Skocpol - Will 9-11 and the War on Terror Revitalize American Civic Democracy

7/28/2019 Skocpol - Will 9-11 and the War on Terror Revitalize American Civic Democracy

1/5

Will 9/11 and the War on Terror Revitalize American Civic Democracy?

Author(s): Theda SkocpolSource: PS: Political Science and Politics, Vol. 35, No. 3 (Sep., 2002), pp. 537-540Published by: American Political Science AssociationStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1554683

Accessed: 24/10/2008 02:26

Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use, available at

http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp. JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use provides, in part, that unless

you have obtained prior permission, you may not download an entire issue of a journal or multiple copies of articles, and you

may use content in the JSTOR archive only for your personal, non-commercial use.

Please contact the publisher regarding any further use of this work. Publisher contact information may be obtained athttp://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=apsa.

Each copy of any part of a JSTOR transmission must contain the same copyright notice that appears on the screen or printed

page of such transmission.

JSTOR is a not-for-profit organization founded in 1995 to build trusted digital archives for scholarship. We work with the

scholarly community to preserve their work and the materials they rely upon, and to build a common research platform that

promotes the discovery and use of these resources. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected].

American Political Science Association is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to

PS: Political Science and Politics.
http://www.jstor.org/stable/1554683?origin=JSTOR-pdfhttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=apsahttp://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=apsahttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/stable/1554683?origin=JSTOR-pdf


2/5

W i l l 9 / 1 1 a n d t h e W a r o n T e r r o rRevitalize American C i v i c Democracy?

O bserversof American ife have seen asilverliningin the darkclouds thatbillowedfrom the Twin TowersandthePentagon n September 1, 2001.Alongwiththe horrorwroughtby the terrorist ttacks amean outpouringf solidarity ndpatriotism-asuddenchangeof heart or manyAmericanswho,prior o thatfatefulday,had seemedto bedriftingnexorablyowardndividualism,elf-absorption,ndcynicaldisinterestn publicaffairs.As StanleyGreenberg2001)aptlyputsit, suddenly he "we"matteredmore thanthe"me."Peoplereachedout to familymembers,neighbors, ndfriends,whileproudlydeclaringtheirmembershipn the Americannationalcommunity.Seventy percentof Americansreportedlygave time or moneyto charitiesattemptingohelp the victimsof 9/11 (Independent ector2001). Anonymouscommuter uburbs n NewJerseysuddenlyorganized o provideconstantcare for dozens of families who lost lovedones.' In the days and weeks after9/11, morethanfour-fifthsof AmericansdisplayedtheU.S. flag on homes,cars and trucks,andclothing.2Andby AmericansdeclaredTheda Skocpol, renewedtrust in thefederalgovernmentHarvardUniversity to "do the rightthing."In April2000, only 29% said

they felt such trust"always"or "mostof the time,"but 64%expressedsuch faith in a poll takenshortlyafter9/11.3In important espects,popular eactionso9/11 and thesubsequentight against erroristsin Afghanistanesemblewhathappenedn pre-vious U.S. wars.Despitegrievousepisodesofrepression ndexclusion,U.S. warshavepro-moted civic vitality. n a nationwhosecitizensare famousfor theirproclivity o organizeandjoin voluntary endeavors, outbreaks of martialconflict have sparkedvoluntaristupsurges thatrepeatedly carried over into postwar eras.The American revolutionary struggleagainst Great Britain was waged and won bycommittees of correspondence and volunteermilitias-and the era during and after therevolution brought the first great explosion ofvoluntary group formation in the new nation(Brown 1974). The Civil War of 1861 to1865 was fought and supported by volunteers(with the military draft responsible for atmost 15% of the men who fought). In turn,the Union victory unleashed fresh rounds ofcivic organizing by men and women whomodeled peacetime association building on

