent into supporting policies that in fact make their lives worse off."
"Focusing on ethnic and religious divided is a powerful strategy the rich have used to tame the poor for centuries. When political conflict organized around national identity, the rich can soak the poor."
"Strong group identities become a political problem when too many of these identities stack on top of each other and coalesce into one big partisan identity."
"Today, we are retreating into our separate camps, surrounded by like-minded people who share our same group identities and values. And from our isolated positions, we become more certain. Certainty makes us passionate and less likely to tolerate dissent. Politics feels like war. Our political opponents appear as less than human."
"What explains the connection between more parties and higher [voter] turnout? First, with more parties, voters are more likely to find a party or candidate they're excited about. Second, with proportional representation, all votes count equally; voters do not have to live in a swing district or state for their vote to matter. And third, because almost all votes matter under proportional representation, parties work to mobilize all possible voters, not just those in competitve districts and states."
"Depending on where in the primary you want to draw a line, Trump was the favorite of between 25 and 40 percent of Republican primary voters. Likewise, depending in whether you want to count just registered Republicans or independent leaners as well, between 25 and 40 percent of the country is Republican. Multiply these numbers, and at the start of the 2016 cycle, Trump was the preferred candidate of somewhere between 5 and 16 percent of the American electorate. That averages out to 11 percent as a reasonable guess. That's about consistent with the anti-system populist parties of Europe....But by winning the Republican Party nomination, Trump became the leader of the Republican Party. He set the tone and the agenda and redefined what it meant to be a Republican."
"To restate a theme of this book: +institutions matter+."
"Instead, [Americans] will keep blaming politicians for responding to the incentives the political system generated, and they will continue to be disappointed. So it's urgent we make the connection between electoral reform and more parties."
I hear all the time about voting for the "lesser of two evils" in elections ranging from the most local to national politics. This comes about because almost no one loves every single position supported by either party. We contain multitudes and our top concerns may be very different than either the Republicans' or Democrats'.
"The solution is multiparty democracy, through modest proportional representation."
Along with this, Lee proposes:
- Single-winner ranked-choice voting in the Senate
- Multi-winner ranked-choice voting in the House
- A larger House
- Removing congressional primaries
Ranked-choice voting is a process where you put candidates in order, ranking them by your favorite to least. If after tallying all voters's first choice, there is not someone with over 50% (for single-winner), then they remove the candidate with the lowest totals, and the votes for that person go to the voter's second-choice. The system is quite simple, though can seem hard to grasp at first glimpse.
Lee believes (and supports) that if we were to implement the above changes, they would allow for parties besides simple Democrats and Republicans to gain some power, and give people much more choice in their voting.
"By removing the winner-take-all nature of American elections and ending the two-party system, the electoral reforms proposed in this book would break the toxic zero-sum dynamic at the root of so many of today's political problems."
Especially the last chapter of this book made me hopeful that these changes could actually make a really positive impact! That being said, I had it ranked as a two for a long time just because it got very slow and boring in the middle and into most of the second half. I think the simple idea of his proposals are incredibly important, but read the sparknotes, and you'll be fine!
Additional Quotes:
"Two-party winner-take-all politics is fueling a calamitous zero-sum toxic partisanship. But there's a way out. America can become a multiparty democracy and break the destructive binary."
"A fully divided two-party system without any overlap is probably unworkable in any democracy, given what it does to our minds. It leads us to see our fellow citizens not as political opponents to politely disagree with but as enemies to delegitimize and destroy. It turns politics from a forum where we resolve disagreements into a battlefield where +we+ must win and +they+ must lose."
"But perhaps the most important discovery is that multiparty democracy performs better than two-party democracy on a wide range of indicators. Multiparty democracies are more stable. They are more responsive. They represent diverse interests better. Economic inequality is lower. Parties are stronger. Voter turnout is higher. Compromise is more valued. Citizens who live in them are happier, and more satisfied with the state of democracy."
"When experts have advised on constitutional design for developing democracies, they've never recommended the American system of government."
"We need some division for parties to provide meaningful alternatives and to give voters power to send strong signals. But too much division and the stakes start to feel too high. Politics becomes toxic. Partisan conflict overwhelms every issue, spreading even beyond politics, and democracy deteriorates."
