With New York City, more than a year into the coronavirus pandemic, suffering hard times, it’s natural for people to number the days until Mayor Bill de Blasio’s term is over and a new mayor takes the helm. It’s tempting to think that electing a better leader will repair all the damage. Unfortunately, it’s not that simple.
A series of reforms to New York’s political and electoral system, undertaken in the name of expanding democracy, have essentially had the opposite effect. In the mayoral election of 1953, 93 percent of registered voters came to the polls; in 2017, that figure had fell to less than 22 percent, with just over 1 million New Yorkers casting ballots. The last time that so few people voted for mayor was 1917—before women’s suffrage doubled the electorate.
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