war mobilizations. At national and locallevels alike, the foundations of modemAmericancivic life were laid as the CivilWargenerationmaturedbetweenthe 1860sand the 1910s (for details and references,seeSkocpol2003, ch. 2). Thereafter,U.S. in-volvements in World Wars I and II broughtnew partnerships etweengovernmentagen-cies andfederatedvoluntaryassociations.Fromthe Red Crossand the YMCA to tradeunionsandbusiness and professionalgroups,from the General Federation of Women'sClubs and the PTA to dozens of fraternalgroups, voluntaryassociationscontributed i-tally to WorldWarmobilizations-and, in theprocess,gainednew infusionsof dues-payingmembers Skocpolet al. 2002).Understandably,he dramatic hifts regis-tered in post-9/11 surveys have encouragedobservers o speculate hatAmerica'scurrentwartimecrisis may againspurcivic revitaliza-tion (cf. Galston2001; Putnam2002).4Butdeeperconsideration f the conditions hatal-lowed past wars to contribute o civic engage-mentsuggests why today'sconflictmightturnout differently.n the Civil War and WorldWarsI and II, new attitudes oincidedwithgovernment fforts to mobilize the citizenryfor war,andpreexistingmembership ssocia-tions channeledpopularparticipation. ut sofar in this new crisis,official efforts to mobi-lize citizens havebeen sporadicand weak,while existingcivic organizations rovidefewchannels or group nvolvement.Politicalscientistsneed not rely on attitudesurveysalone to assess possibilitiesfor civicrenewal n America'snew waron terror.Historicalcomparisonsbringinto sharper e-lief the full set of attitudinal nd institutionalfactorsthat influence he civic impactof war.

Attitudes Shift at the Outbreakof WarFor long-pastwars,we do not have na-tionalsurveyscomparableo the opinionpollsthatenable us to trackattitudinalhangesto-day. Qualitative videncenevertheless evealsthatoutpourings f patrioticandcommunitysentiment accompanied the onset of conflict inApril 1861, April 1917, and December 1941.Newspapers,organizationaleclarations, om-munitydemonstrations,nd personalmemoirsall providerelevantevidence.Whenwarsbreak out-and especially when the nation isattacked-millions of Americans becomeaware of their shared national identity and arewillingto worktogetheron local and nationalresponses o the crisis.

PSOnlinewww.apsanet.org 537


3/5

Government Authorities May-or May Not-Call for Mass MobilizationIf popularattitudes nvariably hift with the outbreak fwar,the willingnessof government uthorities o orchestratevoluntary itizenparticipationariesconsiderably, ependingon the natureof the conflict and the capacitiesof government.Moder warsrequiremajordomestic as well as militarycom-mitments,but governmentbureaucraciesnly sometimespos-sess the capacitiesand resources o act directly.Whenthe U.S. federalgovernmentuddenly ound itself chal-lenged by a massivesecessionistmovementn 1861,for exam-ple, PresidentAbrahamLincolndesperately eededorganizedvolunteer ontributions. t thatpoint,U.S. standingarmiescon-sisted of a mere16,000 men, mostly deployed n theWest,andled by a smallcorpsof aging professional fficers,manyofwhom "wentSouth" o fightfor the Confederacy.n the Northand South alike-but especially n the North-the Civil Warwas foughtby an outpouring f militaryvolunteers ssembledby local communityeaders,combined nto state-levelunits,andknittogether o form the UnionArmy.To supporthe troopsandorganizerelief effortsat home,womenand oldermencre-ated similarvolunteer ederations-the forerunner f whatwould laterbecome the AmericanRed Cross.Federalbureaucracieswere moredevelopedby the outbreakof WorldWarI thanin the 1860s. Nevertheless,executiveagencieshad little capacityto reachdirectlyinto local com-munities and individualhomes, so they turned o the nationaland state leadersof voluntary ederations or the organiza-tional networks hey needed to rundrives to conserve food-stuffs and sell LibertyBonds, campaigns or relief andmilitaryrecruitment, nd campaigns o maximizeeconomicproduction.Federalauthoritiesalso encouragedprofessionalsand managers o come together n new associations o helpmanagenationalprojects.Wartimemobilizationsspawnedmanynew voluntaryassociations,and existing groups gainedvisibilityand recuited new memberswhen they cooperatedwith government.By the time the United StatesfoughtWorldWarII, govern-mentcapacitieswere sufficientlydeveloped hat authorities id