"Compromise is an essential value. Politics is the place where we collectively resolve the issues on which we disagree (again, issues where we agree are not political). That means politicians must be ready to compromise to reach a deal everyone can live with."
"And indeed, as unions declined, the white +working+ class became the +white+ working class. Without an organizational affiliation to stress economic identity, race filled the identify void."
"Starting in the 1980s, however, and especially since the 1990s, voting across all issues collapsed into a single, predictable left-right dimension. More than ever before, today almost all (97 percent) of congressional voting is purely partisan."
"In the 1992 presidential election, more than a third (1,096) of America's 3,113 counties went for one party or the other by less than ten points. In 1992, only ninety-three counties (fewer than 3 percent) were true landslides (that is, decided by fifty points or more). By contrast, in 2016, fewer than one in ten (303) were decided by ten points or less, and almost four in ten counties (1,196) were true landslides."
"The partisan balance of states and districts also impacts the kinds of representatives who go to Congress. As a general rule, the more one-sided the district or state, the more likely it is to send an extreme representative to Congress. In one-party dominant districts and states, representatives devote most of their energies to taking positions on polarizing, national issues. Mostly, they're concerned about staving off a potential primary challenge, which means they need to make sure they remain in good standing with their district's or state's most dedicated partisan voters. This means being a stalwart partisan fighter, not a squishy bipartisan compromiser."
"According to a recent comprehensive survey of county-level party leaders, local Republican Party leaders prefer nominating extreme candidates to centrists by a 10-1 margin, while local Democratic Party leaders prefer extremists to centrists by a 2-1 margin."
"But when partisanship turns toxic, thinking your party is right turns to thinking the other party is not only wrong, but dangerously wrong - so dangerously wrong that should they ever get into power, their policies would pose an existential threat to the nation. When loyalty is absolute, parties can mislead voters they supposedly represent into supporting policies that in fact make their lives worse off."
"Focusing on ethnic and religious divided is a powerful strategy the rich have used to tame the poor for centuries. When political conflict organized around national identity, the rich can soak the poor."
"Strong group identities become a political problem when too many of these identities stack on top of each other and coalesce into one big partisan identity."
"Today, we are retreating into our separate camps, surrounded by like-minded people who share our same group identities and values. And from our isolated positions, we become more certain. Certainty makes us passionate and less likely to tolerate dissent. Politics feels like war. Our political opponents appear as less than human."
"What explains the connection between more parties and higher [voter] turnout? First, with more parties, voters are more likely to find a party or candidate they're excited about. Second, with proportional representation, all votes count equally; voters do not have to live in a swing district or state for their vote to matter. And third, because almost all votes matter under proportional representation, parties work to mobilize all possible voters, not just those in competitve districts and states."
"Depending on where in the primary you want to draw a line, Trump was the favorite of between 25 and 40 percent of Republican primary voters. Likewise, depending in whether you want to count just registered Republicans or independent leaners as well, between 25 and 40 percent of the country is Republican. Multiply these numbers, and at the start of the 2016 cycle, Trump was the preferred candidate of somewhere between 5 and 16 percent of the American electorate. That averages out to 11 percent as a reasonable guess. That's about consistent with the anti-system populist parties of Europe....But by winning the Republican Party nomination, Trump became the leader of the Republican Party. He set the tone and the agenda and redefined what it meant to be a Republican."
"To restate a theme of this book: +institutions matter+."
"Instead, [Americans] will keep blaming politicians for responding to the incentives the political system generated, and they will continue to be disappointed. So it's urgent we make the connection between electoral reform and more parties."
December 7, 2020
Decisively answers the question of what is the root of all our evils in America: first-past-the-post (aka. winner-take-all elections). Note that this is not the same as the greatest of all our evils (we have plenty of those, from systemic racism to climate change and mass shootings). Rather, this identifies why all the other evils have become so seemingly intractable and impossible to solve. Winner-take-all elections are the reason we have a two-party system, which is the reason our politics have dissolved into a zero-sum binary of toxic partisanship.
