Reinventing How This Game Is Played; Who Should Do It? (2016) This chapter examines the question of who should reinvent the game—namely, how is it played and by whom. There is no single magic answer to this complex question. What I can say, however, is that reinventing the game is an essential activity, and it is incumbent upon every citizen to be part of the process, and for the public, more broadly, to be aware that it should be involved. The process of reinvention should begin with a complete redefinition of the game—who is entitled to the game's benefits, what is the game's mission, and what are its rules? The redefinition of game can only take place when the game's true purpose becomes apparent. Only when the public understands that the game was not designed with their welfare in mind will they begin to challenge its rules, demand more transparency, and demand a greater commitment from the architects of the game to fulfill its true purpose, in their view. I have made this argument in several places, notably in the second edition of my book, Reinventing the Rules: The Future of American Politics.5 Reinventing the game means reinventing its purpose and design—beginning at the conceptual stage when the game is conceptualized. I believe this can only happen if there is a public debate about the purpose and design of the game. I have argued that the process of reinvention should also include a new social contract between the citizens and the designers of the game. There is currently no consensus about how a good social contract should look, much less that there is a template that should be followed to create it. In my opinion, citizens' only way to influence the process is to keep pressuring for a new social contract—which should include transparency, accountability, and participation rights. In addition, citizens must demand that the game be redesigned to serve the common good, and that it be designed with the participation of the public at large and with their well-being and purpose in mind. In short, they should demand that the game be designed to promote democratic principles of fairness, equality, justice, and participation. If people reject these demands, they will become part of the problem, and if they don't join the process of reinvention, they will not have an influence over how the game will be changed. One reason for this lack of political involvement by the public is that many Americans are confused about their role in the democratic process. I wrote an essay on this issue in 1999,8 and I have been trying to make the point in many of my articles.9 For example, I have argued that a citizen can be both a consumer and a participant, which to some may seem like splitting hairs, but I have also argued that a citizen is a worker and a shareholder—which may sound confusing, but if you think about it, these terms describe separate and distinct classes of citizens who often view their citizenship differently. But we cannot have a healthy democracy when large numbers of people view the political system as a consumption apparatus—that is, as a place to consume free services, without being responsible for the system that produces them. This is essentially what the Tea Party movement represents: large numbers of Americans who want a share in the profits and benefits of the game without participating in the way that's necessary to build and preserve a vibrant democracy. This is not to say that the government and its citizens should produce or consume the same products and services. The problem is that there is too much inequality in our political process, which produces two classes of workers, and the vast majority of citizens have been denied the benefits and benefits of their participation. This is a result of our political system: an undemocratic system of winners and losers in which government creates winners at the expense of the losers. This political system is a product of the Founders' and Framers' ideology: a view of democracy that does not value or encourage the equal participation of citizens, and a view of competition that is a form of war. It is time for the many to change the conversation, and the public has a responsibility to demand transparency and openness. The public also needs to recognize that the success of our democratic processes and institutions requires the active participation of the many. If the public is not involved in the process of reinventing how this game is played, the result will be an authoritarian society that will deprive people of the ability to effectively participate in a democracy. The result will be the kind of society we have today—a society in which the many have been deprived of their rightful voice and the ability to shape their futures, one they had worked so hard to help create and keep safe. It is therefore crucial that the citizens, along with those elected officials who also work tirelessly to reinvent the game, understand that reinvention requires them to reach across political and other boundaries to overcome the obstacles to a more perfect union. This kind of progress requires new approaches. If reinvention is to take place, it must involve not only the elected officials, but it should include a vast array of actors who should be held accountable to the public—all of whom are committed to a just and equitable future for all. Let me end by echoing a sentiment I expressed many years ago in an article I wrote: I am an active believer in our founding principles, the principles of this country. I believe that all of our founding fathers would have felt the same way about the present state of our democracy that our founders felt about the Articles of Confederation, which limited the power of democracy. That is because all of them believed that democracy should promote the values of liberty and justice, and that there should be more than one class of citizen—not one citizen class and one class of servants. And they believed that the public should be kept informed about all aspects of the government. ## Notes 1. The phrase "democracy is in decline" was made famous by Harvard sociologist Robert Dahl, who used it in his book How Democratic Is the American Constitution? to describe how the role of government in society was being reduced. As Dahl pointed out, the framers of the Constitution understood that democracy was in decline in many places, including their own. They wanted to preserve democracy by limiting political power. But they were optimistic, as they had no experience with the emerging technologies that would take power from government and place it in the hands of the people. 2. Peter Thiel, "The Age of Responsibility," The Financial Times, August 22, 2011, . 3. Gerald Vizenor, Manifest Manners: Narratives on Post-Syllabus Narratives, (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1998), 8. 4. Ibid., 3–4. 5. Martha C. Nussbaum, Reinventing the Rules: The Regulation of Public Bodies, (Washington, DC: American Enterprise Institute, 2009). 6. Nussbaum, Reinventing the Rules, 10. 7. Ibid. 8. My "Crisis in Democracy: How the Public and the Players Are Misunderstanding the Reforms" was originally published in the Fall 2003 edition of Social Policy magazine. . 9. Among them, "Reinventing the Game: Why We Need a National Dialog on the State of the Democratic System in the United States," May 30, 2015, . Chapter 2 # Reinventing the Players The people who decide what the game should be like and who have a major impact on how the game is played are the public. Citizens have the potential to act as agents of change. But for many years, citizens have viewed their citizenship as the equivalent of buying an app to use on their cell phones. The game has grown into a complicated game in which the rules are not known and may even change by the time you read this book. Nevertheless, while the game has expanded into other domains, the central domain of politics—the domain of who plays—has shrunk. Citizens have seen their role as essentially passive: to consume the services or products that have been created by the people in power. But as citizens and citizens alone are responsible for the continued existence of our democracy, they should not see their role as passive or merely consuming. We are experiencing an unprecedented time of political disenfranchisement and disinterest. Citizens have not been granted an adequate share of the game's benefits and benefits, and they have been denied their fair share of political power and authority. Yet, despite the fact that they have seen the game's rules change for the worse, most people have remained passive—and for good reason: the game is not theirs. We are not in the habit of saying, "I want to play." For citizens to become agents of change—agents who are motivated to reinvent the game and change it in the direction they prefer—they must do three things. First, they must begin playing in new arenas. In other words, citizens should look for ways to play that aren't about consumption—