Our nation, and in particular our urban areas, needs a new politics, one that recognizes that meaningful political participation on behalf of individuals, families, and communities requires a politics that is both accessible and associational. That is, there can be no meaningful political participation, no just and accountable public policy, without a politics that is accessible to those who are at the bottom of society, those who are currently left out of the political process. And there can be no meaningful political participation for any of us without a politics that is associational, that is deliberative, that enables us to come together to talk about our families, our property, our education, and other issues important to us.

This new politics is very different from the democratic politics practiced today. It represents a unique--or, for some, authentic--kind of democratic politics. This new politics is absolutely essential for an effective and accountable public sector. It is absolutely essential for a just society.

A New Democratic Politics:
From Aristotle to the Industrial Areas Foundation

There is a dimension of politics and public life that is requisite to the human condition. Aristotle said it best, when he said that we are social beings. We are beings whose personhood emerges to the extent that we are involved in deliberations about those matters that affect the commons, the community: education, the raising of children, the pressures on families, how families grow and thrive, and what happens to property. For Aristotle, these deliberations, which took place around the agora or the public square, were politics. They defined politics.¹

This basic vision of politics is shared by the Industrial Areas Foundation (IAF). For more than fifty years, its primary mission has been to make this kind of deliberative politics a reality in communities throughout the United States. In short, the IAF teaches ordinary people how to do democratic politics, recognizing that this kind of politics requires a special craft, a special perspective, a special attitude. It involves deliberative skills: the capacity to engage in the kind of conversation that is politics.

However, despite reflecting Aristotle's basic vision, the politics of the IAF also are very unique. That is, IAF politics are not only associational, they are accessible. In contrast, Aristotle's politics were not accessible. In fact, Aristotle thought politics were for those who had the time and energy and capacity to see beyond themselves, as he put it. He thought that politics were for men who had leisure time, such as the members of the Hopolite Army. From Aristotle's perspective, the most important people who existed in Ancient Greece were the Hopolites. These were the characters who could afford their own armor, because they came from families who had the resources to provide them. These were the characters who could see beyond their private need and thus should participate in the deliberation that was politics. Accordingly, Aristotle thought that everyone else, women, immigrants, slaves, people who worked with their hands, and everybody else, were into their needs and necessities, and therefore were "idiots," because that is what an idiot meant--one who was totally into one's own private life. Aristotle thought that those people who were idiots should not participate in public life.