But best of all, Drutman proposes a solution. Specifically four policy changes, ranked in order from easiest to pass to hardest. There are clear signs of institutional dysfunction in America, from gerrymandering to the electoral college. But these are extremely difficult to change due to constitutional barriers. What Drutman does is identify the exact nuts and bolts at the crux of the jamming of our gears, and then proposes four possible tools that might fix them, in order of most likely to work to least likely. If you're concerned about our country's toxic partisanship and want to learn more about specific, concrete policy changes that can help make all our other life-critical problems more tractable, then this book is for you.
But best of all, Drutman proposes a solution. Specifically four policy changes, ranked in order from easiest to pass to hardest. There are clear signs of institutional dysfunction in America, from gerrymandering to the electoral college. But these are extremely difficult to change due to constitutional barriers. What Drutman does is identify the exact nuts and bolts at the crux of the jamming of our gears, and then proposes four possible tools that might fix them, in order of most likely to work to least likely. If you're concerned about our country's toxic partisanship and want to learn more about specific, concrete policy changes that can help make all our other life-critical problems more tractable, then this book is for you.
January 9, 2022
Overly repetitive and unrealistically idealistic. The idealism is to be expected and required for a book about reforming our political system. More than one thing to say and more than one way to say it would be nice for a 271 page book. Something of the historical perspective on the development of American politics since WWII is interesting, and I'm sure debatable. Would be interesting to see how events in the 2020 election have impacted or altered his views...
May 11, 2020
A must-read for anyone concerned with where current political trends are taking us.
As our elected officials continue to be constrained by the current identity-driven binary it’s past time to change the incentives. Multiparty democracy moves the business of politics from campaigning to governing, with clearer, more representative, choices between candidates.
Don’t believe it? Read the book.
As our elected officials continue to be constrained by the current identity-driven binary it’s past time to change the incentives. Multiparty democracy moves the business of politics from campaigning to governing, with clearer, more representative, choices between candidates.
Don’t believe it? Read the book.
Read
December 27, 2022Lot of smart ideas, but would have worked better at half the length! Lotta filler in here to get this to 270, would have been a much more compelling read as a thinner pamphlet-style polemic. The books is ultimately about making one case very compelling, and being more succinct would help that—it’s got a persuasive argument to make, so less talk, more rock goes a long way.
January 25, 2021
I predict this is most important book I will read this year, and I’d say it is essential reading for all Americans. I am on the bandwagon for electoral reform! Contemplating how many copies to buy and who to ship them to.
December 3, 2022
Breaking the Two Party Doom Loop: The Case for Multiparty Democracy in America by Lee Drutman, published in 2020, is a worthwhile read for anybody who is frustrated with the grid locked federal government. This is an a-political book. It makes sense whether you are a Republican or a Democrat.
Drutman posits that when there are only two, fully coherent, national parties, representative democracy is doomed. Fully coherent in that the national parties describe the platforms and there is little to no room for candidates anywhere to take a different position if they want financial support from the party.
The US version of this is worsened by our mostly “first past the post, plurality election” system. Combined with gerrymandering from both parties and the electoral college for the presidency the result is a disheartened electorate which mostly feels their votes don’t count. This is particularly true for minorities. In the national election, the presidency is picked by about four swing, or purple, states. People end up voting for the whomever they feel is the lesser of two evils.
In such an environment each party defaults to describing itself as the opposite of the other and each party denigrates the other in outlandish, overblown, carefully edited ads in social media and TV. For those old enough to remember Drutman reminds us that from the mid forties to the mid sixties, we didn’t have this issue. He suggests that is because the national parties weren’t fully coherent then. There were liberal republicans and conservative democrats seated next to the traditional members of their party and this “hidden four party system” is why government worked better, not perfectly.
Drutman provides many examples to support his multi party thesis, including a “ranked choice vote, proportional system” in the state of Maine.
I urge you to read this book. I do fear for our democracy. When it doesn’t work, authoritarian governments typically replace them. #edcinpacomments 10/10
Drutman posits that when there are only two, fully coherent, national parties, representative democracy is doomed. Fully coherent in that the national parties describe the platforms and there is little to no room for candidates anywhere to take a different position if they want financial support from the party.
