This is a very unique book.This is a memoir of a Chinese student studying abroad who just started working in American political activities. As a foreigner, because he lives in this community, in the eyes of Americans, he naturally has the right to participate in political activities.As early as the late Qing Dynasty, Chinese scholars had paid attention to the American political system.The American institutional text was translated into Chinese nearly a hundred years ago.For these early Chinese scholars, the motivation for their research came from their need to reform the country, and they wanted to explore the reasons for the strength of the United States; the motivation for their research also came from the internal logic and rationality of the American political system, which attracted scholars to intellectual exploration.In the past two decades, when China is facing reform again, the scale of Sino-US exchanges has also changed from what it used to be. Therefore, there have been many books about the US political system.However, very few first-generation immigrants from mainland China have gone deep into the "grassroots" of American society to personally "operate" American politics.There are many people who talk, but few people who operate.This book is the first we have seen.

When we look at the grassroots politics that the author and Americans "operate" together, we will inevitably compare our "engagement" politics with the Chinese.The political situation in the United States depicted in this book is very different from our habits, and some of them are unbelievable.Because of his own political views, the author joined a small party in the United States - the Liberal Party.They spend their own money and time, and spend time and energy on holding meetings, discussions, parades, rallies, planting slogans, distributing leaflets, and going door-to-door to persuade and mobilize.And their party is so small that it can't even win the state votes. Even if it wins, the vote rate is very small, and it is difficult to be elected to "government" in eight lifetimes.So what exactly do they want?This is where we often struggle to understand.

This starts with the different concepts of political parties in Chinese and American societies. Political parties, as an aboveboard form of association and association, are the product of Western parliamentary politics and the expression of the same views in parliamentary politics.People with the same views are the same political party, and the purpose is to express their views more forcefully.When this kind of thing was introduced into China and was about to be translated into Chinese, there was no corresponding thing, so we had to take the one with a similar form and name it "Dang", that is, the party that "confesses the party".As the old saying goes, the party is like a relative.To form a party is to separate relatives.When we talked about the party in ancient China, we meant cronies, township parties, and association parties.The impression left on people is that they are a group of congenial people who care about each other's interests.The faction of the people is equivalent to Liu, Guan, and Zhang Taoyuan becoming sworn brothers.Therefore, it is said that a group of gentlemen does not have a party, but there is always a party, and forming a party must be for personal gain, so there is a saying of "party disaster".

At the beginning of the 20th century, when the Chinese people were reforming and striving towards a republic, they also needed a political party. Unfortunately, there was a party first and then a parliament. The revolutionary party came into being before the parliament.The revolutionary party has a clear utilitarian purpose, "the issue of political power is the primary issue of the revolution", and the revolution revolves around power and forms a party.Such a party must have been born out of the ancient "meeting party", and it pays attention to loyalty to the organization.Before entering, there are high thresholds and tests, and after entering, you must promise life and death, and pay attention to loyalty.Recognizing the party's philosophy has risen to the level of belief, changing one's opinion is an act of rebellion, and expulsion is a great humiliation.There is an essential difference between party members and non-party members.Politics is an upward movement.

The grassroots activities of Western political parties described in this book are very different from the revolutionary parties we are used to. The general political parties in the West are organized around how to express their political views, especially the small parties like the Liberal Party that the author of this book joined. They knew from the beginning that this political party has nothing to do with the ruling power and will never Will not come to power as a ruling "official" because of this.But they feel that this society, this country, or the community they live in has some problems that they are worried about. They want everyone to know and want to express their concerns with a louder voice.A civic duty brings together these strangers.They are active, they give, but they don't expect "power" in return from the beginning.This kind of party has no threshold, no discipline, no party building, and there is no expulsion from the party.However, it is precisely these people who are passionate about political activities that constitute the basic form of grassroots politics in urban and rural communities in American society. They are the grassroots politics in the United States. There, "politics" is carried out at the grassroots level to win the approval of the people. , is bound to go down.

The existence of this kind of political party, the existence of this small party with an "opposition" attitude, is a sign of a healthy system.And there are a group of people like the author of this book who are keen on grassroots political activities and who are familiar with and abide by the rules of the game, which is the guarantee for a society tending towards political health.In fact, in any society, there are opposition parties.If a system does not give the opposition party any room to survive, the opposition will go underground, and the cold wind of the iron horse will appear.The U.S. political system has completely opened up the space for opposition parties. Over the past two hundred years, opposition parties have become the driving force for enlightened social change.

