The US fell below the threshold for a “full democracy” in 2016 and is now rated as a “flawed democracy”. The main cause of the US regression was a serious decline in public trust in US institutions in 2016. This year the country’s overall score remained the same, and the US remains in 21st place in the global rankings. The score for Canada also stayed the same, at 9.15, and it remains in joint sixth place (with Ireland).
Donald Trump won the presidential election in November 2016 in part because of his ability to tap into the discontent expressed by many voters with the political and economic state of affairs in the country. His presidency may be an opportunity for the country’s political class to focus on the disempowerment felt by these voters. It is too soon to judge whether President Trump will be successful in assuaging this deep groundswell of popular disaffection. So far his attempts to address the concerns of his voters have resulted in a further polarisation of US politics, resulting in a decline in the score for social cohesion in the 2017 Democracy Index. According to the Pew Research Centre, partisan divides have widened on a number of issues, notably for example on the question of immigration. In response to a question about whether immigrants strengthen the country, a Pew survey showed that Republicans were almost evenly split in their answer to this question, while the majority of Democrats supported the statement that immigration is good for the US. Polarisation has also increased on economic and environmental policies; Republicans and Democrats have deeply polarised views on whether stricter environmental regulations are harming jobs and the economy, with Republicans tending to believe that these policies are detrimental for growth and employment. The growing divisions between (and within) those who identify as Republicans and Democrats help to explain in part why the Trump administration is finding it so hard to govern, despite controlling both houses of Congress.
If Mr Trump is unable to reverse the trend towards increasing social polarisation, US democracy will be at greater risk of further deterioration, especially given the interplay of this trend with other, long-standing drivers of democratic decline. For example, the US scores comparatively poorly in the Democracy Index in the functioning of government category. Bitter partisanship has developed in part because many congressional districts have been redrawn in a way that gives one party a builtin advantage. As a result, members of Congress fear a challenge in their party primaries, which are controlled by the party base, and are consequently incentivised to move to the right (for Republicans) or to the left (for Democrats). The upshot is a stronger emphasis on ideological purity and less appetite for compromise, which reinforces existing cynicism among voters about the workings of Congress. The trend towards partisanship has coincided with an erosion of confidence in government and public institutions over many years. Major political events over many decades have damaged confidence, including the Vietnam war, the Watergate scandal, the Iraq wars, the financial crisis in 2008-09 and repeated federal government shutdowns.
Income inequality has also been a key factor in fuelling popular dissatisfaction with government, its institutions and politicians. Income inequality is higher in the US than in other rich countries and has worsened since the global economic and financial crisis of 2007-09. Studies show that higher income inequality reduces trust in others and undermines social capital. There is a risk that income inequality will widen further in coming years following the major tax changes passed by Congress in late 2017; tax cuts in the bill favour those on higher incomes, especially in the medium term. Also, the central feature of Obamacare was repealed, which the Congressional Budget Office estimates will lead to a loss of access to health insurance for 13m citizens over the next decade
