tag:theconversation.com,2011:/id/topics/campaign-2016-32304/articlesCampaign 2016 – The Conversation2016-12-02T02:59:47Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/692062016-12-02T02:59:47Z2016-12-02T02:59:47ZHow majority voting betrayed voters again in 2016<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/148160/original/image-20161130-17000-nguzzj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">What if this was our choice on Election Day?</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">AP Photos/Gary Landers and Paul Sancya</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The system for electing the U.S. president went woefully wrong from the very beginning of 2016. </p>
<p>First, the two <a href="http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/americans-distaste-for-both-trump-and-clinton-is-record-breaking/">most disliked candidates ever nominated</a> – Hillary Rodham Clinton and Donald J. Trump – emerged victors from their parties’ primaries, but shouldn’t have. Second, the <a href="https://theconversation.com/three-common-arguments-for-preserving-the-electoral-college-and-why-theyre-wrong-68546">increasingly controversial</a> Electoral College system will formally elect Trump on December 19 despite Clinton’s lead of over two million in the popular vote.</p>
<p>The system is “rigged” all right, not for a candidate but against the voter. It fails to elect candidates the voters really want. Why? And what should be done about it? </p>
<p><a href="http://www.ams.org/samplings/feature-column/fcarc-apportionii3">Years of work</a> in developing <a href="http://www.mathaware.org/mam/08/EliminateGerrymandering.pdf">fair</a> <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-to-make-the-house-of-representatives-representative-32921">methods</a> of representation and systems for <a href="https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/majority-judgment">electing candidates</a> that truly respond to the opinions of the electorate have convinced me that the real culprit is majority voting and not the Electoral College. I will give my reasons.</p>
<h2>Majority voting’s failures</h2>
<p>Majority voting (MV) is an extremely crude approximation of the opinion of the electorate that has often elected a candidate counter to the popular will. </p>
<p>Walter Lippmann – claimed by many to be the most influential American journalist of the 20th century – <a href="https://books.google.com/books/about/The_Phantom_Public.html?id=fnk-a3IX5ZgC">realized this in 1925</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“But what in fact is an election? We call it an expression of the popular will. But is it? We go into a polling booth and mark a cross on a piece of paper for one of two, or perhaps three or four names. Have we expressed our thoughts … ? Presumably we have a number of thoughts on this and that with many buts and ifs and ors. Surely the cross on a piece of paper does not express them … [C]alling a vote the expression of our mind is an empty fiction.” </p>
</blockquote>
<p>There have been 57 presidential elections. By my count, 12 of them elected candidates that were almost certainly not the true choices of the electorate, the last three occurring in 1912, 1992 and 2000. </p>
<p>Woodrow Wilson was <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_election,_1912">elected in 1912</a> (with 41.8 percent of the popular vote) against incumbent Republican President William Howard Taft (23.2 percent) because of the Bull Moose candidacy of the former Republican President Teddy Roosevelt (27.4 percent): Either of them would most likely have won head-to-head against Wilson.</p>
<p>A similar <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_election,_1992">scenario occurred in 1992</a> with Bill Clinton (43.0 percent) winning against George H. W. Bush (37.4 percent) because of the candidacy of Ross Perot (18.9 percent): Bush (father) would almost surely have beaten Clinton head-to-head. </p>
<p>And in 2000 George W. Bush (47.9 percent) <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_election_in_Florida,_2000">won with a bare majority</a> of 271 Electoral College votes against Al Gore (48.4 percent) because of the candidacy of Ralph Nader. Bush’s lead of a mere 537 (out of nearly 6 million) votes in Florida would have easily been erased if the 97,000 who voted for Nader could have expressed their preference for Gore.</p>
<p>Why does this happen? Because, as Lippmann suggested, MV does not permit voters to express their opinions fully.</p>
<p>In 1912 it was impossible for a Roosevelt voter to express a preference for Taft over Wilson, or a Taft voter to express a preference for Roosevelt over Wilson. Similarly, it was impossible for voters to express their preference for Bush (father) and Perot over Clinton in 1992, or for Nader voters in Florida to express their preference for Gore rather than Bush (son) in 2000. Had they been able to express their opinions of the candidates more accurately, the outcomes would have been different.</p>
<p>MV, as old as the hills, is merely a mechanism that has been accepted by force of habit. As Thomas Paine <a href="https://www.gutenberg.org/files/147/147-h/147-h.htm">wrote in 1776 in “Common Sense”</a> – “the <a href="https://www.amrevmuseum.org/read-the-revolution/biography/revolutionary-characters">most incendiary and popular pamphlet</a> of the entire revolutionary era”:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“A long habit of not thinking a thing wrong gives it a superficial appearance of being right.” </p>
</blockquote>
<p>Majority voting is such a thing. It is thought to be democratic, but isn’t, as these examples (and many others) show. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/148164/original/image-20161130-17047-civz9d.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/148164/original/image-20161130-17047-civz9d.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=415&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/148164/original/image-20161130-17047-civz9d.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=415&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/148164/original/image-20161130-17047-civz9d.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=415&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/148164/original/image-20161130-17047-civz9d.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=521&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/148164/original/image-20161130-17047-civz9d.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=521&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/148164/original/image-20161130-17047-civz9d.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=521&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Don Lamb, an employee of La Scala Restaurant in Little Rock, Arkansas, cleans the front window of the restaurant, Saturday, Oct. 31, 1992.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">AP Photo/Danny Johnston</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Ranked voting’s failures</h2>
<p>Some reformers advocate another mechanism, “ranked voting” (RV). Instead of choosing one among the candidates the voter lists them all from their most to their least preferred.
