Who are America’s Independents?: A Question of the People vs. the (Two Major) Parties
Recent polls by CNN and Gallup indicate that upwards of 42% of Americans self-identify as independent of the two major parties. Who are these independents? What do they want? What is their history?
An independent political movement uniting voters across the ideological spectrum has been building steam over the last twenty years. These independents are focused on opening up the political process; they are black, white, Latino, and Asian; they are not in favor of parties, yet they will variously use particular parties and candidates as vehicles to advance structural political reforms (such as open primaries, non-partisan elections, and ballot access reform).
Theirs is a history that grows out of America’s rich history of movements for democratic reform--from the Abolitionists of the early nineteenth century to the modern civil rights movement of the mid-twentieth century. And while Jim Crow has been legislated out of existence in terms of race, there is a new form of Jim Crow that excludes tens of millions of Americans from participating as full citizens in the United States.
Other topics:
- The Black and Independent Alliance that elected Barack Obama in 2008
- Independent Voters: A New Constituency for Political Reform
- Declaring Black Independence: African Americans and Independent Politics
- A Brief History of the Independent Political Movement in the United States
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