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THEY DONT REPRESENT US
WITH A NEW AFTERWORD ABOUT THE 2020 ELECTION “This urgent book offers not only a clear-eyed explanation of the forces that broke our politics, but a thoughtful and, yes, patriotic vision of how we create a government that’s truly by and for the people.”—DAVID DALEY, bestselling author of Ratf**ked and Unrigged
In the vein of On Tyranny and How Democracies Die , the bestselling author of Republic, Lost argues with insight and urgency that our democracy no longer represents us and shows that reform is both necessary and possible.
America’s democracy is in crisis. Along many dimensions, a single flaw—unrepresentativeness—has detached our government from the people. And as a people, our fractured partisanship and ignorance on critical issues drive our leaders to stake out ever more extreme positions. In They Don’t Represent Us , Harvard law professor Lawrence Lessig charts the way in which the fundamental institutions of our democracy, including our media, respond to narrow interests rather than to the needs and wishes of the nation’s citizenry. But the blame does not only lie with “them”—Washington’s politicians and power brokers, Lessig argues. The problem is also “us.” “We the people” are increasingly uninformed about the issues, while ubiquitous political polling exacerbates the problem, reflecting and normalizing our ignorance and feeding it back into the system as representative of our will. What we need, Lessig contends, is a series of reforms, from governmental institutions to the public itself, A soul-searching and incisive examination of our failing political culture, this nonpartisan call to arms speaks to every citizen, offering a far-reaching platform for reform that could save our democracy and make it work for all of us.
In the vein of On Tyranny and How Democracies Die , the bestselling author of Republic, Lost argues with insight and urgency that our democracy no longer represents us and shows that reform is both necessary and possible.
America’s democracy is in crisis. Along many dimensions, a single flaw—unrepresentativeness—has detached our government from the people. And as a people, our fractured partisanship and ignorance on critical issues drive our leaders to stake out ever more extreme positions. In They Don’t Represent Us , Harvard law professor Lawrence Lessig charts the way in which the fundamental institutions of our democracy, including our media, respond to narrow interests rather than to the needs and wishes of the nation’s citizenry. But the blame does not only lie with “them”—Washington’s politicians and power brokers, Lessig argues. The problem is also “us.” “We the people” are increasingly uninformed about the issues, while ubiquitous political polling exacerbates the problem, reflecting and normalizing our ignorance and feeding it back into the system as representative of our will. What we need, Lessig contends, is a series of reforms, from governmental institutions to the public itself, A soul-searching and incisive examination of our failing political culture, this nonpartisan call to arms speaks to every citizen, offering a far-reaching platform for reform that could save our democracy and make it work for all of us.
400 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2019
63 people are currently reading
796 people want to read
About the author
Lawrence Lessig
65 books482 followersLawrence "Larry" Lessig is an American academic and political activist. He is best known as a proponent of reduced legal restrictions on copyright, trademark, and radio frequency spectrum, particularly in technology applications.
He is a director of the Edmond J. Safra Foundation Center for Ethics at Harvard University and a professor of law at Harvard Law School. Prior to rejoining Harvard, he was a professor of law at Stanford Law School and founder of its Center for Internet and Society.
Lessig is a founding board member of Creative Commons, a board member of the Software Freedom Law Center and a former board member of the Electronic Frontier Foundation.
He is a director of the Edmond J. Safra Foundation Center for Ethics at Harvard University and a professor of law at Harvard Law School. Prior to rejoining Harvard, he was a professor of law at Stanford Law School and founder of its Center for Internet and Society.
Lessig is a founding board member of Creative Commons, a board member of the Software Freedom Law Center and a former board member of the Electronic Frontier Foundation.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 39 reviews
February 10, 2020
This is a good overview of some of the flaws in the voting apparatus of democracy. Not all votes matter and money has skewed elections. He has some pretty counter-intuitive claims--like maybe we have a rotating electorate like a jury that has to be informed before they vote (which is sort of odd, but also tempting at this moment of peak misinformation). He is smart and informed, but I think he places too much blame on misinformed voting and not enough on structural issues like inequality and the fact that we have a purposefully unrepresentative electoral college, etc. Still, I am glad I read this one.
June 15, 2022
I disagree with Lessig's point that we shouldn't closely monitor our representatives- something we can do easily with bills and votes being online now. (Though he appears to contradict himself later.) Here's one example, we're all upset about gas prices and Republicans are blaming it on Biden. Meanwhile, Republicans in the house voted down a bill to keep gas companies from artificially inflating gas prices or gouging. Shouldn't all Americans be aware of that regardless of which party they choose to vote for? Also it took me less than a minute online to look at the bill and confirm that our representative Congressman Bacon (R-NE) had voted against this helpful bill. Lessig offers no example to support why we shouldn't monitor except that "this what lobbies do." Notably they are successful in preventing bills unfavorable to their companies.