This <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Borda_count">18th-century idea</a> (from the French mathematician and political scientist <a href="http://gerardgreco.free.fr/IMG/pdf/MA_c_moire-Borda-1781.pdf">Jean-Charles de Borda</a>) is a better scheme for voters to express themselves – and so it must have seemed to the narrow majority of 51.99 percent of <a href="https://ballotpedia.org/Maine_Ranked_Choice_Voting_Initiative,_Question_5_(2016)">Maine’s voters</a> who adopted one version of the possible methods based on RV, Ranked Choice Voting, in a statewide vote on November 8. </p>
<p>However, I argue that they were sold a bill of goods: RV’s drawbacks completely disqualify it. </p>
<p>First and foremost, RV is far from permitting an adequate expression of the voters’ opinions. A voter cannot reject all candidates, cannot consider two candidates equally good and cannot express strong versus lukewarm support (or rejection). </p>
<p>Furthermore, when RV has actually been used by juries in such competitions as <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISU_Judging_System">figure skating</a>, <a href="http://www.fig-gymnastics.com/publicdir/rules/files/mag/MAG%20CoP%202013-2016%20(FRA%20ENG%20ESP)%20July%202015.pdf">gymnastics</a> and <a href="http://www.fina.org/content/diving-rules">diving</a>, its results have sometimes been so wildly peculiar that increasingly it has been abandoned in favor of methods that ask judges to evaluate competitors instead of ranking them. Figure skating juries’ rules, for example,<a href="https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/majority-judgment"> made the change</a> in response to the 2002 winter Olympic scandal in pairs figure skating. </p>
<h2>Majority judgment</h2>
<p>My colleague, Rida Laraki, and I <a href="https://theconversation.com/trump-and-clinton-victorious-proof-that-us-voting-system-doesnt-work-58752">have developed a new method</a> of voting, <a href="https://mitpress.mit.edu/books/majority-judgment">majority judgment (MJ)</a>, which avoids the drawbacks of MV and RV. </p>
<p>MJ asks voters a simple and natural question such as that recently posed by the Pew Research Center: “What kind of president do you think each of the following would be – a great, good, average, poor or terrible president?” In its <a href="http://assets.pewresearch.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/5/2016/11/03170033/10-27-16-October-political-release.pdf">last national survey </a> of registered voters (Oct. 20-25) Pew reported the following results (here adjusted to sum to 100 percent):</p>
<iframe id="datawrapper-chart-VlROX" src="https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/VlROX/2/" frameborder="0" allowtransparency="true" allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen" webkitallowfullscreen="webkitallowfullscreen" mozallowfullscreen="mozallowfullscreen" oallowfullscreen="oallowfullscreen" msallowfullscreen="msallowfullscreen" width="100%" height="270"></iframe>
<p>All one needs to do is look at the evaluations of the two candidates in the table above to conclude that Clinton is better evaluated than Trump. </p>
<p>But what exactly is the majority opinion? </p>
<p>Clinton would be an Average President because in a majority vote between Average and any other “grade,” it wins. This is most easily seen by noting that a majority of 8%+27%+20%=55% believes she would be at least Average – so Average defeats any lower grade – and a majority of 20%+11%+34%=65% that she would be at most Average – so Average defeats any higher grade. It suffices to start from each end of the spectrum adding percentages until a majority is reached; in practice the sums from both directions will always reach a majority at the same grade. </p>
<p>Similarly, a majority believes Trump would be a Poor President because 54 percent believes he would be at least Poor and 57 percent that he would be at most Poor. With these evaluations majority judgment elects Clinton since the majority evaluates her above Trump. </p>
<p>MJ simply uses the majority principle – the idea that the majority can represent the whole – to deduce the electorate’s evaluation of every candidate, called their majority-grades, instead of using it to compare the number of votes each candidate receives. </p>
<p>No system is perfect. But majority judgment is far superior to any other known system. Here’s why:</p>
<ul>
<li>It is easier and more natural for voters since grading is familiar since school days; </li>
<li>It obtains more information from voters and puts more confidence in them by permitting them to express their opinions accurately;</li>
<li>It gives more information about the standing of candidates in the eyes of the public – had Clinton won she would have known her standing: Average;</li>
<li>Most importantly, it elects the candidate highest in the esteem of the electorate.</li>