The US version of this is worsened by our mostly “first past the post, plurality election” system. Combined with gerrymandering from both parties and the electoral college for the presidency the result is a disheartened electorate which mostly feels their votes don’t count. This is particularly true for minorities. In the national election, the presidency is picked by about four swing, or purple, states. People end up voting for the whomever they feel is the lesser of two evils.
In such an environment each party defaults to describing itself as the opposite of the other and each party denigrates the other in outlandish, overblown, carefully edited ads in social media and TV. For those old enough to remember Drutman reminds us that from the mid forties to the mid sixties, we didn’t have this issue. He suggests that is because the national parties weren’t fully coherent then. There were liberal republicans and conservative democrats seated next to the traditional members of their party and this “hidden four party system” is why government worked better, not perfectly.
Drutman provides many examples to support his multi party thesis, including a “ranked choice vote, proportional system” in the state of Maine.
I urge you to read this book. I do fear for our democracy. When it doesn’t work, authoritarian governments typically replace them. #edcinpacomments 10/10
October 29, 2024
This is one of the best books about America I've ever read. Others have been hit or miss and have strong points and weak points. This nails us to a tee. To be clear, I'm not just saying this because I happened to find a book that agreed with things I already thought. This book has changed my mind on some things. Some of the overall direction the author proposes I already agreed with, but this has completely changed my opinion on the why it is this way and how we got here.
This book would describe me as an anti-partisan, much as the Founders were. The author successfully argues that not only are political parties inevitable, but they are actually incredibly necessary because they are the primary way through which citizens engage with government. I had previously thought that the parties were the problem and if people would quit being dumb and disengage themselves from these power hungry organizations that everything else would fix itself. But the problem isn't parties, the problem is that our winner take all elections encourage the formation of two parties. Then the two parties are likely to separate further and further apart as they respond to reasonable incentives and the nation falls further and further down the spiral of toxic politics. To fix the problem we have to change the incentives and to change the incentives we have to change the system.
I'm skeptical whether we can achieve the changes proposed here, but I feel better because at least I now think I can explain how we got in this position and why it seems like every election cycle it just gets worse.
This book would describe me as an anti-partisan, much as the Founders were. The author successfully argues that not only are political parties inevitable, but they are actually incredibly necessary because they are the primary way through which citizens engage with government. I had previously thought that the parties were the problem and if people would quit being dumb and disengage themselves from these power hungry organizations that everything else would fix itself. But the problem isn't parties, the problem is that our winner take all elections encourage the formation of two parties. Then the two parties are likely to separate further and further apart as they respond to reasonable incentives and the nation falls further and further down the spiral of toxic politics. To fix the problem we have to change the incentives and to change the incentives we have to change the system.
I'm skeptical whether we can achieve the changes proposed here, but I feel better because at least I now think I can explain how we got in this position and why it seems like every election cycle it just gets worse.
June 16, 2023
I've given the book a rating of 3 out of 5. There are two reasons for this. First, the audiobook repeats large sections of Chapter 10 inside of Chapter 11. It also seems there are portions of other chapters sprinkled into Chapters 9,10, 11. In fact, it's actually as if Chapter 11 is just an expanded Chapter 10. Perhaps that's merely an anomaly of the audio version. I'm not certain. I only know it was a problem. Second, in a Twitter universe where people's attention spans are often 160 characters (and 30 seconds) long, the first half of the book really belabors setting up the problem before he gets around to the solution. I was happy to listen to it because I'm intrigued about ranked choice voting. I imagine it could be a deal killer for those with a less athletic attention span.
Regarding the point of the book itself, I applaud him making the effort to raise awareness of ranked choice voting and other proportional voting models. Until I heard about the subject on an Ezra Klein podcast, I didn't know it existed (learn something new every day!). Now, I can't get enough reading about it. I was surprised to find it so prevalent already at the municipality level (something like 50 cities and counties) and two states (Maine and Alaska) use it to varying degrees.
My low ranking, then, is largely because of the plodding and repetitive writing style. If that can be refined in a second printing, it would raise the book one star at least.
