Diversity Dialogue: Everything You Need to Know about Voting Rights
By Alain Puma, Publications Intern
Students have an important role to play as stewards of American democracy and society, according to Dr. Giuliano Espino, assistant professor the Political Science, Law and Global Studies Department at Framingham State University.
“They are a part of this broader political society that we are discussing,” said Dr. Espino during a recent Diversity Dialogue Event. “These are going to be slow, generational changes. There are no quick and easy solutions. They are the ones who are responsible for building the future and engaging in these various forms of advocacy. They are the next generation. The future.”
Espino also wanted students and others to be keenly aware of the power they possess to effectuate change, starting at the local level.
“A lot of these changes have to be from the bottom up. Focus on your local community first. That’s where you have the most influence. Local involvement is the way to go,” he said.
The Diversity Dialogues event centered around the state of American politics with regard to the role of money in the political system, underrepresentation of the majority of citizens, voter engagement issues, political division and polarization, and the rise of authoritarianism.
Dr. David Smailes, who is now retired but was an associate professor in the Political Science, Law, and Global Studies department at FSU discussed the idea of fostering societal unity through finding common areas of agreement with regard to democratic values. Smailes utilized Dr. Martin Luther King’s “Letter from a Birmingham Jail to begin to illustrate his point.
“Dr. King had a few ways of determining what makes an unjust law. The first two were that an unjust law does not square with the laws of morality or the laws of God. Another was that unjust laws are ones inflicted on the minority by a majority - but that the majority does not have to follow. And finally, an unjust law is one that the majority subjects a minority to - despite the fact that the minority had no voice in enacting the law because they were denied the right to vote,” he said.
Smailes then underscored the significance of the last two characteristics of an unjust law.
“Both of those arguments are democratic arguments. If you believe in democracy, you can’t deny those last few categories of what makes an unjust law. Even if you don’t agree with my view of morality, even if you don’t believe in God, okay. But you can’t deny - as anyone who believes in democracy - that those last few categories are clearly unfair and unjust. And, that ability to appeal to people’s sense of what brings us together around political ideas - around a shared sense of what we are about as a society - becomes the heart on which we can begin to address the issues we are facing,” he said.
Dr. Jonathan Martin was another panelist and he focused his talk on the rise of authoritarianism, its root causes and possible solutions, voter apathy, the role of money in politics, and the damage it all does to society and democracy.
Dr. Martin also warned against putting the monumental task of fixing the issues with the political system on one politician or political party and urged citizen engagement.
“To me, it doesn’t appear that voting one way or another in 2024 is likely to fundamentally change the conditions that created these problems in the first place. Regardless of who wins this election, it would appear that the pulse of democracy won’t get much stronger in the US, until some new powerful force - that is truly committed to fighting for and uniting the vast majority of Americans - is built. But let me be clear, I’m not suggesting that people should not vote,” he said.
Dr. Martin also spotlighted unions and labor movements as one of the potential solutions to the issues facing the political system because of their ability to give voice to average, working Americans.
“Perhaps, with respect to our future, labor movements and unions may be a key to getting us out of this situation,” he said.
