In authoritarian regimes without political parties, trade unions were hotbeds of democratic practices and democratization. Solidarity emerged as part of a strategy to create parallel civil society organizations in an authoritarian Poland. After the authorities gave in to Solidarność`s central demand during their 1980 strike and legalized independent trade unions, Solidarność became an organization that practiced direct democracy from the bottom up in factories across Poland. [xii] In West Africa, trade unions played a key role in democratization, first by supporting independence struggles by participating in strikes that destabilized colonial regimes, and then by working with civil society groups in the 1980s and 1990s to protest austerity pressures imposed by authoritarian governments. [xiii] Mandatory voting can also address the main cause of declining voter turnout: low voter turnout and party membership among young voters. Studies have consistently shown that young people vote at lower rates and, as the number of union members decreases, tend to be less likely to join mass organizations such as political parties. [lxiv] Compulsory voting tends to bring the voter turnout of young people closer to that of older voters and may make voting habitual; After the abolition of compulsory voting by the Netherlands in 1970, only one third of the youngest voters voted, while almost two-thirds of those over 65, who had been subject to compulsory voting throughout their adult lives, did so. [lxv] The Tunisian UGTT, similar to the ZCTU experience in Zimbabwe, had rank-and-file members independent of any government-appointed leadership, which strengthened the UGTT`s internal autonomy and ability to represent workers. Under Ben Ali`s one-party state, the UGTT was a haven for left-wing nationalist and Arab activists who lacked the capacity to engage in other forms of political activity. It was dissidents like these who opposed management and supported a strike in Gafsa in 2008, and it was local trade unionists from Sidi Bouzid who took Muhammad Bouazizi to hospital and helped his family advance his case to the local government office after Bouazizi`s self-immolation in December 2010. Members of local unions are reportedly an important part of a network that extends protests throughout central Tunisia. These local actions forced the national leadership to play a role in the mobilization and eventually explained the strike in Tunis that triggered the overthrow of Ben Ali in January 2011. [xxiii] Given the decline in the influence of political parties and the concomitant hostility of voters towards political parties in several parts of the world, the emergence of new populist parties is likely to be a recurring feature of politics as no effort is made to re-establish party ties with voters.
Once populists are in government, domestic and international actors have much more limited options for dealing with populists and examining the threats they might pose to democratic governance, and such efforts can reinforce the populists` message that they are fighting a cartel of corrupt national and international elites. Bacchi suggests that any given policy is based on a specific understanding of a problem – a « presentation of the problem ». 21(pxii) Policies are created in historical and cultural contexts, and their representations of problems include the values and assumptions of the environments in which they are produced. In identifying a solution to a problem, policymakers blame some factors, while others remain unaccounted for and therefore « non-problematic ». 21(p. 14) In this way, politics does not simply respond to problems; You define them. The study of representations of problems is important, Bacchi argues, because these constructions have real material and experiential effects on groups of people approached by politics. Representations of problems also shape public understanding of problems by limiting how they can be thought of and, therefore, how they can be addressed through interventions.21 Starting from Bacchi`s approach, we will first examine the context in which self-responsibility-oriented representations of problems have developed in Medicaid policy.
Then we will look at their potential implications. Michigan`s Medicaid expansion plan grew out of a conservative political climate at a time of considerable hardship and financial incentives. If the state chose to expand Medicaid, more than half a million uninsured adults would be eligible for coverage, and the state would realize an estimated net savings of $1 billion over 10 years.11 Governor Rick Snyder, a moderate Republican, announced in February 2013 his support for Medicaid expansion, announcing its economic benefits and potential. Reduce the burden on hospital emergency departments.12 After initially rejecting the idea of expanding Medicaid, in August 2013, the Republican-controlled legislature passed a controversial bill to expand Medicaid, subject to the addition of program requirements such as expanding cost-sharing (with co-payments and premiums in health savings accounts) and financial incentives for healthy behavior. east. Rep. Joe Haveman expressed the ambivalence of many conservative lawmakers toward this approach: reviving political parties would improve both democratic accountability and democratic resilience. The parties themselves are most likely to reverse their own decline by involving members more directly in substantive internal deliberations. States can play a role in increasing the supply of political parties through grants that strengthen party partner organizations, and in increasing demand for political parties by making voting compulsory (with reasonable provisions for voters). Given current trends, the alternative is a world with more anti-government protests due to a lack of responsiveness, as in France, or a lack of democracy, as in Sudan – a world in which a growing number of countries are facing growing unrest and the rapid rise and fall of personalist parties. with persistent dissatisfaction with democracy.
Increased risk of democratic collapse and continued political instability between the two.