Here's my thoughts on the rest of it:
The issue that Americans are uninformed is a symptom of the bigger illness that our government is purposefully unrepresentative (electoral college, Senate, gerrymandering, difficulty voting in poorer communities) and that a lot of money goes towards purposefully misinforming us (lobbies, big donors, advertising on "entertainment news" such as Fox News, false and misleading negative campaign ads, Russian misinformation). To the extent that he blamed Americans for their own misinformation - who has time right?- I think Lessig missed the mark.
I love the random-selection-of-a-body-of-government idea (which Lessig does not specifically advise but only mentions historically). I mean we couldn't do worse for the House of Representatives that spend all two years fundraising, and we might do better. Or maybe we should just do away with an unrepresentative Senate. You know if we could wave a wand to change our Constitution.
On the issue of smaller candidates, I've found that voting by mail has greatly increased my knowledge, as we have time to research the questions and candidates on our ballot before voting.
I signed up for represent.us per Lessig's recommendation!
Here's my thoughts on the rest of it:
The issue that Americans are uninformed is a symptom of the bigger illness that our government is purposefully unrepresentative (electoral college, Senate, gerrymandering, difficulty voting in poorer communities) and that a lot of money goes towards purposefully misinforming us (lobbies, big donors, advertising on "entertainment news" such as Fox News, false and misleading negative campaign ads, Russian misinformation). To the extent that he blamed Americans for their own misinformation - who has time right?- I think Lessig missed the mark.
I love the random-selection-of-a-body-of-government idea (which Lessig does not specifically advise but only mentions historically). I mean we couldn't do worse for the House of Representatives that spend all two years fundraising, and we might do better. Or maybe we should just do away with an unrepresentative Senate. You know if we could wave a wand to change our Constitution.
On the issue of smaller candidates, I've found that voting by mail has greatly increased my knowledge, as we have time to research the questions and candidates on our ballot before voting.
I signed up for represent.us per Lessig's recommendation!
November 21, 2019
Just in time for the election season, accomplished author and Harvard Law professor Lessig has written a compelling book that, even for a political rube like me, held my interest. This isn’t about parties or doctrines, it’s a non-partisan call to arms that argues and explains why our government no longer accurately represents who we are as a country and how we function. This “unrepresentativeness” has detached our government from “we the people.” And we the people are increasingly fractured and uniformed. One only has to turn on the TV to witness this. The last part of the book is prescriptive and involves radical revision, but it was the first half that held my interest as it winds through what the founding fathers intended and how we got to where we are as history and events rolled on.
February 21, 2024
Okay, I wanted to give this book five stars but I didn’t only because I think Lessig is being too fantastical in his belief in democratic reform. While being somewhat dated, having been written in 2019, his concerns are even more of the essence today. Our democracy is failing, we all know it. He does an excellent job of breaking down all the failures and makes a compelling argument that most of this is related to how we get our news and social media. His solutions just won’t be feasible, that’s where he seems to be too fantastical, but the conclusion presents some real world examples of change that could be duplicated across the states to make our democracy more representative. A really important book, maybe if enough of us read it, we would be able to make some grand procedural changes to save our country.
April 23, 2020
In general I would say I recommend this to all Americans who are interested in democracy. Whether this is something you've thought about a lot, or issues you're new to, this book is a good primer that is worth reading. It is also very much nonpartisan so should appeal to anyone who genuinely cares about democracy and believes in its merit.
Of course I don't agree with all the takes in the book (it would be weird to ever agree completely with any book, no?), but in general I think the ideas are useful and worth thinking through. I think my biggest point of (slight) disagreement with Lessig is around how to make the changes we need. In the conclusion Lessig introduces a distinction between "ordinary politics" (i.e. elections / debate between Democrats and Republicans) and what he calls "platform politics" or the politics behind how we structure our system. I tend to have more optimism than Lessig does about the role that ordinary politics can play in getting us towards the types of reform we need. You can also say the reverse, that I am probably more skeptical than Lessig about our ability to achieve these types of reform completely outside of the scope of ordinary politics. Most of my qualms in the book have to do with this fundamental disagreement. I do wonder, however, how much if I could speak to Lessig directly he might agree with me on some of this – Lessig continually states the important of nonpartisanship in achieving these reforms, and so he seems to try and push himself to always seem nonpartisan. To say you think you can achieve these reforms by investing in one of our parties will always sound partisan.
Anyways, read the book! It's good.