</ul>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/148161/original/image-20161130-17028-73izta.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/148161/original/image-20161130-17028-73izta.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=438&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/148161/original/image-20161130-17028-73izta.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=438&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/148161/original/image-20161130-17028-73izta.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=438&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/148161/original/image-20161130-17028-73izta.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=550&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/148161/original/image-20161130-17028-73izta.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=550&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/148161/original/image-20161130-17028-73izta.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=550&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">John and Colleen Kramer, of Stockton, Missouri, vote at the Caplinger Mills Trading Post on Tuesday, Nov. 8, 2016, in Caplinger Mills, Missouri.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(AP Photo/Charlie Riedel)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>What happened this year?</h2>
<p>Pew Research – without realizing that their question serves as the basis of a method of voting – posed exactly the same question this year in January, March and August as well as late October. </p>
<p>In every case the majority evaluated Clinton an Average President and Trump a Poor President; moreover, their respective grades remained remarkably similar over all four polls, suggesting that despite all the hoopla – emails, sexism, racism, walls, FBI, secret speeches, jail and so much more – the electorate’s opinions concerning the two candidates remained very much the same throughout the year. </p>
<p>And yet Trump beat Clinton. Why? MV denied voters the right to express their opinions adequately in the state face-to-face encounters. </p>
<p>U.S. voters were in revolt, determined to show their exasperation with politicians. But how, with the majority vote, could they express this disgust other than by voting for Trump? </p>
<p>With majority judgment some of them would surely have rated Clinton as Poor or Terrible to make the point, but Trump as Poor or Terrible as well, exactly as the Pew survey shows. </p>
<p>This could well have been the case in each of several states where their total votes were close such as <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/elections/results/florida">Florida</a> (a difference of 1.3 percent in their vote totals), <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/elections/results/michigan">Michigan</a> (a difference of 0.3 percent), <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/elections/results/wisconsin">Wisconsin</a> (a difference of 0.8 percent) and <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/elections/results/pennsylvania">Pennsylvania</a> (a difference of 1.1 percent). With MJ the result would then have been much closer to a true expression of voters’ opinions and so of the popular will: 307 Electoral College votes for Clinton, 231 for Trump.</p>
<p>Well before the vote on Nov. 8 something else went wrong. Trump and Clinton should not have been the victors in the Republican and Democratic primaries – they are, after all, generally considered to be the least popular candidates of recent history. But the primaries were decided by majority vote as well. Had the primaries used <a href="https://theconversation.com/trump-and-clinton-victorious-proof-that-us-voting-system-doesnt-work-58752">majority judgment</a>, the general election would have pitted Bernie Sanders against John Kasich. </p>
<p>Imagine how different the country and the world would feel today – and be tomorrow – had they been the candidates!</p>
<p>The time has come to replace the obviously undemocratic mechanism of the majority vote by a method that captures the true will of the electorate: majority judgment.</p>
<p><em>Editor’s note: this article was updated to make clear that Ranked Voting has different versions, including Ranked Choice Voting.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/69206/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Michel Balinski is related to an employee of The Conversation US. </span></em></p>In this year’s election, the system of majority voting didn’t allow voters to express their opinions adequately. If they had, the choice would have been between Kasich and Sanders.Michel Balinski, American Applied Mathematician, Mathematical Economist, and O.R. Analyst. "Directeur de recherche de classe exceptionnelle" (emeritus) of the C.N.R.S., École polytechniqueLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/676192016-11-01T07:52:16Z2016-11-01T07:52:16ZEuropean leaders would see a Donald Trump victory as total calamity<p><em>This piece is part of The Conversation Global’s ‘The View From …’ series, explaining how governments and citizens in key countries worldwide view the US election. Today, Richard Maher explains why Europe is so afraid of Donald Trump, and how it all comes down to Russia, NATO and trade.</em></p>