Regarding the point of the book itself, I applaud him making the effort to raise awareness of ranked choice voting and other proportional voting models. Until I heard about the subject on an Ezra Klein podcast, I didn't know it existed (learn something new every day!). Now, I can't get enough reading about it. I was surprised to find it so prevalent already at the municipality level (something like 50 cities and counties) and two states (Maine and Alaska) use it to varying degrees.
My low ranking, then, is largely because of the plodding and repetitive writing style. If that can be refined in a second printing, it would raise the book one star at least.
November 15, 2021
I agree with probably 80% of Drutman's diagnosis and about 80% of his solutions.
He's a little more approving of parties in general than I am; I prefer elections to be essentially between candidates (with parties being little more than a tool for limiting the field to a manageable amount) whereas he thinks of elections largely in terms of being between parties (with candidates as their standard-bearers).
He tries very hard to not sound biased against Republicans and conservatives (he admits in the beginning to being a Democrat), but this basically just ends up with him sounding sympathetic to racism. It's honestly a bit amusing.
Parts of his final chapter were probably a bit unwise as an advertisement for the system, because he randomly snuck in a few liberal policy wins that he agrees (federally financed elections, major environmental regulation, etc) with and made it seem like the system would result in those things... not a good way to sell conservatives on the proposal.
But I bring up these things because they are the exception, not the norm. It's all in all a good book, with good ideas. End the duopoly!
He's a little more approving of parties in general than I am; I prefer elections to be essentially between candidates (with parties being little more than a tool for limiting the field to a manageable amount) whereas he thinks of elections largely in terms of being between parties (with candidates as their standard-bearers).
He tries very hard to not sound biased against Republicans and conservatives (he admits in the beginning to being a Democrat), but this basically just ends up with him sounding sympathetic to racism. It's honestly a bit amusing.
Parts of his final chapter were probably a bit unwise as an advertisement for the system, because he randomly snuck in a few liberal policy wins that he agrees (federally financed elections, major environmental regulation, etc) with and made it seem like the system would result in those things... not a good way to sell conservatives on the proposal.
But I bring up these things because they are the exception, not the norm. It's all in all a good book, with good ideas. End the duopoly!
November 26, 2020
Better things are possible
Drutman has written an absolutely vital book for this moment in history. He synthesizes a tremendous amount of research to show how institutilns have fueled "toxic politics" and a "doom loop" of polarization that make the stakes of every election feel apocalyptic. But he then makes a convincing case for why electoral reform could revive American democracy and make the government work again, all without amending the constitution (namely new rules to make elections proportional, which would likely splinter the two parties into more coherent groups that better represented the range of opinions in the electorate). While it draws upon political science, this is not an academic book -- it is meant to persuade all Americans that there is an alternative to despair. This book deserves to be widely read.
Drutman has written an absolutely vital book for this moment in history. He synthesizes a tremendous amount of research to show how institutilns have fueled "toxic politics" and a "doom loop" of polarization that make the stakes of every election feel apocalyptic. But he then makes a convincing case for why electoral reform could revive American democracy and make the government work again, all without amending the constitution (namely new rules to make elections proportional, which would likely splinter the two parties into more coherent groups that better represented the range of opinions in the electorate). While it draws upon political science, this is not an academic book -- it is meant to persuade all Americans that there is an alternative to despair. This book deserves to be widely read.
January 26, 2021
Breaking the Two-Party Doom Loop by Lee Drutman
I finished this book today. My initial reaction is I love the ideas, message and main point. The writing style and structure detracted significantly from these elements of the book. Weird 😬
Totally agree that America has an electoral and structural problem in its government, but the historical and current evidence Drutman used was not persuasive, clear, and easy to follow. The parts about why he recommended electoral change and it would improve our democracy were better, but even they were not as persuasive, clear, and easy to follow as I think they should be.
Ranked choice voting and multi winner districts were my favorite suggested electoral reforms. Someone needs to simplify the vocabulary and the concepts before it will ever gain enough support to be implemented.
I finished this book today. My initial reaction is I love the ideas, message and main point. The writing style and structure detracted significantly from these elements of the book. Weird 😬
Totally agree that America has an electoral and structural problem in its government, but the historical and current evidence Drutman used was not persuasive, clear, and easy to follow. The parts about why he recommended electoral change and it would improve our democracy were better, but even they were not as persuasive, clear, and easy to follow as I think they should be.