Of course I don't agree with all the takes in the book (it would be weird to ever agree completely with any book, no?), but in general I think the ideas are useful and worth thinking through. I think my biggest point of (slight) disagreement with Lessig is around how to make the changes we need. In the conclusion Lessig introduces a distinction between "ordinary politics" (i.e. elections / debate between Democrats and Republicans) and what he calls "platform politics" or the politics behind how we structure our system. I tend to have more optimism than Lessig does about the role that ordinary politics can play in getting us towards the types of reform we need. You can also say the reverse, that I am probably more skeptical than Lessig about our ability to achieve these types of reform completely outside of the scope of ordinary politics. Most of my qualms in the book have to do with this fundamental disagreement. I do wonder, however, how much if I could speak to Lessig directly he might agree with me on some of this – Lessig continually states the important of nonpartisanship in achieving these reforms, and so he seems to try and push himself to always seem nonpartisan. To say you think you can achieve these reforms by investing in one of our parties will always sound partisan.
Anyways, read the book! It's good.
November 26, 2019
Lessig is a genius. I typically avoid politics. To Lessig’s point, I’m not stupid but am ignorant in some areas due to lack of research and attention to these matters. So many Americans are like me in this way, and that’s a problem. We are partisan, and we don’t take time to understand the real issues. So much news is fake - do we look into the accuracy of it before judging and forming opinions on important matters? Are we thinking about ourselves or society as a whole?
I highly recommend this book if you want an unbiased understanding of how our political system works, ideas of alternatives and a spark for evaluating topics objectively in the future. Informative and enlightening read.
I highly recommend this book if you want an unbiased understanding of how our political system works, ideas of alternatives and a spark for evaluating topics objectively in the future. Informative and enlightening read.
January 18, 2020
Really a great description of how “unrepresentativeness” has broken our democracy. But unlike other books, this one offers some common sense solutions—- some of which are contained in the HR1 bill that is sitting in the Senate, as yet untouched. Some sections of the book are dense, but it’s worth the read just for the anecdotal evidence in the conclusion that supports the idea that voters can use their power to affect change.
July 9, 2020
Derek pointed out that most of Lessig’s books are about money in politics, but I haven’t read anything of his besides Free Culture (repeatedly—I love that book) so this was like reading a beloved author in a new topic (though it is apparently a well worn subject for him). Depressing but enjoyable detailing of the various ways in which our democratic system...isn’t...and how we could change it.
November 9, 2019
The American political system is so outdated and extremely complicated.
How can the people of California, the countries second most populous state only have representation from just 2 seniors?
Fix it.!
How can the people of California, the countries second most populous state only have representation from just 2 seniors?
Fix it.!
August 18, 2024
Probably a 3 point something, so I’ll round up for effort and for the importance of the topic.
Lessig does a good job describing the problems with the current political system in the US, including “winner take all” (p. 36), the electoral college (p. 43), gerrymandering , money in politics, and most importantly (I think), the market incentive for the media that rewards polarization rather than serving the public (p. 80, etc).
The solutions he proposes are also clearly good, including ranked choice voting (p. 152), filibuster reform (p. 158), or at least worth exploring, including reducing federal spending based on the proportion of citizens who are not registered to vote (p. 168), deliberative polling (p. 176), and increasing pay for our representatives (p. 228).
There’s a lot to cover here, and while Lessig makes a valiant effort to present a compelling narrative, it does seem to lack focus in places, and while the conclusion includes several hopeful anecdotes about how things might be improved, it’s a bit light on concrete steps that could be taken to implement the proposed solutions.
Lessig does a good job describing the problems with the current political system in the US, including “winner take all” (p. 36), the electoral college (p. 43), gerrymandering , money in politics, and most importantly (I think), the market incentive for the media that rewards polarization rather than serving the public (p. 80, etc).
The solutions he proposes are also clearly good, including ranked choice voting (p. 152), filibuster reform (p. 158), or at least worth exploring, including reducing federal spending based on the proportion of citizens who are not registered to vote (p. 168), deliberative polling (p. 176), and increasing pay for our representatives (p. 228).
There’s a lot to cover here, and while Lessig makes a valiant effort to present a compelling narrative, it does seem to lack focus in places, and while the conclusion includes several hopeful anecdotes about how things might be improved, it’s a bit light on concrete steps that could be taken to implement the proposed solutions.
January 14, 2021
The diagnosis for what's wrong in US politics was most interesting. His ideas for a fix were varied and landed with varying success for me. Lots to think about and definitely interesting for anyone curious on possible reforms that could move us toward a functioning government.