not need voluntary roupsas badlyas in 1917. Yet it was clearfrom the start hat this conflict would be massive, engthy,andcostly.Remembering ow WorldWarI was fought,U.S. offi-cials saw advantagesn gettingmasses of Americansdirectlyinvolved.Conservation ndfund-raising riveswere rerun nmuch the sameway as in 1917-19, with women'sgroups,fraternal roups, he Red Cross,the Knightsof Columbus,heYMCA,and hundreds f professional, usiness,and ethnicassociations alleduponto mobilizetheirmembers o contributeto the war effort.Again, membershipsn voluntary ssociationssurged orward nto the postwarera.In the post-9/11waragainstterrorism,U.S. authorities avenot been so eagerto engage in mass mobilization.Obviously,this is a differentkind of conflict,waged by a relativelysmallnumberof highly trainedprofessionalmilitarypersonnelbackedby a few newly mobilizedNationalGuardunits. Anall-out war againstthe Iraqiregime may eventuallyrequireanew U.S. militarydraft,but the initialmilitaryefforts inAfghanistanhave not. What is more,in 2001 and early2002,heightenedhomelandsecuritymeasuresand efforts to copewith the anthrax careseemedto call for professionals,notcitizen volunteers.The nation also faced an economic slow-down, yet reigningRepublicandeas led officials to put theirfaithin tax cuts andconsumerspendingas remedies.Given all of this, in the monthsfollowing9/11, federalofficialssuch as Directorof HomelandSecurityTomRidgestressedmanagerial oordination ndprofessional xpertise.

With limited U.S. militaryquotasfilled,volunteerswere turnedaway.To be sure,PresidentGeorgeW. Bush sporadicallycalled on Americans o volunteer n their communities.But hisappealsseemedlargely symbolic,not connected o vitalwartimeactivities,even as Bush administration fficialsvisiblypuzzledover what to do with volunteers.5 residentBush didnot launchany big new civic effort,such as mandatory a-tional service for youngAmericans.6nstead, or weeks after9/11, his most prominent ppealswere commercial ather hancivic. The TravelIndustryAssociationof Americaestimatedthattwo-thirdsof Americans aw the President tarringn atelevision advertisementallingfor people to express"courage" y takingmoretrips.And the president epeatedlyaskedpeople to go shopping o stimulate he economy.Ifenduring magesof WorldWarsI and II featuredpostersofUncle Sam encouraging itizens to do theirduty, perhapsweneed a revised versionposterto capture he mainpresidentialmessagein 2001!Civic Organizations Channel Participation

In historicwars,citizens were eagerto volunteerand thefederalgovernment ngagedin mass mobilization.Yet the na-ture of existingvoluntaryassociationsat the time of the CivilWar and the WorldWars also contributed o wartimemobi-lizationsand helpedto sustaingains in civic connectedness.Fromthe early 1800s until the 1960s, membership-basedvoluntaryassociationswere at the center of Americanpubliclife (for further vidence andcitations,see Skocpol2003,chapters1-3). Leadersestablished ivic reputations y helpingto organize ellow citizens into membership roups.Clubs,lodges, and posts were as ubiquitousas churchesandschools-and most local membership roupswere linked to-gether nto state and national ederations.When nationalcrisesstruck, herefore, eadersknewhow to mobilizefellow citi-zens, andtherewere well-worn nstitutional hannels hroughwhichpeoplecould worktogetherandpool resources.After the 1960s, however,U.S. civic life was radicallyre-organized Skocpol 1999; Skocpol 2003, chapters4-5). In thewake of the Civil Rightsand feministmovements, raditional