Ranked choice voting and multi winner districts were my favorite suggested electoral reforms. Someone needs to simplify the vocabulary and the concepts before it will ever gain enough support to be implemented.
February 9, 2024
Electoral system reform is a complex subject. The great value of this book for anyone outside the US is the excellent arrangement of the relavant arguments. Drutman grounds his overarching argument in an extensive historical approach of the issue of representation in the US for the past 70 years or so, mainly I think to motivate the claims of toxicity and doom. I am sure American political scientists have more ways to skin the cat of contemporary american politics, but his general assessment of political disaffection rings largely true. There is a lot to like in his arguments about switching the electoral system in the US within the constitution's parameters. Drutmant carefully, i.e with extensive bibliographical refernces, approaches the relevant pol sci discussions. His writing style might appear too easy for the subject, but I think the scope of the issue is well covered.
December 31, 2020
This idea of ranked choice voting is maybe the single best solution yet. Clearly American politics need a major revamp and his point is no matter who is in power, the pendulum swings and it is unsustainable. It's a long, detailed read with good comparisons of other countries' systems, scenarios played out and clear arguments for how that might occur here. What used to be a hidden 4 party system (if you include the polar camps of conservative/liberal within the 2 party system of Dems and Repub) has now left voters with reps that do not mirror voters' values & community as the parties have been incentivized not to compromise. He addresses campaign finance as well. Good information here that voters in a democracy should read and consider.
May 12, 2025
I enjoyed Drutman’s candid, passionate prescription for America’s political travails. He honed in on two of the biggest problems facing American democracy—the decline of local identities and the perceived infallibility of the Constitution.
While the tone sometimes veers on the side of polemics, the arguments and solutions presented are thoughtful, measured, and honest. While the historical examples/precedents given are compelling and tailored, I do wish there was a slightly stronger section on actualization. I also don’t feel like I walked away with a deep understanding of how the voting systems Drutman describes actually work. All in all, an interesting read with sections of really sharp, insightful commentary, but one that left me feeling ever-so-slightly underinformed.
While the tone sometimes veers on the side of polemics, the arguments and solutions presented are thoughtful, measured, and honest. While the historical examples/precedents given are compelling and tailored, I do wish there was a slightly stronger section on actualization. I also don’t feel like I walked away with a deep understanding of how the voting systems Drutman describes actually work. All in all, an interesting read with sections of really sharp, insightful commentary, but one that left me feeling ever-so-slightly underinformed.
October 14, 2020
Good but Optimistic
I liked this book because it proposed real solutions to some serious electoral problems tje US faces. Drutman's examples and models were relevant and data driven which is always nice to see. I did think that his outlook was a little too rosy. Although the system he proposes would probably be less polarizing and divisive, the damage may have already been done. Drutman also doesn't adequately address other factors in the political system such as the courts and the media. Overall, it was a good primer on why and how the US needs to reform its electoral process.
I liked this book because it proposed real solutions to some serious electoral problems tje US faces. Drutman's examples and models were relevant and data driven which is always nice to see. I did think that his outlook was a little too rosy. Although the system he proposes would probably be less polarizing and divisive, the damage may have already been done. Drutman also doesn't adequately address other factors in the political system such as the courts and the media. Overall, it was a good primer on why and how the US needs to reform its electoral process.
June 12, 2023
If you are an American or interested in American politics (which affects everyone, unfortunately), this one is definitely worth your time.
It outlines many of the institutional reasons for polarization and it gives very logical and proven advice on how it might all be fixed.
I would really like for the concepts in this book to blow up and become zeitgeist because they would make for a much safer world.
All that being said, it could have been shorter. There was a lot of repetition and anecdotes that weren't absolutely necessary. The book's concepts might find a wider audience with a shorter length and less academic tone.
It outlines many of the institutional reasons for polarization and it gives very logical and proven advice on how it might all be fixed.
I would really like for the concepts in this book to blow up and become zeitgeist because they would make for a much safer world.
All that being said, it could have been shorter. There was a lot of repetition and anecdotes that weren't absolutely necessary. The book's concepts might find a wider audience with a shorter length and less academic tone.
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