Rebuilding the Republic From the Bottom Up 

Across the country, a new cohort of Democrats is speaking the language of economic populism with energizing clarity and moral urgency. Their message is simple, blunt, and resonant: The system is rigged, people are squeezed, and the only way out is to fight entrenched power and deliver affordability and opportunity for working Americans.  

Consider Georgia Senator Jon Ossoff, telling a raucous crowd in Savannah last summer that “nothing works for ordinary people” because their “elected representatives … represent the donors.” Or U.S. Senate candidate James Talarico of Texas, who Joe Rogan encouraged to run for president, arguing to a packed house in Austin in July that, “The culture wars are a smoke screen. The biggest divide is not left vs. right; it’s top vs. bottom.”  Or New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani and governors-elect Mikie Sherrill (New Jersey) and Abigail Spanberger (Virginia), each winning with a laser focus on affordability and a rambunctious readiness to take on powerful interests.  

These new-wave Democrats are gaining traction by naming the opposition—monopolies, corporate price-gougers, entitled donors—and offering bold solutions that, if realized, promise to transform people’s lives and prospects. But no economic transformation succeeds without grassroots power to sustain it. Moreover, Americans don’t just want lower costs, they yearn for a better democracy, too. One that is less divisive and in which they have greater say in decisions affecting their lives.  

Democrats should build on their recent success by complementing economic populism with an ambitious agenda for civic renewal. By that, I mean policies and partnerships that empower citizens, rebuild communities, and make politics a shared and purposeful project. This pairing—of a fairer economy and deeper democracy—is what unshackles Democrats from the status quo and repositions them as agents of needed change. It’s a combination rooted deeply in American history.  

During the Gilded Age, the Populists (or People’s Party) of the 1890s linked achieving a better living to building a better democracy. In addition to battling monopolies, they championed the secret ballot, direct election of Senators, citizens’ referenda and women’s suffrage. They created newspapers and conducted lectures that treated Americans as thinking citizens, and forged a groundbreaking (if ultimately unsuccessful) coalition of Black and white southern farmers. Progressive Era reformers carried the Populists’ fight forward, achieving direct election of senators (17th Amendment), women’s suffrage (19^th Amendment), and the creation of institutions like the Federal Trade Commission to rein in corporate abuses.  

In the wake of the Great Depression, the New Deal fused these impulses again. Along with Social Security, jobs programs, and union-friendly policies came ambitious civic initiatives like “America’s Town Meetings of the Air,” a nationwide radio program that drew millions into local conversations about democracy. “New Dealers were trying to save the economy; they ended up saving democracy,” historian Jill Lepore explained, “They told a new American story.” 

Fast forward a generation, and the Civil Rights Movement picked up the torch. Most remember its beginnings: a seat on a bus, a demand for democratic rights for Black Americans. Less discussed is its evolution into the Poor People’s Campaign to achieve economic justice for all working Americans. As with the People’s Party and the New Deal, robust public debate and civic education were integral to the struggle. While the campaign was cut short by Martin Luther King, Jr.’s assassination, a vision of nonviolent, multiracial, working-class solidarity was established in the American imagination. 

The lesson is enduring: Populist moments and opportunities for large-scale reform arise when the American people feel economically defeated and politically powerless. The response must speak to their twin dilemmas.  

Some might argue that civic renewal muddies a crisp economic message, and add that “democracy” doesn’t poll well. Fine, use another word, but embrace the ideal. Polling also shows that citizens connect big money domination to their diminishing prospects. They think our problems go beyond specific policies to a rigged system and a political culture they find exhausting and dispiriting.  

Civic renewal fosters civic power and relationships that drive change while countering the loneliness of modern life. In skeptical times like ours, marrying political power with civic power offers a more compelling theory of change than ‘elect the right candidate and your troubles are over.’ Civic renewal says, elect the right candidate and we’re halfway there. If we keep working together, we can create and sustain the change we need.  

A bottom-up economic agenda and a civic renewal agenda can reinforce each other. Georgia Senator Raphael Warnock provides an example when he asks, “How can we have productive conversations about lowering health care costs [and] creating good-paying jobs if politicians get to cherry-pick their voters [through redistricting] and the people’s voices are squeezed out of their democracy?” The relationship works in the other direction, too, as economically secure citizens are better able to fight for their democratic rights, as when Black-owned businesses helped fund the Civil Rights Movement. 