<p>As the US presidential election enters its final week, most poll-based models show Democratic nominee and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2016/us/elections/polls.html">in front</a> of Republican challenger, Donald Trump. </p>
<p>There are questions about how Clinton’s ratings will bounce back from the announcement that the FBI is <a href="http://www.bbc.com/news/election-us-2016-37811529">reviewing a newly discovered trove of emails</a> that relate to her use of a personal server for government business when she was secretary of state. But her significant lead in the polls will be hard to beat. </p>
<p>While Clinton has not garnered the same level of enthusiasm across Europe as current US President Barack Obama received in <a href="http://www.pewglobal.org/2008/07/16/obamamania-abroad/">2008</a> or <a href="http://www.pewglobal.org/2015/06/23/1-americas-global-image/">2012</a>, European leaders are no doubt breathing easier now that a Clinton victory seems more likely. </p>
<p>In mid-summer, polls showed a <a href="http://www.bbc.com/news/election-us-2016-37450661">real possibility</a> that Trump could win the election and become the 45th President of the United States, an outcome that was seen as catastrophic across Europe.</p>
<p>European leaders watched Trump’s ascent first with dismay and then with growing alarm. Some offered uncharacteristically blunt assessments of his fitness to be a party nominee, and their preferred electoral outcome. </p>
<p>French President François Hollande <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/aug/03/francois-hollande-says-donald-trump-makes-you-want-to-retch">said</a> that Trump “makes you want to retch”. Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-election-clinton-italy-idUSKCN0XL0V8">criticised</a> what he called Trump’s “policy of fear”, and made clear his “very strong” support for Hillary Clinton. </p>
<p>German foreign secretary Frank-Walter Steinmeier called Trump’s portrait of the United States as being beset by internal and external enemies “grotesque”, and <a href="http://www.politico.eu/article/steinmeier-trump-transatlantic-news-doubt-president-us-germany-steinmeier/">warned</a> that a Trump presidency would lead to “many uncertainties for the trans-Atlantic relationship”.</p>
<p>For European leaders thinking about the election, three major issues occupy attention: the future of the NATO alliance; the West’s relations with Russia; and whether the moribund Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) can or should be revived.</p>
<h2>NATO</h2>
<p>The candidates’ views of NATO mark one of their most striking foreign policy differences. </p>
<p>While Clinton has <a href="http://edition.cnn.com/2016/03/23/politics/hillary-clinton-brussels-terrorism-trump-cruz/">called the alliance</a> “one of the best investments America has ever made”, Trump has <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/0f397616-f9b8-11e5-8e04-8600cef2ca75">said</a> the alliance is “obsolete”. Trump has also been coy over whether he would respond automatically to a <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/21/us/politics/donald-trump-issues.html?mtrref=www.nytimes.com&gwh=1755B1DAB4C50303BED2E98450557777&gwt=pay">hypothetical Russian incursion</a> into one of the Baltic republics, which have been NATO members for more than a decade.</p>
<p>Every US president since Truman has interpreted <a href="http://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/official_texts_17120.htm">Article 5 of the NATO Treaty</a> – the mutual defence clause – as establishing a legal and moral obligation on the United States to aid another alliance member facing external attack. Instead of automatically upholding this commitment, Trump has said that he would condition a US response on whether the NATO ally had previously “fulfilled their obligations to us”. </p>
<p>Anders Fogh Rasmussen, former Danish prime minister and former NATO secretary general, <a href="http://www.politico.eu/article/qa-anders-fogh-rasmussen-nato-on-donald-trump/">condemned this statement</a>, saying it undermined US credibility and risked allowing Russia to increase its influence in Europe. </p>
<h2>Russia</h2>
<p>No Democratic or Republican presidential nominee in history has spoken with such admiration of Russia as Donald Trump. Russia is, at the very least, a country most US and European security experts continue to view as a rival if not an actual adversary. </p>