PS September200238


4/5

chapter-basedmembership federations, most of which had been SEPT.racially and gender segregated, failed to attractmany youngermembers. The war in Vietnam, ultimately unpopular and mili-tarily unsuccessful, rendered traditional patriotic associationsless appealing to many Americans. Challenged by movementsand defections from below, traditional voluntary associationswere also bypassed in national politics by professionally man-aged advocacy associations, which proliferated in the 1970sand 1980s. Professionally run citizen-advocacy groups oftenhad no individual members at all, or else recruited monetarycontributions through the mail (Berry 1977, 1999). At the stateand local levels, meanwhile, nonprofit social agencies prolifer-ated. Like advocacy groups, these are professionally managedcivic organizations that raise money from donors, governmentagencies, or mailing-list adherents, rather than from memberswho attend meetings and pay regular dues.Well before the crisis of 9/11, therefore, professionally ? Joe Heller,Gimanaged associations and institutions had become central toAmerican civic life. Churches remain vital centers of mem-bership activity in many U.S. communities, but other kinds in civic attitucof membership associations have dwindled or disappeared. behavior. NotWhen a national crisis happens nowadays, there are fewer terrorist attackwell-established channels through which people can volunteer net upward juitogether-and fewer ways to link face-to-face activities in Wartime crilocal communities to state and national projects. Throughout solidarity, butmuch of American history in war and peace, voluntary mem- and availablebership federations teamed up with local, state, and national ple to act togepublic officials to pursue important public projects (Skocpol less of a gap 12003, ch. 3). But today, partnerships between civic organiza- Americans airtions and government are primarily a matter of collaborations prior to 9/11-among professionals. government ofAgainst this background, we can better understand why, some evidencefollowing 9/11, Americans suddenly displayed new attitudes Pew Researchof social solidarity and trust in government, while barely perceived religchanging their patterns of civic participation. I prepared gious behaviorFigure 1 using data gathered by Robert D. Putnam in a na- were already rtionally representative panel survey conducted months before Bush backed rand, again, months after 9/11. As the figure shows, net gains and appealed 1

Figure 1After September 11, 2001, American CivicAttitudesChanged More Than Behavior

56%i s 0%-- Pa

I 10%I

Data from Putnam2002).

TUDES CIVICEHAInet ere14.7% Increa of

AII. r,I

KRSwt - 13.9% - ho-up

4.

rl CHARITIESI IOTERCHARTmEsI

Sol EL . .

reen Bay PressGazette.

les were much greater than net gains in civicsurprisingly, given the spectacular nature of the:s, the one sort of activity that exhibited a bigmp after 9/11 was mass TV viewing.ses may immediately evoke attitudes of civicsome combination of government mobilizationorganizational channels is needed to enable peo-:ther.If this hypothesis is true, we should seebetween attitudinal and behavioral change amongeady engaged with membership associations-and we should see positive responses whenffers new opportunities to participate. There ison both scores. According to a report from theCenter (2001), a large majority of Americansgionto be more important after 9/11, yet reli-rs changed very little, except among people whoregularchurchgoers. Moreover, after Presidentnodest expansions in national service programsto Americans to join, applications to AmeriCorpsand related programs shot up.Institutional shifts also help us to

understand imbalances in U.S. charityfollowing 9/11. Prior to the 1960s,charitable giving was typically chan-neled through chapter-based federa-tions, which took advantage of wartimesensibilities to raise resources both forthe immediate crisis and for long-runorganizational and community needs.Federations with thousands of localrv - chapters could also move funds around-u to meet a variety of needs. Yet U.S.18% charities today are highly professional-\ - ized operations, very dependent onmedia-drivenmessagesto attract

money from contributors who expecttheir money to go exactly where theadvertisements promise. After 9/11,U.S. charities were inundated withcontributions if they advertised plans tohelp the victims of the terrorist attacks.But if charities tried to bank resourcesfor general needs, they could get intotrouble-as did the American RedCross, when a national "scandal" brokeout over its attempts to devote somepost-9/11 donations to other needs(Sontag 2001). Furthermore,in the

PSOnlinewww.apsanet.org

I?*WF?

539


5/5

monthsafter9/11, charities hatroutinely elpthe poorin com-munitiesacross he United Stateswere starvedor necessary e-sources.7 ood banksand other ocal agencieswereout of themedia imelightas theirregulardonorsgave to 9/11 causes.An Urge to Act-but How?

The American"public eels urgeto act-but how?"askedaninsightful rticleappearingn the Christian cienceMonitornotlong after he terroristttacksof 9/11 (McLaughlin001). "WhatAmericans rebeingcalleduponto do-live normalives-hardly eemsheroic.UnlikeduringWorldWarII, citizensaren'tneeded o roll bandagesor GIs or collectscrapmetal to makeairplanes."My analysisof the rootsof war-encouragedpurtsncivic engagementuggests hat, ndeed,Americansince 9/11maybe willingto do morethantheyhavebeen askedto do bygovernment,ndmore thantheyhavebeen allowed o do, giventhe structuref existingcivic organizations.If they persist,post-9/11attitude hifts towardpatriotism,trust,andcommunity esponsibilitymay contributeo electoral

Notes1. Andrew Jacobs, "TownSheds Its Anonymityto Comfort theBereaved,"New YorkTimes, 14 October2001, sec. B.2. William Risser and Sam Ward,"USA Today Snapshots:Starsand

StripesFlying High,"USA Today, 19 October 1001, sec. A.3. Dana Milbank and RichardMorin, "Poll: Americans' Trust inGovernmentGrows," WashingtonPost, (June 28, 2002).4. See also E.J. Dionne Jr.,"Our New Spiritof Community,"BostonGlobe, 26 December 2001, sec. A.