January 9, 2020
Great description of the ways our political system fails to produce leaders that represent the population. Also has practical ways forward to correct many of these problem with examples of states that have made changes to improve the election system. Lessig is one of the more knowledgeable academics looking to improve our political process and our democracy. Though I think some of his suggestions are more difficult to attain then others they are all aimed at finding that ever so allusive republic. As he’s said many times election reform is not the most important issue facing America, it’s just the first issue that needs to be tended to before this country is even remotely capable of taking on all the more important problems it is utterly failing to overcome. Great read for the political hacks out there! Cheers!
December 20, 2019
Minuteman. Good summary of forces that have brought US democracy to the brink--media fragmentation, voter suppression, gerrymandering, corporate money buying elections, stacking courts Didn't get to sections on solutions.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
November 12, 2019
A must read.
January 15, 2020
Learned so many things!
March 6, 2020
An excellent description of why we are not represented equally, and specific was to correct it.
I will probably need to read it two or three more times to make sure I understand it all.
I will probably need to read it two or three more times to make sure I understand it all.
April 22, 2022
[Imported automatically from my blog. Some formatting there may not have translated here.]
Lawrence Lessig came to my attention in 2002 when he argued (and to my mind, botched) the case Eldred v. Ashcroft before the Supreme Court, an attempt to challenge the constitutionality of the "Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act". (He lost the case, 7-2.) I knew, from occasional sightings since then, that this book would be out of my confort zone. Lessig is a Progressive Democrat, with all that implies. But he knows the law, and the Constitution, and in this book he sometimes surprised me with occasional libertarian instincts. He's a mixed bag.
But I was most intrigued by the title. I was like: "Dude, I know THEY don't represent US." Specifically, me. Even more specifically: in 2020, my CongressCritter, Democrat Chris Pappas squeaked to re-election with 51.3% of the vote. His main opponent, Republican Matt Mowers, got 46.2%. My vote went to Libertarian Zachary Dumont, who got 2.4%.
In my mind, there is no meaningful way in which Chris Pappas could be said to "represent" me. Or for any of the 48.7% of the voters who preferred someone else. As I type, he's a 100% rubber stamp for Biden, like (to be fair) nearly all his Democrat colleagues. He could be replaced by a suitably programmed robot.
But Lessig has a different view of "representation". Or it's maybe more accurate to say he has multiple views of "representation", but none of them match with mine. For example, he waxes predictably about "gerrymandering", but that wouldn't resolve my issue: Pappas only got 51.3% of the popular vote, but that translates into an entire vote in the House. No matter how the district lines are drawn, it's winner take all, baby. (My crackpot reform idea is here.)
Lessig advocates multimember Congressional districts with ranked-choice voting determining the winners. (More detail at the FairVote advocacy site.) Intriguing, but I suspect that would simply get me represented by N robotic representatives instead of one.
Lessig also supports an Article V Convention for "fixing" the Constitution; public financing of campaigns where every voter is provided an $N dollar voucher they could "donate" to a candidate (whereupon it would turn into actual taxpayer money); "civic juries", a bunch of citizens who would consider various public policy options, considering the testimony of "experts presenting various viewpoints". And other assorted gimmickry to fix things to his imagined liking.
He is a huge fan of the Sarbanes/Pelosi HR1 voting reform act (as it was proposed in 2019). He correctly notes that it was unable to gather a single GOP vote in the House, and was bottled up in the Senate. (The most recent iteration, the "For the People Act" also went nowhere.) He makes no effort to consider the valid Constitutional/Federalism/separation of powers objections.
Gimmicks aside, Lessig's unstated view of government is not the design of the Founders: to protect the inalienable rights of its citizens, and otherwise stay out of the way. Instead, government is essentially there to solve problems. Using "democracy", of course, to both define and solve the problems.
Not that he's examined that premise much. Jason Brennan's critique Against Democracy is dismissed in a single sentence. Bryan Caplan's The Myth of the Rational Voter isn't mentioned at all.
Lessig's prose style is earnest, and occasionally dreadful. What do you do when confronted with a sentence like (p. 56):
But we should neither exaggerate the insignificance of losing presidential public funding nor, and more important for our purposes here, imagine that the economy of influence for funding presidential campaigns is anything like the economy of influence for funding campaigns for Congress.
We shouldn't exaggerate insignificance of losing something. I'm still working on what that might mean.
February 20, 2020
There wasn't enough novelty for me in this book. Much of it summarizes other people's ideas (e.g., campaign finance "democracy coupons," quadratic/square-root weighting). It is a good collection and a decent summary, but not that interesting if you are already familiar with them. Lessig isn't naive, but he is definitely an idealist, and his relentlessly positive viewpoint doesn't always fit with the reality of our political situation. In his idea of deliberative polling or civic juries, for example, he supposes that Americans will learn to respect the conclusions of a random sample of Americans who are given facts about the issues. Republican policies aren't based on facts. (And as Lessig himself writes, "most Americans identify with identities, not policies; with tribes, not truth. Political parties are attitudes, not collections of party platforms.")
