From the time the American people separated from England on July 4th 1776, the American political system has been a combination of different parties each with their own ideas and beliefs. While this competitive system has helped encourage development as a society, it has also led to social divide and controversy in recent years. No matter what an individual’s beliefs are, democratic or republican, political ideologies will conflict and arguments will be formed. The question at hand is not; why have we developed this social controversy? It is, how can we use this controversy to get better, and what would our country be like without it. I believe that social movements play a critical role in the overall development that the American society goes through. Without them, we as the people encourage a less diverse and progressive society which only results in more oppression.

To understand the importance of social movement and political unrest that our country has gone through, one must go back to the beginning when America separated themselves from England in 1776. Two groups existed in our society with drastically different opinions. There was a group of England loyalists who believed in supporting the King of England and paying taxes in his name. There was another group of people who believed in the independence of America and what this country could be on its own. Among them was Thomas Jefferson who would later become one of our founding fathers. His philosophy of “moral rationalism” pushed the believe of individual and equal rights. Jefferson was attracted to this idea of moral rationalism because it essentially believed that, “political conclusion can be inferred from a self-evident premise” (Gerber 587). This is essentially saying that political ideas and regulations can come from within the moral conscience and is something that should be obvious to everyone. Eventually, this would become the premise for the declaration of independence and would become a cornerstone of American philosophy for years to come. This idea of moral rationalism can be closely compared to many of the social movements that go on today. The prominent “Black Lives Matter” movement is another way of fighting for the equal rights of every man and woman. In this case, the unfair treatment is being argued by a minority of our country rather than separation from someone else’s power like in the times of Thomas Jefferson. The importance of the connection between these two social movements from completely different time periods isn’t necessarily what the “Black Lives Matter” movement is truly about. The importance is that without someone fighting for the rights of an individual like Thomas Jefferson did, our country would not be in existence, we would still be under the rules of England, being oppressed and being treated unfairly. This is the value of social movements. Without them, our countries political agenda would never be questioned, never be changed. This is where the argument can be made that political unrest will lead to some good and development as a country instead of looking at it from a negative and destructive standpoint. The idea is that with patience and the proper reasoning for fighting for a cause, the issues that people need resolved will be accomplished through the work of people like Thomas Jefferson.

Political unrest that America is going through now is the result of more than just conflicting ideas. Media plays a large role in the issues that our country is currently facing. The way information is portrayed is what has caused so much turmoil in recent years. This can be examined by journalist Daniel Allen, Rick Perlstein, and Daniel Schlozman when they state how “Too much stress has built up along too many ideological and demographic fault lines for things to remain the way they are” (The Nation). It is the overall idea that change is upon us and maybe our current political structure does not support a healthy and functioning society. The current system is composed of two political parties. The Democratic party and the Republican party. In the most recent election, the Republican party was represented by our current president, Donald Trump. These by far are the two most popular parties and have taken majority of the votes every election. This has encouraged competition between the two parties and has led to close elections that has encouraged our overall development as a society. Every presidential election the battle between these two parties means that at least there isn’t one group winning every year with the same ideas and same representation. The problem begins when one side begins to attack another. These two parties have become so big that media outlets are often times have tendencies where they believe in one political parties opinion more than the other. For example, CNN is a notorious liberal media outlet that will often times show bias in articles towards the democratic party. The issue now becomes when CNN portrays information to hurt another political party and their candidate rather than just portraying information in a non-bias way. This form of attacking has led to a trend of bitter fights and accusations with every election. Danielle Allen explains what the future holds by saying “speculating on what the future holds for America’s political alignment requires thinking through a complex array of factors: voting rules, political egos, the time horizons of charismatic leaders, questions of succession, the intensity of carious ideological commitments, and a famously mutable public opinion. What we are most likely to see is the new normal: incredibly bitter fights among plurality-sized groups for total-if temporary- control of one of the major parties” (The Nation). In her words, she is saying that the new normal in politics is nothing more than fighting amongst individuals in order to sway public opinion in his or her favor and gain representation of one of the two political parties. Politics has become so much more than fighting for the rights of the people. It has become a money generating operation that is focused more around fooling the public through information control rather than convincing someone to believe in you based off of a politician’s ideologies and beliefs. Another argument in regards to competition can be made based on voter turnout. “Recent research suggests that rigorous party competition can promote more active citizens by encouraging higher voter turnout and other forms of political participation” (Flavin and Schufield). This adds on to the previous argument made that a strong competition between two parties will result in more people voting and wanting his or her opinion to be heard. This is how progression is made in society and how more issues are resolved rather than constant leadership with the same ideas and same political figures. These are all things that can benefit us as a society.

