David Geltner on “Are We Losing Our Democracy?”

I have learnt so much from David Geltner over the last 20 years. First, there was his seminal textbook, then paper after paper and many conversations during my postdoc years at MIT’s Center for Real Estate. And yesterday, when I read another example of his clear thinking and writing in response to an article in the New York Times:

To the Editor:

“Are We Losing Our Democracy?” is an important piece of journalism, but it raises yet another important question: Why is this happening now, after 250 years?

To stop and reverse the autocratic slide, we must admit that our democracy was not actually working in the first place. For at least a decade before President Trump’s second term began, the federal government could not, with rare exceptions, get anything meaningful or important done and implemented.

Even initiatives with clear popular support were often stalled by political polarization and extreme partisanship. A government of checks and balances requires compromise in order to function effectively.

This paralysis happened not in a time of general satisfaction and well-being, but in a time of crises — of cultural identity, income inequality, information distribution — and a steep decline in the average American’s happiness and sense of security, for themselves and their children.

For a society, this is a recipe for governmental change. Like it or not, President Trump has had a big impact on the direction of that change. But even without this president, we would need to find our way out of the crises and state of paralysis we’ve been in for too long.

David Geltner
Carlisle, Mass.