ReferencesBerry, JeffreyM. 1977. Lobbying or the People: The Political Behavior ofPublic InterestGroups.Princeton,NJ: PrincetonUniversityPress... 1999. The New Liberalism:The Rising Power of Citizen Groups.Washington,DC: BrookingsInstitutionPress.Brown, RichardD. 1974. "TheEmergenceof UrbanSociety in RuralMassachusetts,1760-1820." Journalof AmericanHistory61(1): 29-51.Galston,William A. 2001. "CanPatriotismBe Turned nto Civic Engage-ment?"Chronicleof Higher Education,November 16, B16.Greenberg,StanleyB. 2001. "'We'-Not 'Me': Public Opinionand theReturnof Government."The AmericanProspect,December 17, 25-27.Independent ector.2001. "A Surveyof CharitableGivingAfterSeptember11, 2001."October23, 1-10. .McLaughlin,Abraham.2001. "Public Feels Urge to Act-But How?"Christian Science Monitor, October 16, 1, 11.Pew ResearchCenter.2001. "Post9-11 Attitudes:Religion More Prominent,Muslim-AmericansMoreAccepted."Onlinereport romthe PewResearchCenterfor The People and The Press. .

trends and changes in individual behavior, especially amongyoung people just coming of age. There is, however, little evi-dence that 9/11 and its martial aftermath led to any immediateupsurge in collective voluntary activities at all comparable tothe upsurges associated with historic wars. This twenty-first-century conflict has different requirements, and Americans to-day live in a very different governmental and civic universethan their forebears-a changed public world in which politi-cal authorities and nonprofit organizations rely on professionalmanagement and media messages rather than on organizedpopular participation.

Terroristattacks and the commitment of U.S. forces toarmed combat abroad may have aroused the usual patrioticand communal feelings, but the outbreak of this war could notsuddenly remake the institutional face of American civicdemocracy. Absent organizational innovations and new publicpolicies, therefore, the reinvigorated sense of the American"we" that was born of the travails of 9/11 may well graduallydissipate, leaving only ripples on the managerial routines ofcontemporary U.S. civic life.

5. Alison Mitchell, "Asking for Volunteers,GovernmentTries to De-termine What They Will Do," New YorkTimes, 10 November 2001,sec. B.6. AlbertR. Hunt,"Waitingor the Call,"WallStreetJournal,30 March2002, sec. A.7. Winnie Hu, "Outpouringor Sept. 11 GroupsMeans Less for FoodBanks,"New YorkTimes,21 November 2001, sec. B.

Putnam,Robert. 2002. "Bowling Together:The United State of America."TheAmerican Prospect, February11, 20-22.Skocpol, Theda. 1999. "AdvocateswithoutMembers:The Recent Trans-formationof AmericanCivic Life." In Civic Engagement n AmericanDemocracy, ed. Theda Skocpol and Morris P. Fiorina.New York andWashington,DC: Russell Sage Foundationand BrookingsInstitutionPress.- . 2003. Diminished Democracy: FromMembership o Management nAmerican Civic Life. RothbaumLecture Series. Norman:University ofOklahomaPress.- , et al. 2002. "PatrioticPartnerships:Why GreatWars NourishedAmericanCivic Voluntarism."n Shapedby Warand Trade:InternationalInfluenceson AmericanPoliticalDevelopment, d. IraKatznelsonandMartinShefter.Princeton,NJ: PrincetonUniversityPress.Sontag, Deborah.2001. "WhoBroughtBernadineHealy Down?"NewYorkTimesMagazine, December 23, 32-40, 52-55.

PS September200240

Documents

Skocpol - Will 9-11 and the War on Terror Revitalize American Civic Democracy