Political Cynicism Around the World

I found the topic of cynicism and the effect it has on politics to be very interesting. I know that at times I have felt very cynical towards certain aspects of politics. After thinking about it, I wondered if America was the only country that felt cynicism on the same level as we do here. At times I think that many Americans just flat out do not believe anything that our politicians have to say because we're always looking for the hidden meaning.

I found 3 editorial blogs/articles all written in different countries about this topic. The first one is from an American source talking about U.S. Representative Rangel who is in hot water for many issues including violations of gifting rules as well as many other ethical issues. The author goes on to say that it is no wonder that American voters are losing faith in political leaders because "Neither party has a monopoly on virtue — or a clue about virtue, it sometimes seems."

The second article comes from an Irish newspaper opinion piece discusses the author's reasons for becoming so politically motivated and serves to highlight his plea to Irish voters to refrain from cynicism. He states that "unfair criticism or cynicism about politics can only weaken and threaten democracy and we all have a responsibility in this regard." His piece is a call to action to stay away from cynical thoughts to preserve the young democracy in the country.

The third article comes from a British site is part 2 of a look into parties and elections of the country. The author explains that it has been shown that cynicism is dangerous and involved in almost every aspect of politics. He reasons that this started as a campaign tactic for one political party against another to create doubt in the ruling party but was not abandoned once the power moved from one party to another. His solution is to remove individuals who cause cynicism from politics altogether and instead elect a higher caliber of individuals.

These articles demonstrated that political cynicism is not simply an American problem. People all around the world are slowly learning to distrust their government officials, and most of the time it is because a few bad apples ruin it for all of the political figures. This has the potential to become an even bigger problem if these individuals are not weeded out now, as explained by the British source, and political parties stop defending guilty individuals. The public's trust all over the world is slowly being turned to resentment, apathy and an overall sense of distrust toward the very officials that are representing them in some very important issues.

Brittany Thomas