<p>Trump has <a href="http://www.bbc.com/news/election-us-2016-37303057">praised</a> Putin’s intelligence and leadership style, invited Russia to <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/28/us/politics/donald-trump-russia-clinton-emails.html">commit cyberespionage</a> against Clinton, and suggested that, as president, he might <a href="http://www.theatlantic.com/news/archive/2016/07/trump-crimea/493280/">formally recognise Crimea</a> as part of Russia. This is despite the fact that, in the most blatant and serious challenge to post-Cold War Europe’s political and security order, Russian military forces <a href="http://edition.cnn.com/2014/03/18/world/europe/ukraine-crisis/">forcibly seized</a> the peninsula from Ukraine in a show of force reminiscent of Europe’s darker periods.</p>
<p>If elected, Clinton would enter office with the most strained and contentious relationship with Russia of any president since the end of the Cold War. As David Sanger of the New York Times has <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/21/us/hillary-clinton-donald-trump-putin-russia.html">reported</a>, some of Clinton’s longtime advisers are already thinking of ways to put pressure on the Russian government and on Putin himself. These include the imposition of additional sanctions, diplomatic isolation, and international condemnation. </p>
<p>While European leaders would hardly welcome an escalation of US-Russia tensions – especially since the question of how to respond to Russian actions in Ukraine, Syria, and elsewhere is already <a href="http://www.politico.eu/article/eu-leaders-consider-new-sanctions-against-russia-theresa-may-donald-tusk-european-council/">dividing European governments</a> – Trump’s apparent infatuation with the Kremlin creates even more unease.</p>
<h2>Trade deals</h2>
<p>A key battleground for the US election has been the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP), which aims to widen market access, enhance regulatory cooperation, and set common rules to promote transatlantic trade and investment. The <a href="http://trade.ec.europa.eu/doclib/docs/2016/october/tradoc_155027.pdf">15th and latest round of talks</a> took place in New York in October 2016. </p>
<p>For the United States, TTIP is a corollary to the 12-country Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), which was signed in February 2016 but has not yet been ratified.</p>
<p>Regardless of who wins the election, the odds of concluding the TTIP agreement seem unlikely. Trump (along with Democratic Senator and former presidential candidate <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/rep-bernie-sanders/the-tpp-must-be-defeated_b_7352166.html">Bernie Sanders</a>) has stoked opposition in the United States to free trade agreements generally. </p>
<p>Trump has made opposition to the North American Free Trade Agreement and the TPP a <a href="https://www.donaldjtrump.com/policies/trade/">core element</a> of his candidacy. While bemoaning the loss of domestic manufacturing jobs to globalisation and free trade, he has proposed a <a href="http://www.wsj.com/articles/donald-trumps-tariff-party-1467240379">range of tariffs</a> and other protectionist measures unseen in the United States since the 1930s. </p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"651136309029834752"}"></div></p>
<p>Clinton supports the expansion of free trade agreements less enthusiastically than Obama, who pushed hard during his presidency for both the <a href="http://edition.cnn.com/2016/09/06/politics/obama-tpp-politics-congress/">TPP and TTIP</a>. As president, Clinton is unlikely to make TTIP a priority. </p>
<p>Despite once <a href="http://www.state.gov/secretary/20092013clinton/rm/2012/11/200565.htm">supporting the TPP</a>, she has now come out in <a href="https://www.hillaryclinton.com/issues/an-economy-that-works-for-everyone/">opposition to it</a> (and has even <a href="http://www.pri.org/stories/2016-07-28/hillary-clinton-s-stand-nafta-and-tpp-it-s-complicated-and-evolving">criticised NAFTA</a>). </p>
<p>Even if Clinton decides to push for the conclusion of TTIP negotiations, however, diminishing popular appeal in both parties for new free trade agreements will make it hard for her to get it ratified by Congress, even though <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/26/upshot/economists-actually-agree-on-this-point-the-wisdom-of-free-trade.html">many economists</a> on both sides of the Atlantic have said that the agreement would <a href="http://www.economist.com/news/leaders/21571890-good-idea-state-union-address-business-should-rush-support-come-ttip">create jobs</a> and give an important boost to sluggish economic growth in the EU.</p>
<p>If the talks fail, Europe may lose more than just greater access to transatlantic trade and investment. Its ability to promote its values and set global standards – in areas such as workers’ rights, environmental protection, and sustainable development – through trade would take a hit.</p>
<h2>Cheering for Clinton</h2>
<p>A Trump victory on November 8 would be viewed across European capitals as calamitous. While Clinton is well known to European leaders, they view Trump as erratic, unpredictable, and even unstable. </p>