I did appreciate the imagination.
> Democracy had been liberated from the politicians and the pundits, just as religion had been liberated from the priests and the pretenders. And while Gallup's revolution didn't trigger the wars that Luther's did, it was resisted, too, for it too "threatened to topple one local priesthood and replace it with another." It is hard for us today to realize just how profound George Gallup's invention was. We live at a time when polls are ubiquitous
> The jury has the lawyers and the judge spoon-feeding the information they need to make their decisions; the president has an army of brilliant souls feeding every relevant fact and consideration; the judge has clerks as well as lawyers to frame her decisions; the representative has a modest number of staff and an endless army of lobbyists. All of these public officers get support before they are "represented." But the citizen gets no support before she is "represented." It is a system designed to render us embarrassing. So is there any doubt that public opinion polls make Americans look stupid?
> one advanced by FairVote and embodied in the Fair Representation Act. This system would create multimember districts for Congress, and then give every voter a chance to rank his or her choices for Congress within those multimember districts. The ordinary district would have five members of Congress. Each voter could rank up to five candidates running within that district.
> the history of humanity when most were focused on the same set of stories—and most viewed those stories as the product of truth, not spin—was a weird quarter century that will never happen again. There will be no rerun of the 1970s. That age is over. The question now is how to build a democracy that does not assume that we all, at any particular time, know anything, and that accepts that what's told to us is told to us with partisan spin
> As Van Reybrouck describes, and as Oliver Dowlen explains as well in his wonderful pamphlet, Sorted: Civil Lotteries and the Future of Public Participation, there are many examples—from ancient Greece to much of the history of Florentine Italy—of governments that were filled with people selected randomly. The Greeks invented a device that would do the random selection. Their commitment to sortition survived for more than two hundred years. A Venetian lottery system survived for more than five hundred years.
> Imagine we did this by paying people to watch political ads. Imagine you would watch an ad—preferably a longer ad—and then answer some questions. If you answer the questions correctly, you get paid. Every voter would get a number of chances to get it right to get paid. But the very act of choosing to listen would change the character of what could be said.
> Represent.us is among the most impactful in this space. They've pushed corruption reform across the country, as well as gerrymandering reform and RCV. … EqualCitizens.US. Equal Citizens aims to practice the lesson this book wants to teach. By taking on cases and causes that show a commitment to political equality, we want to build a movement of political egalitarians. Our initial strategy was through litigation. Our first cases aimed to reform the Electoral College, by challenging winner-take-all. We have a case pressing the courts to adopt the original meaning of "corruption" so as to allow the regulation of SuperPACs. And we have been pushing the cause of RCV in both presidential primary and general elections.
I did appreciate the imagination.
> Democracy had been liberated from the politicians and the pundits, just as religion had been liberated from the priests and the pretenders. And while Gallup's revolution didn't trigger the wars that Luther's did, it was resisted, too, for it too "threatened to topple one local priesthood and replace it with another." It is hard for us today to realize just how profound George Gallup's invention was. We live at a time when polls are ubiquitous
> The jury has the lawyers and the judge spoon-feeding the information they need to make their decisions; the president has an army of brilliant souls feeding every relevant fact and consideration; the judge has clerks as well as lawyers to frame her decisions; the representative has a modest number of staff and an endless army of lobbyists. All of these public officers get support before they are "represented." But the citizen gets no support before she is "represented." It is a system designed to render us embarrassing. So is there any doubt that public opinion polls make Americans look stupid?
> one advanced by FairVote and embodied in the Fair Representation Act. This system would create multimember districts for Congress, and then give every voter a chance to rank his or her choices for Congress within those multimember districts. The ordinary district would have five members of Congress. Each voter could rank up to five candidates running within that district.
> the history of humanity when most were focused on the same set of stories—and most viewed those stories as the product of truth, not spin—was a weird quarter century that will never happen again. There will be no rerun of the 1970s. That age is over. The question now is how to build a democracy that does not assume that we all, at any particular time, know anything, and that accepts that what's told to us is told to us with partisan spin
> As Van Reybrouck describes, and as Oliver Dowlen explains as well in his wonderful pamphlet, Sorted: Civil Lotteries and the Future of Public Participation, there are many examples—from ancient Greece to much of the history of Florentine Italy—of governments that were filled with people selected randomly. The Greeks invented a device that would do the random selection. Their commitment to sortition survived for more than two hundred years. A Venetian lottery system survived for more than five hundred years.
