[T]his last establishment will probably be within a mile of Charlottesville, and four from Monticello, if the system should be adopted at all by our legislature who meet within a week from this time, my hopes however are kept in check by the ordinary character of our state legislatures, the members of which do not generally possess information enough to percieve the important truths, that knolege is power, that knolege is safety, and that knolege is happiness.—Thomas Jefferson (1817)
A founding father of the American republic, a respected statesman, and a polymath, Thomas Jefferson has left a lasting legacy of lucid, prescient views on democracy, the state, and governance. One can only imagine his interest and marvel at the world of two centuries ahead of his own, a world of media, mass education, consumer culture , or global production. Perhaps his greatest awe would be the access to information and knowledge, 1 unimaginable to his contemporaries, yet taken for granted by the modern-day multitudes. Without a doubt, he would have many a question about its impacts on society and its implications for democracy. And there is no shortage of contemporary developments that would lead him not just to answers but also to a disturbed re-examination of some of his seemingly ageless pronouncements. A curious headline, “The British are frantically Googling what the E.U. is, hours after voting to leave it” (Fung 2016, emphasis added), hints to one such a scenario.
The headline, of course, refers to the June 23, 2016 decision made by the voters in the UK on their membership in the European Union (EU). The referendum was the second opportunity in the last four decades for the people to weigh in on whether to stay in the largest trading block in the world. This time the decision was different: a vehement out.
There exist many analyses of the reasons behind the so-called Brexit. While both the proximate triggers, including the salient EU immigration and the global and regional economic challenges, and the ultimate causes, including the unique British geography and history (Cooper 2016; Dennison and Carl 2016), have merit in explaining the outcomes, the referendum can be seen as a product of a miscalculated political choice. Conservative leader David Cameron promised a vote to placate his political base, to help deprive various Eurosceptic parties including the UK Independence Party (UKIP) of votes, and thus to secure his party’s victory (Calamur et al. 2016). The voters were let to the polls on the assumption they appreciated the benefits of remaining or the drawbacks of leaving the EU, and with the anticipation of a result in line with the 2014 Scottish vote to stay a part of the UK. Ultimately, political careers on both sides of the argument came to an end, and the country is left in the state of ambiguity and trepidation.
Instructive across many dimensions, this case is especially revealing of the sociocultural dynamics in the UK and beyond. First, it is the way the question was posed. “Should the United Kingdom remain a member of the European Union?” suggests a solution that can be distilled to a menu-like option—yes or no, remain or leave. The choice not only forces the voter to select the less undesirable; it also obscures the nature and gravity of the problem framed as coming squarely from the membership in the economic union.
Only when the voters woke up the next day to find their currency at 30-year lows, the markets in disarray (BBC 2016), and were exposed to the many alarmed international commentaries, they began their anxious search for answers referenced in the above headline. The remorse set in (Curtice 2016). Yet, this should not have been a surprise as many sobering analyses have been just a click away. 2 The doubt alone brings dramatic material and social implications. As one observer aptly noted:
[it is the uncertainty] about the new arrangements, which will lead to less investment, slower growth, lower pay and higher unemployment. In the long run, we will not have the same access to the European single market, which will mean lower exports, less foreign investments. It will mean that we are all poorer. (John Van Reenen as quoted in Urquhart 2016)
Going beyond economics, there are also the geopolitical consequences. Breaking from the European Union project, a successful antithesis to the continent historically fragmented and bellicose, will mean diminished British influence in Europe and globally. Now, with the British government triggering the Article 50 of the Lisbon Treaty and entering the formal secession process, Scotland is likely to push for a new independence vote that could end with the disintegration of the UK itself.
While the decision seems surprising in the age of universal literacy, instant access to virtually endless information, and the 24-hour news cycle, a closer examination of the general discourse reveals an environment conducive to these (mis)steps. Difficult, dangerous, turbulent, and out-of-control are terms deployed with frequency when framing the problems of the day. We also hear the society stands at a precipice, inflection point, or crossroads. Such statements are usually followed by simple and confident prescriptions about what we must do, how to change, or whom to tap to correct the course. And this is just one among the many streams of trivializations borne of the environment that, by design and desire, induces us to distill multifaceted dilemmas to binary choices, neglect the big picture, gloss over alternatives, or filter reality through a lens of convenience.
It is this setting that enabled the Brexit vote and molded its outcomes and the same environment that played a role in another case unfolding an ocean away. California, once a paragon of social and fiscal responsibility, is now a state with perennial deficits, runaway education costs, and a plethora of social challenges. In a series of referenda starting with Proposition 13 in 1978, the people consistently opted for increased government spending while limiting the state’s ability to draw a stable income ( The Economist 2011). Would informed citizens privy to the flaws of democratic pluralism and its short-term, interest-pleasing decisions, and inoculated to the messaging torrents of highly organized factions vote differently? Would they countenance this line of initiatives at the outset? Research shows that even with nominal guidance, citizens make different choices (Jacobs and Matthews 2012; Chapter 6).
Simplicity is comforting and appealing as it seems natural to explain, classify, organize, or navigate the world with effortless intuition and common sense. Thus, perhaps unsurprisingly, the deceptively plain choices offered to consumers, members of communities, or citizens with confidence are received with gusto and are often difficult to contest. The problem is, however, that the consequences of the above are progressively more costly. Whereas in the not-so-distant past, our decisions would have limited effect and could be reversed without much impair, today they are amplified through the various connections and dependencies among jurisdictions and carry global ramifications. Returning to the above example, the Brexit decision has caused trillion dollar market losses and led to the International Monetary Fund’s (IMF) downgrade of the global economic growth outlook for 2016 and 2017 (IMF 2016). Accordingly, this intricate sociopolitical environment where trivialization reigns requires our close attention.
Information Asymmetries and Social Change
As hinted above , there exist many more or less apt generalizations of the world today. Without engaging in a distracting debate, it can be said this era is very different from any other time in the past. One can confidently point to technology driving advances in communications and transportation, in turn opening unparalleled opportunities at a global scale. But there is another, less obvious but equ...