Another sign of political issues can be seen in polls that help show the feelings of citizens in our country. For example, unrest can be seen in our presidential approval rating. Historically, when times have been tough approval ratings have been low because people feel as though the representatives they voted into office are not getting the job done. The last president to have an average approval rating of over 60% was John F. Kennedy (Gallup). The past two presidents, Barrack Obama and George W. Bush, have had average approval ratings below 50% (Gallup) This can be linked to some of the economic stress that America has been dealing with over the recent years. This likely has sparked some of the issues in society that we have been dealing with and is likely to be the cause of social issues. People are stressed, times are tough which causes a call for change. On top of poor approval ratings for our president, another poll shows that Congress’ job approval ratings “reached record lows for two consecutive years and now hovers around 15%” (Riffkin). The connection between record breaking statistics and growing turmoil is no coincidence. When times get tough people want change. This is natural and an important part of how a democracy works. Without it, nothing would be accomplished. It is obvious that when people don’t approve of the president and the work he is doing in order to make our country a better place, people will want change and to fix the issues that they see in our society.

The idea that the two main political parties, Republican and Democratic, are soon to be on the way out is very possible. Donald Trump represented the Republican party in this last election. The interesting thing about this situation is that majority of his beliefs and standpoints do not line up with the traditional beliefs of a true Republican. For example, the Republican party has been considered the party of free trade for a long time. The beliefs of free trade are based on the fact that it helps American consumers because they will, “pay less for products and (it) benefits U.S. companies and workers who are able to sell more goods overseas” (LA Times). This has been a staple of the Republican party, and it is something that does not align with Trumps beliefs. While he says he believes in free trade, there have been cases where what he says shows otherwise. In Pennsylvania he gave a speech where he was critical of multiple trade pacts including, “The North American Free Trade Agreement and the Trans Pacific Partnership” (LA Times).  He considered these trade pacts “Bad Deals” and threatened to withdraw from them. This is just one example of how a candidate from a major political party has beliefs that does not align with the ideas of the respective party. The question now becomes is this a good or a bad thing? One may say it is a bad thing because how can you have someone represent a political party, in this case the Republican party, and then they don’t even believe in what the party truly stand for. While this makes sense, the opposition to this argument is that without people changing the “status quo” and fighting against the conformity of a certain political party, we would continue to have the same representation with the same beliefs which does not encourage growth and development. If every political representative believed in the same thing just because that is what the party has always believed, where is growth with the times? New issues come into play every election. With new issues requires new ideas and new methods of accomplishing the goal of a healthy and sustainable society. 

Based off of what people in our country have been fighting for, the question at hand becomes this, when does social activism change from progressive, to damaging in our society. Without people like Martin Luther King Jr. fighting for what they believed is right, there would have been no progression as a nation. The main theme that people seem to be fighting for in recent years has revolved around one thing, responsibility. People just want politicians to be responsible for our society because the decisions that they make in office are the ones that will have a direct impact on the future of the country. To answer the question, “how can we use controversy to become better as a country?” we must look at what it is that people are fighting for. This is often times where the controversy arises because one group believes in one fight while another believes it isn’t worth it at all. This grey area of ideas and politics can only be resolved with looking at how it helps benefit our society as a whole. One major issue we have been dealing with as a nation is the environmental movement which fights to preserve natural resources and sanctity of our planet. This is a battle that is for the common good of every individual. It is fighting to preserve the earth that we all share and use. The call to action here is from a group of individuals who see the value in this fight and they are attempting to bring it to the attention of the political leaders who job is to be responsible for all of us. The connection between social movements and political unrest can be seen on a deeper level with this specific example. As a result of people fighting for this cause, a new political party was created, known as the Green Party. The significance of this is that the social movement became so strong that it created a group of political leaders whose main goal is to fight for the environment and against corporate America. This is a perfect example of how a social movement is helping progress our society forward. Not only is the fight for a good cause, it is now creating political competition by creating a third party that will provide competition against the two main political parties we have in place.

Politics is something that has always resulted in controversy and arguments in America. Without it we would not be where we are today as a society. We in fact would not be independent without the work of social activist who believed hundreds of years ago that we had the right to separate from the rule of England and become our own establishment. The question arises is when does this become destructive to our society and what can we do to make sure that this does not happen. Establishment of the Green party is an example of how a social movement is working in politics to fix a problem that people see value in.  The political parties have issues amongst them that will never be completely resolved. Instead, it is important to use the differences between groups to create a better society. Use it as progression rather than a destructive force that is detrimental to our society rather than something that builds it up.
