American Political Culture

American political culture contains a number of core ideals and values. Not all Americans share the same views, of course, but the vast majority subscribes to these general ideals, including liberty, equality, democracy, individualism, unity, and diversity. Political debates tend to be over how best to achieve these ideals, not over whether these ideals are worth having in the first place.

Liberty

Americans today tend to define liberty as the freedom for people to do what they want. We also tend to believe liberty is essential to personal fulfillment and happiness. Nevertheless, liberty must be restrained on some level in order to create a stable society. A widely accepted principle of freedom is that we are free to do whatever we want as long as we do not impinge on other people’s freedom.
A limited government is a government that places relatively few restrictions on its citizens’ freedom. There are some things that the government cannot do, such as limit freedom of speech or impose a single religion on its citizens. A limited government usually has a constitution that defines the limits of governmental power. In the United States, the Constitution outlines the structure of government, whereas the Bill of Rights guarantees some of the citizens’ specific liberties.

Economic Liberty

For many Americans, liberty includes economic liberty. People should be free to do as they see fit in the economic sphere without government interference. Throughout most of the nineteenth century, the American economy was based on laissez-faire capitalism, an economic system in which the government plays almost no role in producing, distributing, or regulating the production and distribution of goods. Today, people want some governmental intervention in the economy, but most Americans want this intervention to be limited in scope.

Equality

Although no two people are truly equal, they are considered equal under the law. Some Americans may be poorer than others, and some may have cultural backgrounds different from the majority, but all Americans have the same fundamental rights. The term equality refers to a number of ways people are treated the same.

Political Equality

Political equality means that everyone is treated in the same way in the political sphere. This means, among other things, that everyone has the same status under the law (everyone is entitled to legal representation, for example, and every citizen gets one vote) and that everyone gets equal treatment under the law. Everybody must obey the laws, regardless of race, creed, religion, gender, or sexual orientation, and in return, everyone enjoys the same rights.

Equal Opportunity Versus Equality of Outcome

In American political culture, political equality also commonly means equality of opportunity: All people get the same opportunities to compete and achieve in the world. Some people will succeed and some will fail, but most Americans believe that everyone, no matter what, is entitled to the opportunity to succeed.
Most Americans oppose equality of outcome. Under this system, the government ensures all people the same results, regardless of how talented or hardworking they are. Most Americans consider this unfair because this system means that talented and diligent people do not get the success they deserve.

Example: In the United States, the government tries to ensure equal opportunity among its citizens by giving everybody access to a solid public education. For example, President George W. Bush and many members of Congress championed the No Child Left Behind Act, passed in 2001, because the law aimed to give all American students a good education. A good education gives people the ability to compete for good jobs, which means that they can achieve success if they so desire.

Equal Opportunity to Succeed
Many liberal social policy advocates argue that Americans do not actually have equal opportunities to succeed. Women, for example, still earn less than men in the same professions, whereas young African Americans from inner-city neighborhoods are much less likely to attend college than young whites. Democratic and Republican political leaders both try to level the playing field so that everyone has equal opportunity, but the two groups have radically different ideas about how to do so.

Democracy

Most Americans believe that democracy is the best form of government and therefore tend to support policies that protect and expand democracy. The importance placed on democracy in American political culture usually appears in domestic politics, but sometimes a desire to spread democracy to other countries drives American foreign policy.

Example: American foreign policy during the Cold War often aimed at supporting and spreading democracy around the world. During the 1980s, members of Ronald Regan’s administration illegally sold arms to Iran in order to raise money for the Nicaraguan contras, who were fighting the communist regime in power.

Popular Sovereignty

Popular sovereignty, when the people rule, is an important principle of democracy. Democracy is government by the people, so political leaders in a democratic society are supposed to listen to and heed public opinion. Democracies hold elections to allow the people to exercise their power over government.

Majority Rule

Majority rule, the belief that the power to make decisions about government should reflect the will of most (the majority) of the people, is another important principle of democracy. In fact, American political culture relies on majority rule: The candidate who wins a majority of votes, for example, wins the race. Likewise, a bill that wins the support of a majority of members of Congress passes. Without majority rule, a democracy could not function.

Minority Rights

The flipside of majority rule is that the majority does not have unlimited power. In a democracy, the rights of the minority must also be protected, even at the expense of overriding the will of the majority. The minority always has the right to speak out against the majority, for example. Similarly, the minority cannot be arrested or jailed for disagreeing or voting against the majority. Without minority rights, majority rule would easily evolve into tyranny of the majority, in which the majority would ignore the basic rights of the minority.

Speaking for the Majority
Because of the power of the majority, political groups often claim to speak for the majority even if they do not actually do so. Making such a claim gives the group some legitimacy. Many authoritarian dictators, for example, hold rigged elections in order to claim popular support and legitimacy even if the election results are fabricated. International elections officials monitor the casting and counting of ballots in elections around the world to make sure democratic elections are really fair.

Individualism

According to the concept of individualism, humans are fundamentally individuals who have the freedom to make choices and join (or not join) groups as they wish. An individual’s life belongs to no one but that individual, so people should make choices that are right for them regardless of what other people think. A true individual is unlike anyone else. Americans value individualism and respect people who make independent choices.

Individual Rights in American History
The protection of individual rights had been a hallmark of American politics even before the American Revolution. Many colonial governments had bills of rights that, to some extent, granted freedoms of speech, religion, and assembly. At the start of the revolution, states wrote new constitutions for themselves and listed rights that the government could not take away. The first ten amendments to the Constitution, known as the Bill of Rights, were added as soon as the new government took office in 1789.