The End of Inequality
The End of Inequality
复制标题
不平等的终结
DOI：
10.1089/elj.2009.8102
复制
发表时间：
2009
影响因子：
7.5
通讯作者：
Grant M. Hayden
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Grant M. Hayden
“一人一票”是有史以来最具吸引力的政治口号之一，它在某种程度上体现了平等主义的情绪，近乎一句格言。这一短语体现在现代宪法的要求中，即大多数政治区必须划分为包含相同数量的人，从而使个人选票的数量权力相等。虽然这一要求现在被广泛接受为民主选区划分的自然特征，但情况并不总是如此。就在半个世纪前，地区人口的差异很大，集中和稀释了居住在这些地区的人的投票权。然后，从20世纪60年代开始，最高法院大胆地走进了“政治丛林”，将一人一票的标准强加于全国几乎每个政治区。这本名为《不平等的终结》的新书成功地(有时令人窒息地)讲述了重新分配革命及其后果的故事。与书名不谋而合的是，这本书的核心主张是，一人一票的标准最终不仅使选票平等，而且使政治权力平等。但这本书，就像它所倡导的标准一样，并没有完全达到它的承诺。这本书的前三分之一很好地详细描述了历史分配不当问题的范围以及其原因和后果。如今，当人口偏差以个位数的百分比(在某些情况下，是用少数人)来衡量时，很难充分认识到到20世纪50年代末，差距已经扩大到了什么程度。在一个典型的州，最大和最小立法选区之间的人口差异在20比1的数量级上；在几个州，这一比例上升到数百。与当时的几位评论员一样，作者将地区之间的人口差异转化为少数人统治，以传达这个问题的全部影响：在许多州，不到四分之一人口的少数人选出了立法机构至少一个议院的多数席位。如此明确地背离多数人规则的概念，需要一个解决方案。人口巨大偏离的根源是一个众所周知的故事。在二十世纪上半叶，面对人口从农村地区向日益增长的城市和郊区的重大转变，州立法者拒绝重新划定选区边界。他们不情愿的动机是自我保护--立法者不打算重新划分自己的权力--并导致农村政治权力的集中。在这个基本故事中，作者巧妙地添加了几个被忽视的方面，这些方面阻碍了政治解决方案的不当分配问题。例如，城市受到竞争对手的困扰-
“ONE PERSON, ONE VOTE” is one of the most appealing political slogans of all time, capturing egalitarian sentiment in something approaching an aphorism. The phrase is embodied in the modern constitutional requirement that most political districts must be drawn to contain the same number of people, thus equalizing the numerical power of individual votes. While the requirement is now widely accepted as a natural feature of democratic districting, this was not always the case. Just a half century ago, there were tremendous variations in district populations, concentrating and diluting the voting power of people living in those districts. Then, beginning in the 1960s, the Supreme Court boldly stepped into the “political thicket” and imposed the one person, one vote standard on almost every political district in the country. This new volume, The End of Inequality, is a triumphantly (and, at times, breathlessly) told story of the reapportionment revolution and its aftermath. True to its title, the book’s central claim is that the one person, one vote standard ultimately equalized not just votes, but political power. But the book, like the standard it champions, does not quite live up to its promise.The first third of the book nicely details the scope of the historical malapportionment problem as well as its causes and effects. These days, when population deviations are measured in single-digit percentages (and, in some cases, by handfuls of people), it’s difficult to fully appreciate how large the disparities had grown by the late 1950s. In a typical state, population differences between the largest and smallest legislative districts were on the order of 20 to 1; in several states, that ratio rose into the hundreds. The authors, like several commentators at the time, translate the population differences among districts into terms of minority rule in order to convey the full impact of the problem: in many states, a minority comprised of less than a quarter of the population elected a majority of the seats for at least one chamber of the legislature. Such clear departures from the concept of majority rule demanded a solution. The source of the great population deviations is a well-known story. Over the first half of the twentieth century, state legislators refused to redraw district boundaries in the face of significant demographic shifts from rural areas to growing urban and suburban areas. Their reluctance was motivated by self-preservation—legislators were not about to redistrict themselves out of power—and resulted in the concentration of rural political power. To this basic story, the authors smartly add several overlooked aspects of the malapportionment problem that stood in the way of a political solution. Cities, for example, were beset by rival-