The Vicious Circle of Fear and Indifference

Citizen indifference and lack of participation is the most damaging result of a
lack of trust in government officials. One reason is that a vicious
circle is created. When government officials are untrustworthy, and
especially when they use intimidation to create the sort of fear that
severely cuts into citizen participation, there are fewer people to
watch over them on behalf of the public. This makes government
officials feel more fearless and act more self-serving and more openly
intimidating. And so on.<br>
<br>
As <a href="http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-voting-patterns-20101017,0,6944…; target="”_blank”">an
article in yesterday's Los Angeles <i>Times</i></a> points out, even when
local politics is intensely fought amongst the few, low voter
participation allows individuals to act in their personal interest
rather than in the public interest.<ul>

"The danger here is that you have a
small group running everything for their own benefit, rather than for
the public good," said Jack Pitney, a professor of government at
Claremont McKenna College. "The democracy isn't very healthy.... Low
turnout is an invitation to misconduct."</ul>

One result in Los Angeles County has been city government that is
characterized by recall wars and accusations of voter fraud. When small
numbers of citizens are involved, a city's players feel no obligation
to consider the expense to taxpayers of recall elections and special
elections for ballot measures.<br>
<br>
Special elections are their favorite tool, especially at times no
one is around or paying attention, because these special elections mean very low
voter participation and an easy, inexpensive path to victory via a
small number of supporters and aggressive approaches to a few others,
especially senior citizens.<br>
<br>
Another result of this vicious circle is the high salaries of officials
in Bell, the subject of <a href="http://www.cityethics.org/content/lack-transparency-and-voter-indiffere…; target="”_blank”">an
earlier blog post</a>, which were enabled by a ballot measure approved
by fewer than 2% of the city's voting age population.<br>
<br>
There are other characteristics of these communities that help create
this vicious circle, including a large percentage of immigrants, and
the lack of a vibrant local press or civic institutions that provide
relatively neutral analysis of local candidates and issues. As
Professor Steve Erie is quoted as saying, "There is no watchdog
function."<br>
<br>
Robert Wechsler<br>
Director of Research-Retired, City Ethics<br>
<br>
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