<p>Trump’s views regarding NATO, his overtures to a revanchist and increasingly authoritarian Russia, and his opposition to the expansion of free trade deviate in profound ways from America’s approach to Europe since the end of the second world war – an era that has spanned twelve presidential administrations, six Democratic and six Republican. </p>
<p>European leaders are also worried that a Trump victory might embolden their own national populist movements. </p>
<p>Marine Le Pen, the leader of France’s far-right National Front, has said that <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/us-le-pen-trump-idUSKCN0ZM05W">she would vote for Trump</a>. Nigel Farage, a major figure in the successful campaign for the UK to leave the EU, has <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/aug/24/nigel-farage-donald-trump-rally-hillary-clinton">appeared on the campaign trail</a> with Trump. Anti-Islam Dutch politician <a href="http://europe.newsweek.com/donald-trump-anti-islam-geert-wilders-freedom-party-far-right-republican-482208?rm=eu">Geert Wilders</a> appeared at a fringe event of the Republican National Convention in Cleveland in July, praising Trump’s proposed ban on Muslim immigration into the United States.</p>
<p>For all these reasons and more, leaders across Europe are rooting for a Clinton victory on November 8, some quietly and some more openly.</p>
<p><em>UPDATE: This article originally stated that Nigel Farage led the Leave campaign in the UK. This has been amended to state that he was a major figure.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/67619/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Richard Maher does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Europe has a lot riding on this election: NATO, relations with Russia and free trade all hang in the balance.Richard Maher, Research Fellow, European University InstituteLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/662532016-10-17T01:05:44Z2016-10-17T01:05:44ZEvangelical Christians are on the left too<p>On Oct. 3, <a href="http://longwood.edu/">Longwood University</a>, a public university in Virginia, hosted the first and only 2016 vice presidential debate. In what were described as the debate’s <a href="http://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/opinion/the-conversation/sd-vice-presidential-debate-on-faith-20161004-htmlstory.html">“most sincere”</a> and <a href="https://thinkprogress.org/what-the-vice-presidential-candidates-meant-when-they-talked-about-faith-last-night-88dec3a54f97#.wg3oy3skn">“most honest”</a> moments, Senator Tim Kaine (D-VA) and Governor Mike Pence (R-IN) discussed their religious faiths. </p>
<p>Pence, a Roman-Catholic-turned-evangelical, <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2016/10/04/the-mike-pence-vs-tim-kaine-vice-presidential-debate-transcript-annotated/">appealed to familiar concerns</a> of the Christian right, such as abortion and “the sanctity of life.” Kaine, a Roman Catholic, emphasized the moral responsibility of honoring individual choice. </p>
<p>That Pence pivoted toward abortion is not surprising. Since 1973 – when the landmark Supreme Court decision, Roe v. Wade, legalized the right to an abortion – the Christian right has put abortion, as well as homosexuality and <a href="http://www.upenn.edu/pennpress/book/15416.html">“family values,”</a> at the center of conservative politics. </p>
<p>This particular focus stemmed from the fear, particularly among white southern evangelicals, of disturbing an old order based on white supremacy, heterosexuality and female domesticity. Decades of judicial and legislative progress toward a more inclusive and democratic nation as a result of the civil rights, women’s rights and gay liberation movements of the 1960s and 1970s only increased that fear. It also consolidated southern white evangelicals’ political strength in the Christian right.</p>
<p>It is not surprising, therefore, that since the 1970s, it is the <a href="http://are.as.wvu.edu/lebeau1.htm">Christian right</a> that has set the discourse about religion in America. What has remained unrecognized is the important role the Christian left has played during the last 50 years.</p>
<h2>What is the ‘Christian left’?</h2>
<p>Generally, left and left-leaning Christians seek religion not so much in expressing faith in social justice. Sociologist <a href="http://hirr.hartsem.edu/sociology/articles/Golden%20Rule%20Christianity.pdf">Nancy T. Ammerman</a> has found that these “lay liberals” are “defined not by ideology, but by practice.” They especially value practicing Christianity according to the Golden Rule, or Jesus’ message,</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“In everything do to others as you would have them do to you.” (Matthew 7:12) </p>
</blockquote>