> Imagine we did this by paying people to watch political ads. Imagine you would watch an ad—preferably a longer ad—and then answer some questions. If you answer the questions correctly, you get paid. Every voter would get a number of chances to get it right to get paid. But the very act of choosing to listen would change the character of what could be said.
> Represent.us is among the most impactful in this space. They've pushed corruption reform across the country, as well as gerrymandering reform and RCV. … EqualCitizens.US. Equal Citizens aims to practice the lesson this book wants to teach. By taking on cases and causes that show a commitment to political equality, we want to build a movement of political egalitarians. Our initial strategy was through litigation. Our first cases aimed to reform the Electoral College, by challenging winner-take-all. We have a case pressing the courts to adopt the original meaning of "corruption" so as to allow the regulation of SuperPACs. And we have been pushing the cause of RCV in both presidential primary and general elections.
May 11, 2024
The bloom is a little off of the Larry Lessig rose for me. Twenty plus years ago I read his book Code and thought it was brilliant. He gave me a new way to think about the interactions between technology, social norms and law. He seemed to have a clearer view than most of where the internet might be taking us. Then he moved on from copyright and the internet to focus more on politics. I'm a little sorry that he did, as I don't think that he has as much to say in this area.
The book starts with chapters on the problems that we all know beset our current political system in the United States and that make it deviate significantly from our commonly held ideas of what a representative democracy should be and do - gerrymandering, the electoral college, partisan primaries, campaign finance controlled by the wealthy, media, particularly social media, controlled by advertisers and thriving on polarization and rules of process like the filibuster that create deadlock in Congress. There's nothing wrong with his analysis of these problems, but they are largely self-evident to anyone with interest in current affairs in America today, and others have already written about them in more depth.
Then he gets to solutions, but I didn't find a lot that was attractive here either. He advocates for public funding of campaigns, restrictions on large contributions and ranked choice voting. Again, nothing new here, and I have liked the way that others have dealt with these issues better. He'd like us to have a new Constitutional Convention. I have long been skeptical of that one, but he did a good job of convincing me that it might not be a bad idea. It will either go nowhere or make things better. Maybe there would be unfortunate compromises, as there were in the original Constitution, but the chances of a new convention making things worse seems small. And he's very taken with the idea of shadow committees and shadow juries, which, in his conception of them, are groups of randomly selected citizens convened to consider and recommend actions on matters of great public importance. Maybe that could work. It's creative, but I think it is more likely that, if they are politically feasible at all, they will be hijacked like grand juries have been.
My biggest gripe with Mr. Lessig is that he looks at the problems with the eyes of a lawyer. Everything is imbued with legal process and legal analysis. It's all too technical and mechanistic. Legal thinking is too often a Procrustean bed when applied to real world problems - important things like hands and feet get chopped off to fit the square peg of human behavior into the round hole of legal analysis. To Mr. Lessig's credit, he does have a section about storytelling in which he suggests that seeing the world through stories can tell us more and do more to change minds than any kind of legal or academic analysis, though that runs counter to the main thrust of the book. And in the end he suggests that the solution lies in grassroots bipartisan activism aimed at making the system better, but much of that felt like wishful thinking to me, a desperate grasping at straws.
Sure, it can work sometimes, when run by dedicated people and focused on specific reforms, but it isn't going to just self-organize and rise from the ashes to fix our problems.
The book starts with chapters on the problems that we all know beset our current political system in the United States and that make it deviate significantly from our commonly held ideas of what a representative democracy should be and do - gerrymandering, the electoral college, partisan primaries, campaign finance controlled by the wealthy, media, particularly social media, controlled by advertisers and thriving on polarization and rules of process like the filibuster that create deadlock in Congress. There's nothing wrong with his analysis of these problems, but they are largely self-evident to anyone with interest in current affairs in America today, and others have already written about them in more depth.
Then he gets to solutions, but I didn't find a lot that was attractive here either. He advocates for public funding of campaigns, restrictions on large contributions and ranked choice voting. Again, nothing new here, and I have liked the way that others have dealt with these issues better. He'd like us to have a new Constitutional Convention. I have long been skeptical of that one, but he did a good job of convincing me that it might not be a bad idea. It will either go nowhere or make things better. Maybe there would be unfortunate compromises, as there were in the original Constitution, but the chances of a new convention making things worse seems small. And he's very taken with the idea of shadow committees and shadow juries, which, in his conception of them, are groups of randomly selected citizens convened to consider and recommend actions on matters of great public importance. Maybe that could work. It's creative, but I think it is more likely that, if they are politically feasible at all, they will be hijacked like grand juries have been.