This book is actually divided into two parts.One part is grassroots politics aimed at local self-government and community building, while the other part, which may be equivalent to half or more, is the record of the author's participation in the US election campaign.Although, on the surface, the author is still participating in grassroots political activities, the content of these two parts is completely different.The author himself realized, "My regret is that I originally planned to spend half of my energy helping Chuck or Jim to run for office, because as Americans often say: "All politics is local politics", I think the election of representatives is actually It is more meaningful than the presidential election, and it can better reflect the essence of democratic politics. But then the Kerry camp needs to invest too much time, and the Liberal Party has no plan for a large-scale campaign, so I lost a closer experience of grassroots politics. Chance."

In this kind of support camp, no matter which side you are supporting, it seems that you are standing at a higher position, but in fact, your vision may become narrower.Because in such a place, people with strong political inclinations naturally gather and infect each other.The author is a person with independent thinking ability, but he also saw afterwards that he "has been caught in these irrational emotions many times without knowing it."Therefore, the author sometimes involuntarily replaces the overall picture with what he sees in this circle, which also affects his comments. For example, the author feels the remarks of the surrounding election circles, and sees that the conventions of the two parties have turned into god-making conventions, so he thinks, "The second thing I don't flatter about American politics is their packaging of the personal character of the candidates. Sometimes It even goes beyond the discussion of policy.” In fact, after this general election, few commentators believe that this is the result of the public’s personal likes and dislikes of candidates.The vast majority of Americans, in local elections, have the meaning of selecting capable people, and they will follow their personal achievements and political opinions more than simply follow their political party affiliation.In the general election, most of the people whose voting direction is relatively stable, the votes of the people basically follow the political party.In other words, the policies, ideas, and values ​​represented by a certain political party are what they care more about.Their dissatisfaction with the opposing candidate is often based on this basis.Therefore, they don't care so much who the candidates of the party they agree with are.

As for the incitement at the conventions of the two parties, the difference between different systems is that in non-democratic places it is incitement at one end, and it starts from the education of children, and you have no discussion about incitement.Under such circumstances, the people cannot afford to be incited, especially when there is only one savior and one hope, and if they have been incited since childhood.In the United States, first of all, school education is neutral.Schools are not allowed to be turned into small party schools.Second, the media must also be neutral if it intends to be popular.Therefore, after a TV station broadcasts the Democratic Party's convention, it must also broadcast the Republican Party's convention.In other words, it is the party convention that is sensational, not the media.As the media, after broadcasting the sensationalism of the two parties equally, the role of the media itself is not to sensationalize, but to put out the fire.Ordinary people see that a candidate of a political party represents "America's Hope" is emerging, and their enthusiasm is also being stirred up. However, they immediately see another political party doing the same and launching another "America's savior" .No matter how stupid the people are, they will understand that this is just a propaganda trick.The real choice is to put aside the hustle and bustle, carefully examine the specific policy orientations of the two sides, and see which one is really in line with one's own interests, and then decide on the direction of voting.

Therefore, democracy is not without sensationalism.Running for elections under a democratic system also incites goosebumps.However, that is offset sensational.The only sensationalism will become bigger and bigger, and the people are more likely to be blindly mobilized, while the oppositional sensationalism will lead to comparison and thinking.One of the important goals of the political parties in the campaign is to always maintain a group of hardcore aides, and the small circle of campaigns is among them.There were ups and downs and excitement there.However, in today's United States, although the votes were extremely close twice in a row, and even the results of the 2000 election were disputed, the vast majority of people did not take to the streets.They work and live normally, consider their vote very personally, then go to the polling station to vote, wait for the result to come out according to the law, and accept the result.There is not so much extreme confrontation, excitement and excitement that the author feels.This is because American democracy has matured.In their eyes, American politics and elections will have many views that are different from those of the author.If only the most colorful side is presented, its maturity is not shown.

Therefore, the author goes deep into the central circle of campaign aid, in this mountain, and in the mountain of a certain party, there must be "gain and loss".The author has a very clear understanding of this, and emphasized at the beginning, "I just hope to provide readers with an audible channel for 'listening together and understanding'." It is a pity that domestic readers have another channel for obtaining information. , probably much less. This book is irreplaceable by other books. It is first-hand information with very detailed records and vivid descriptions.It allows us to see that it is a political norm in the United States to promote innovation in the United States in the form of opposition, and it allows us to see where its tolerance lies.There are both far-right neo-Nazis and far-left black parties; fair competition and peaceful coexistence.And there are more political parties that are not extreme, that is, opposition parties with different opinions. Their essence is constructive.The author is well aware of this, and he mentioned at the end, "My own plan is to participate more in local politics in the future. Politics is not only about voting and campaigning, but more importantly, interaction with the community." Everyone actively participated The vitality of American grassroots politics and the vitality of the United States lies in the political party activities and political activities that are constructive rather than combative.Americans call this kind of scene where there are many parties and parties like big trees and small trees on the left and right as the "political landscape".This landscape has a history of more than two hundred years. After reading this book, we believe that such a landscape is bright.