<p>Their concerns include income inequality, racism, violence, hunger and homelessness. They do not necessarily support the hard-line ideological positions of the Christian right, including those <a href="https://thinkprogress.org/what-religious-people-actually-think-about-using-religious-liberty-to-justify-anti-gay-discriminatio-68e7baf94d3#.ddn4tn4az">regarding LGBTQ Americans and marriage equality</a>.</p>
<p>The Christian left does not easily fit within traditional organizational structures, though they do <a href="http://hirr.hartsem.edu/sociology/articles/Golden%20Rule%20Christianity.pdf">value church membership</a>. </p>
<p>The Pew Research Center’s 2014 <a href="http://www.pewforum.org/religious-landscape-study/political-ideology/">Religious Landscape Survey</a> is suggestive of this trend. In the American South, where 34 percent of residents identify as evangelicals and 14 percent as mainline Protestant, the survey found that at least 21 percent of adults identify as liberal and 32 percent as moderate. These data suggest that the Christian left has found space within evangelical and mainline Protestant southern churches.</p>
<h2>A historic tradition, a southern legacy</h2>
<p>The Christian left is not a new phenomenon. American Christians have played important roles in many progressive movements dating back to the anti-slavery movement of the early- to mid-19th century. </p>
<p>After the Civil War, many Christians championed workers’ rights, orphanages and schools, women’s suffrage and resistance to American intervention in World War I. During this time, the black church, particularly in the South, became an important instrument in promoting social activism based on ideas of <a href="http://www.jstor.org/stable/25163288">“social responsibility and good works”</a> grounded in Christianity.</p>
<p>The black church was <a href="http://www.jstor.org/stable/3660172">integral to the civil rights movement</a>. At the time, both black and white Christians living in the South confronted head-on the Jim Crow laws, which enforced segregation and voting rights. </p>
<p>In the aftermath of the Supreme Court’s historic decision in Brown v. Board of Education (1954), which made racial segregation illegal, many white Christian leaders joined hands with African-Americans to advocate for racial justice within their white congregations, as racial injustice continued.</p>
<p>One of the most well-known Christian left organizations at the time was the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC). Formed in 1957, the SCLC put black evangelical clergy at the <a href="http://www.jstor.org/stable/2209569">forefront of the movement</a>, including Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. It coordinated with local civil rights organizations and played a role in voter drives and the 1963 <a href="http://kingencyclopedia.stanford.edu/encyclopedia/encyclopedia/enc_southern_christian_leadership_conference_sclc/">March on Washington</a>. That was where King delivered his famous “I Have a Dream” speech.</p>
<p>Perhaps King best summarized his vision for the Christian left, shared by the SCLC, when <a href="http://www.thekingcenter.org/archive/document/letter-birmingham-city-jail-0">he wrote from inside a Birmingham, Alabama, jail cell</a>, </p>
<blockquote>
<p>“Was not Jesus an extremist in love?”</p>
</blockquote>
<p>It is important to note that the Christian left did not limit its reach to racial justice, nor did its significance wane in the 1970s and ‘80’s, when the Christian right consolidated its political base. </p>
<p>For example, it is not widely known that some Christian denominations welcomed LGBTQ Americans. According to historian <a href="http://www.basicbooks.com/full-details?isbn=9780465032709">Jim Downs</a>, churches for gay men and women, including those located in the South, played an important role in gay liberation in the 1970s. In the 1980s, mainline Protestant denominations such as <a href="http://www.integrityusa.org/">the Episcopal Church</a> formed support ministries for LGBTQ members. Episcopalians also took a lead role in affirming women’s rights by ordaining women.</p>
<h2>A southern phenomenon then and now</h2>
<p>This history of Christian activism in the South continues today. North Carolina – a state that has been the focus of <a href="http://uncpress.unc.edu/books/12185.html">my own research</a> – exemplifies how the Christian left’s past informs its present. </p>
<p>Historically <a href="https://www.thenation.com/article/north-carolinas-moral-mondays/">one of the most progressive southern states</a>, North Carolina is home to <a href="https://www.facingsouth.org/2013/06/what-is-moral-monday.html">the Moral Monday Movement</a>. Formed in 2013 by <a href="http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2014/04/william-barber-moral-monday-north-carolina">Rev. Dr. William Barber</a>, president of the <a href="http://www.naacpnc.org/">North Carolina National Association for Advancement of Colored People (NAACP)</a>, the movement raises its voice against a wide range of issues related to unfair treatment and discrimination such as restriction of voting rights and cutting funding for Medicaid, welfare and education. </p>
