I spent part of this morning with a great group of people. They form a worldwide team of engineers, social scientists, developers, and administrative staff at Facebook, devoted to countering misinformation on their platform about the 2020 Census.
The US decennial census is a national ceremony conducted each 10 years to fulfill the mandate of the founding fathers’ directive in Article 1, Section 2, of the US constitution. It is the only action of the country that asks all persons to participate, whether they are citizens or not, whether they are registered voters or not, whether they are active members of their community. This national census of all persons resident in the country is the basis of the reapportionment of the US House of Representatives, to recalibrate the allocation of 435 representatives to roughly equal numbers of persons across the country. The boundaries of congressional districts are redrawn each 10 years to reflect growth/decline of the population.
The original use of a population census for these purposes was an unprecedented act at the time of the writing of the constitution. It was a passion of James Madison to use such a scientific method for such a political power allocation.
While the outcome of the Census affects political power allocation to areas, the design, data collection, and analysis of Census data must be done in a totally objective, nonpartisan way. The value of the census rests on its credibility to the vast majority of the residents of the nation. That credibility is crucial to the acceptance of the population counts for uses in reapportionment of the US House of Representatives and later to help form congressional districts inside the states. The ubiquitous credibility is ruined if the Census is viewed as affected in any way by partisan viewpoints.
Of course, one of the problems in understanding the arguments above is that the Census occurs only once in a decade. For the vast majority of persons, completing the census questionnaire is not vividly memorable. The connection between the personal activity in answering the questions and the myriad number of uses of the data is not visible to most persons in the country.
The team at Facebook is treating the 2020 US Census as an event equally important as the 2020 US national election. The team is designing global efforts to identify attempts to damage the data collection efforts of the Census through the use of the Facebook platform.
They were interested in what efforts existed in 2010 that threatened that Census. We talked about political figures who urged people to resist the Census as an unwarranted intrusion in the private lives. We discussed concerns of new immigrant groups that did not trust the Census Bureau to implement their governing law that specifies fines and imprisonment for breach of confidentiality of data. We talked about the physical attacks on Census enumerators in various parts of the country that oppose Federal government activity. We discussed likely types of misinformation that might be spread to harm the Census for various subpopulations.
In prior decades, private sector firms helped encourage their customers to complete their Census questionnaires. They sponsored advertising in stores and in news media; they supported community groups organizing to encourage census participation.
We now live in a world of global social media, deliberate dissemination of false information, deep fakes, and other attempts at social influence over behavior of social media subscribers. In this world, we must acknowledge that the old means of support for the Census remains necessary, but is by itself insufficient. The country needs vigilance about misinformation affecting the 2020 Census. It was heartwarming to meet with a group of people devoting their next year (and more) to promoting a successful, nonpartisan, decennial census, one that the founding fathers imagined in 1787.
It is a very important issue for a nation, especially for the USA. A good leader is very important for a nation. However, a proper census could be a part of to chose a good leader. Thanks for your article and the topic.
“Have Form Follow Function” is a good slogan to follow even in the case of the U.S. Census.
Article I, Section 2 of he U.S. Constitution* implies use of a cenus form that merely facilitates the counting (enumerating) of the people by state while leaving it to Congress to decide what constitutes the necessary relationship between the person to be counted and the state (residency? citizenship? just passing through the state at the time of the enumeration?).
Congressional adding to the census function (which is legally/constitutionally permissible, even if not politically/adminstratively wise) has expanded the census form in ways that lead some to oppose cooperating with the census undertaking. The added functions are probably useful, but seperate forms/surveys could be used to collect the additional information. The representation-taxation apportionment function of the censu is so primary/important that it isn’t wise to “muddy the waters” with additional functions.
*”Representatives and direct Taxes shall be apportioned among the several States which may be included within this Union, according to their respective Numbers, which shall be determined by adding to the whole Number of free Persons, including those bound to Service for a Term of Years, and excluding Indians not taxed, three fifths of all other Persons. The actual Enumeration shall be made within three Years after the first Meeting of the Congress of the United States, and within every subsequent Term of ten Years, in such Manner as they shall by Law direct…” Then the function was somewhat modified through a portion of the 14th Amendment: “Representatives shall be apportioned among the several states according to their respective numbers, counting the whole number of persons in each state, excluding Indians not taxed.” So, the count was still to omit those tribal Americans who were not assimilated into the governance structure through tax obligations.
It sure would be easier on the private sector (and any other sector) if the requested support was simply a matter of encouraging people to be counted (thus not needing to encourage people to reveal anything to enumerators that a person might be hesitant to reveal, such as immigration status and even tax status in the case of tribal Americans).
Perhaps, the private sector should encourage a rationalization of the census process through a simplification of the function of the census (along the lines of producing the right tool for the job in question and producing other tools to address other questions).
You made certain that this went well ten years ago. Thank you!
We all should make certain that this will go well again in 2020. Thank you for calling this issue to our attention — and I hope we will all work to ensure that this is done right. The current powers to be surely are set to distort and undermine the process.