This is not to say every Democrat should run on an identical platform with identical rhetoric—some things will work better in a purple state than a deep-blue city. But if the details are flexible, the direction of economic policy should aim toward affordability and opportunity for working people. Thus, Mayor Mamdani committed to free buses, free childcare, and affordable rents; governor-elect Sherrill ran on a utilities-cost freeze, cheaper prescription drugs, and small-business tax breaks. One might also include elements of the “Abundance” school of reform to make it easier to build affordable housing, transportation, clean energy, and other public goods. 

But to pique the democratic imagination and restore faith in the party and democracy itself, neo-populist Democrats should incorporate fresh civic renewal ideas to transform the political process. For that, they can draw on democratic innovations spreading across the globe. 

Citizens’ assemblies, for example, involve random samples of residents that deliberate on challenging issues to inform and influence public policy. In Ireland, they helped overcome gridlock on marriage equality and abortion rights, leading to constitutional amendments and groundbreaking legislation. Political scientist David Farrell, a key player in Ireland’s assemblies, told me he hoped they would inoculate Ireland from the democratic backsliding infecting nations since the Great Recession. Citizens’ assemblies are beginning to appear more frequently stateside as well—no surprise, as they share DNA with our New England town meeting tradition, the aforementioned “Town Hall Meetings of the Air,” and recent experiments in deliberative democracy.  

Creating the conditions for more informed and considered public opinion complements citizens’ assemblies by helping most Americans—not just a sample—grapple more effectively with issues they care about. The Trump administration has pursued the opposite: attacking ideas they dislike and information they can’t control by cowing the press, curtailing government data, cancelling research, hamstringing higher education, and punishing free speech. Democrats, by contrast, should work to create conditions that help Americans learn, think, debate, and act as citizens. 

One way is to revive local journalism. A remarkably congruent approach for neo-populist Democrats, discussed in this magazine, is using antitrust enforcement to help news organizations regain the advertising revenue Big Tech siphons off. Another suggests tax breaks for citizens who subscribe to local news outlets.  

Neo-populist Democrats should also stand against the democracy-be-damned algorithms of social media that provoke polarization, amplify disinformation, and deepen isolation. “Instead of accepting the existing digital political battlefield as inevitable, Democrats should … be the party that cleans it up,” Zach Marcus argued in these pages.   

Democrats might also embrace national service opportunities—paid stints working on conservation, education, healthcare, or community development. They help those who participate develop new skills and real-world relationships as they help develop the nation. Elizabeth Warren and Pete Buttigieg are among those proposing to expand service opportunities. 

Then there’s participatory budgeting, which enables communities to decide together how a portion of public funds is invested. “PB” is now at work in many U.S. cities, as well as thousands more worldwide—resulting in improved libraries, upgraded playgrounds, safer streets, and more. It also shows that citizens are more willing to accept the defeat of their favored project if they perceive the process as fair and inclusive. 

Let’s consider two scenarios that illustrate how politicians can embrace democratic innovations that can strengthen civic life while helping achieve affordability. 

Imagine if Governor Gretchen Whitmer were to integrate citizens’ assemblies into her existing “Growing Michigan Together Council,” a panel of non-government experts that advises the state on key challenges. An annual assembly could bring together a random sample of “regular” citizens for in-depth deliberations on the Governor’s affordability goals, such as lowering childcare costs or reducing medical debt. Imagine Michiganders seeing each other wield that kind of influence; consider how it could turn populist anger into democratic agency and shake off the political malaise that gives demagogues their opening. 

Or suppose Mayor Mamdani were to weave an expansion of participatory budgeting in New York into his affordability agenda. I’m proud to lead a city, he might say, that is a pioneer in democracy itself. I intend to work with the City Council to fund participatory budgeting next year to support people’s ideas for making their communities affordable. Mamdani appears poised to embrace such experiments, having already established an Office of Mass Engagement.  

Economic populism is opening the door for Democrats; civic renewal can seal the deal. Together, they enable Democrats to fight for Americans while strengthening people’s capacity to fight for themselves. This is how the Party can again help the nation tell a new American story, one written by and for its people.