My biggest gripe with Mr. Lessig is that he looks at the problems with the eyes of a lawyer. Everything is imbued with legal process and legal analysis. It's all too technical and mechanistic. Legal thinking is too often a Procrustean bed when applied to real world problems - important things like hands and feet get chopped off to fit the square peg of human behavior into the round hole of legal analysis. To Mr. Lessig's credit, he does have a section about storytelling in which he suggests that seeing the world through stories can tell us more and do more to change minds than any kind of legal or academic analysis, though that runs counter to the main thrust of the book. And in the end he suggests that the solution lies in grassroots bipartisan activism aimed at making the system better, but much of that felt like wishful thinking to me, a desperate grasping at straws.
Sure, it can work sometimes, when run by dedicated people and focused on specific reforms, but it isn't going to just self-organize and rise from the ashes to fix our problems.
February 10, 2020
Lessig does an impeccable job of identifying a series of problems that plague the United States democracy as we know it, but his ultimate solutions look backward to the forms of representational democracy that have eroded in the last 50 or so years rather than proposing 21st-century solutions. His approach is quite centrist—he sees democratic socialists as the polar opposite of tea party extremists, he is in favor of the electoral college, and he even goes so far as to forgive the surveillance state when it provides what he sees as a convenient service for those who are surveilled. Nevertheless, he does have some interesting proposals, some of which are already widely supported, like ranked choice voting, but other proposals do not seem especially likely, such as “democracy coupons” that might allow voters to use vouchers provided by the government to contribute to political campaigns. At one point he even seems to forgive super pacs donating huge sums of money largely to political campaigns, suggesting that there are other more noble ways to combat the problem than to admit that it is nefarious. Ultimately he would like to strengthen the representative democracy by making changes that would make it more representative than it is at present, which sounds nice, but one comes away from the book with a sense that it is a whimper of centrist hope drowned out by a roar of progressive ideology.
July 9, 2023
If this is the first book you read on political reform / what's wrong with our democracy, this is a good starting place. I'd be much more inclined to recommend books by some of the names giving praise on the back cover of the book (Sandel, MacLean, Daley, etc). I found the first half - which serves almost as a lightning round of unrepresentativeness in the U.S. - to be much better than the second half. The second half is too much "throwing things at the wall and see what sticks".
My biggest criticism is he leaves out critical factors to reforming our democracy. Democracy doesn't just work because of a well-crafted political system. It extends to other arenas like education and economic inequality. The system can't be "fixed" without fixing all of the contributing problems. On top of those omissions, there are important parts of the political system that he left out. I'll give one example. He talks about cable news at length but never mentions the FCC Fairness Doctrine, in which the repeal of is what allowed cable news to start disseminating partisan information in the first place. Shouldn't the reader know that we did have a law in place to prevent news outlets like Fox News from outright lying to us? I noticed omissions like that frequently throughout the book, which is why I say this book is better as a starting place, as the more you read on the subject, the less significant this book becomes.
My biggest criticism is he leaves out critical factors to reforming our democracy. Democracy doesn't just work because of a well-crafted political system. It extends to other arenas like education and economic inequality. The system can't be "fixed" without fixing all of the contributing problems. On top of those omissions, there are important parts of the political system that he left out. I'll give one example. He talks about cable news at length but never mentions the FCC Fairness Doctrine, in which the repeal of is what allowed cable news to start disseminating partisan information in the first place. Shouldn't the reader know that we did have a law in place to prevent news outlets like Fox News from outright lying to us? I noticed omissions like that frequently throughout the book, which is why I say this book is better as a starting place, as the more you read on the subject, the less significant this book becomes.
January 14, 2020
I checked this book out from my local library. I am very interested in political economy, history, economics, basically - why is this world the way it is. When I find a book with a title like this one, I turn to the index first. If I find not one reference to even one of the following - foreign direct investment, investment, globalism, imperialism, corporatism, empire, neoliberalism, neo-conservatism, Wall Street - then I know that book is one I can skip and I will have missed nothing. This is such a book. Read Chomsky if you want to understand how the world works or why they don't represent us. BTW - my rather large local library and even larger library loan consortium has virtually no Chomsky books. I find that disturbing and suspect. The man dedicated his life to researching and impeccably documenting U.S. imperialism and he is sidelined and ignored, cast out from the mainstream. Instead, there are shelves full of Lessig's and other's nonsense asking questions they refuse to answer.
February 25, 2020
It was at times meandering, there were several glaring typos that should have been caught by a keener eye than mine, and it was uncomfortably too self-aware (yes, I know Lessig, a Harvard professor, is a NE liberal and believes x and supports/ed candidate y).
