Based on political parties, mass communications, public opinion and voting behavior, and interest groups, the United States is an elitist system in which a few wealthy, powerful, and highly motivated individuals and groups with common goals control the agenda and the outcome of the political process. This report examines three texts to discover evidence of this elitist system, and argues that the system is therefore unjust, because it cheats the majority out of participation in that process, or at least discourages that majority from such participation.
Welch et al. make clear that political parties make democracy possible and can at the same time prevent democracy from being as widespread as it might be. The situation is the same today as it was at the founding of the nation:
George Washington warned against the "baneful" effects of parties and described them as the people's worst enemies. More recently, a respected political scientist . . . argued that "political parties created democracy and that democracy was impossible without them." The public echoes these contradictory views (Welch et al. 141).
The fact is that political parties are like any other tool in a democracy--they can be used to advance democracy or to hold it back. In most cases in this country's history, from the beginning up to today, political parties, along with mass communications, voting, and interest groups, have been controlled and used, or abused, by the elites in power in the government and business.
After the founding of the nation, "it appeared the nation could be governed by consensus" (Welch et al. 144). In other words, the rich white men who ran the country agreed to try to agree among themselves as to how to run the country. However, conflicts arose among the founding elites. The political parties were the result of these conflicts. The parties were an attempt to keep the conflicts from becoming factional and dividing the elitist leader...