<p>When the Moral Monday Movement began in North Carolina in 2013, religious leaders issued a <a href="http://www.diocesewnc.org/dfc/newsdetail_2/3160087">joint statement</a> urging activism not along partisan but religious lines.</p>
<p>The movement has since spread to other southern states, including <a href="http://www.moralmondayga.com/">Georgia</a>, <a href="https://www.facebook.com/pages/Moral-Mondays-Florida/613494705415958">Florida</a> and Mike Pence’s home state, <a href="http://www.indianamoralmondays.org/">Indiana</a>. Moral Monday rallies have also been held in <a href="http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/sep/22/moral-mondays-movement-spreads-to-alabama/">Alabama</a> and <a href="http://www.msnbc.com/way-too-early/watch/moral-monday-protests-planned-in-missouri-341270595891">Missouri</a>. </p>
<h2>Lost in media coverage</h2>
<p>Despite the growth of movements such as Moral Mondays, however, the Christian left often gets lost in media coverage during election cycles.</p>
<p>This is not surprising as media coverage of religion is limited. In 2008 and 2012, <a href="http://www.journalism.org/2012/12/14/media-religion-and-2012-campaign-president/">merely one percent of media coverage</a> concerned religion, and 2016 appears to be no different.</p>
<p>Furthermore, whatever coverage does take place is often limited to <a href="http://www.journalism.org/2012/12/14/coverage-particular-faiths/">conservative Christians</a> and the “red states” of the South. </p>
<p>Unfortunately, the “red state” identification does not capture the region’s social, political and racial diversity. It is true that religion is important in the South. In 2014, <a href="http://www.pewforum.org/religious-landscape-study/region/south/">62 percent of adults in the South</a> reported that religion was “very important” to them. However, the percentage of religious southerners who lean Republican and Democrat are roughly the same (approximately 40 percent). </p>
<h2>The voices that have been missed</h2>
<p>It is important to note that even in this election cycle, the South’s Christian left has not been silent. </p>
<p>On Sept. 26, in the aftermath of the fatal shooting of <a href="http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/keith-lamont-scott-autopsy-calls-death-homicide-article-1.2829044">Keith Lamont Scott</a> by a Charlotte police officer, Rev. William Barber led a <a href="http://qcitymetro.com/2016/09/26/rev-william-barber-lead-monday-rally-charlotte/">“unity rally for justice and transparency”</a> at a historic black church in North Carolina, where he asked his audience to hold up their <a href="https://www.ncchurches.org/2016/09/21724/">“faithful voter cards.”</a> He led the gathering in a civil rights marching song.</p>
<p>This year’s presidential election might be an opportunity for the Christian left to become more visible. There were indications of this when on Oct. 6 more than 100 evangelical leaders <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/evangelical-leaders-donald-trump_us_57f7b304e4b068ecb5ddc355">denounced</a> Republican presidential candidate Donald J. Trump and warned the media against viewing evangelicals as a monolithic group. </p>
<p>Of course, the “Christian left versus Christian right” discussion is itself limiting. In the context of the rich religious pluralism of the U.S., we must ask more broadly what the religious left can do collaboratively to affect change in American political discourse. </p>
<p>There is movement in this direction, including in the federal government. For example, in 2009, just two weeks into his first term, President Barack Obama established the <a href="http://www.pewforum.org/2009/08/18/president-obamas-advisory-council-on-faith-based-and-neighborhood-partnerships/">White House Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships</a>. The office has embraced core principles of the Christian left, including social and economic justice. This year it appointed <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2016/05/12/president-obama-announces-more-key-administration-posts">Barbara Satin</a> to the advisory council, who is the first openly transgender appointee and an active member of the United Church of Christ. </p>
<p>Such examples can prove instructive, especially to local, grassroots organizations. As election day approaches, the Christian left can play an important role in taking a stand in favor of this progress.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/66253/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Timothy J. Williams does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The Christian left has played a strong role in America’s history. In this election too, it is not silent.Timothy J. Williams, Visiting Assistant Professor of History, University of OregonLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.