The best part of the book was the Conclusion—and I’m saying that in all honesty. There were good, thought-provoking pieces throughout the book, but it was only in the Conclusion where the book really seemed to find its coherent, cohesive, and problem-solving voice. Maybe it was the writing style, but I would have liked a whole book written like that. I’m especially heartened by the vignettes of all the “platform politics” where “ordinary” people managed to defeat the politicians and achieve a better democracy. I will certainly look more into those organizations. Overall a good read where I learned something, but didn’t necessarily enjoy the entire process.
The best part of the book was the Conclusion—and I’m saying that in all honesty. There were good, thought-provoking pieces throughout the book, but it was only in the Conclusion where the book really seemed to find its coherent, cohesive, and problem-solving voice. Maybe it was the writing style, but I would have liked a whole book written like that. I’m especially heartened by the vignettes of all the “platform politics” where “ordinary” people managed to defeat the politicians and achieve a better democracy. I will certainly look more into those organizations. Overall a good read where I learned something, but didn’t necessarily enjoy the entire process.
April 22, 2023
Lawrence Lessig has written an excellent book exploring “representative democracy” - how we got where we are, the dangers undermining our democracy and what we might do about it.
What makes “They Don’t Represent Us” an important and useful read is that it is based on entirely non-partisan thinking. In fact, he makes the point that if any proposed set of solutions were ascribed to one side or the other then the “other side” would crush the effort.
The two party system we have and the “winner take all” primaries and general elections make it impossible for any candidate nor part of one of the existing parties to gain any real traction.
If you are frustrated with lack of any lasting progress at any level of government you should read this book.
What makes “They Don’t Represent Us” an important and useful read is that it is based on entirely non-partisan thinking. In fact, he makes the point that if any proposed set of solutions were ascribed to one side or the other then the “other side” would crush the effort.
The two party system we have and the “winner take all” primaries and general elections make it impossible for any candidate nor part of one of the existing parties to gain any real traction.
If you are frustrated with lack of any lasting progress at any level of government you should read this book.
December 17, 2019
Found the opening premise — our country‘s problems are deeper than the occupant of the WH — interesting but too many inconsistencies for me ie he’s suspicious of polling but then points to polling to back up his claims that’s what the populace wants. Denounced social media, but the three network anchors had other issues. Also found his solutions a bit far fetched — the Senate based on population? Uh, that’s the House. Lastly, although the book is marketed an nonpartisan, it clearly has biases — which is fine but don’t label it nonpartisan.
In the end, just didn’t live up to expectations.
In the end, just didn’t live up to expectations.
February 9, 2020
I like Lessig's diagnoses of what is wrong and how we got here. I wish he had more compelling solutions. The first book of his I read, _Republic Lost_, brought up the insidious nature of our current campaign finance system. This book adds other representational problems we have and opens new categories of life-threatening problems our democracy suffers, but as I said above...I'd like to see more comprehensive, workable solutions.
If I were President, I'd have Lessig on a council to fix these problems, but I'd put others on the council too, so the solutions could be more thoroughly worked out.
My guess is we won't fix democracy before we revolt against it. You say you want a revolution...
If I were President, I'd have Lessig on a council to fix these problems, but I'd put others on the council too, so the solutions could be more thoroughly worked out.
My guess is we won't fix democracy before we revolt against it. You say you want a revolution...
December 26, 2024
I thoroughly enjoyed the book. He writes in a crisp and bright style that conveys his thinking directly.
I appreciate that even though it is five years since its publication, it is very topical and up-to-date regarding the present distress of out republic.
I particularly like that his recommendations are for both "them" and "us". Most books of this sort picture our crisis as caused by an evil "them". "We" citizens truly shoulder a share of the blame.
I appreciate that even though it is five years since its publication, it is very topical and up-to-date regarding the present distress of out republic.
I particularly like that his recommendations are for both "them" and "us". Most books of this sort picture our crisis as caused by an evil "them". "We" citizens truly shoulder a share of the blame.
February 16, 2022
I listened as an audiobook. Overall, I’m a big fan. It gave new words to a lot of the thoughts I’ve had for a while now, and got me thinking about a few things in a less partisan way. I’m dubious of the possibility of implementing the change this book demonstrates as necessary, but it doesn’t skirt the issue of that difficulty, either.
September 27, 2023
While I was happy to see a book that didn't just criticize, but acutally offered what looked like helpful solutions, I was too depressed to read it entirely, realizing no one in Congress seems to be interested in doing anything helpful. Ever.
April 24, 2020
The style was a little too preachy for me but I agree with his points....
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