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Notes -
If so many Americans are as politically disillusioned as polling suggests, why haven't we seen that translate into even lower voter turnout? Why haven't we seen more political groups that meet the needs of disillusioned?
Voter turnout is highly variable based on the election in question (looking at presidential only here). At least, the under-45 vote is - older voters are more stable in voting propensity. Compare to for example this where if you scroll down a bit you can see that "double haters" of both political parties has gone from 6 to 28% in 30 years. So at least casually, there doesn't seem to be a super strong relationship.
I'd question the premise. There are some setups where feelings just don't matter all that much. If you hate to do laundry, well, you still (usually) wear the same number of clothes and end up doing a similar amount of laundry, to use a trivial example. My guess is that the "politically disillusioned" moniker is too generalized to be useful. After all, you only need to care about one specific race to vote, local politics doesn't fall into neat national lines, and many people consider voting a duty or privilege or habit and not a luxury indulgence dependent on positive vibes. I'd consider that latter attitude about voting being a luxury to be faulty, or at the very least, atypical for most Americans.
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US politics has basically institutionallized the two party system. It's not a single big law but a whole lot of little laws, well some big, that make starting a competitive third party basically impossible. Whenever a third party presidential candidate makes an impact states tighten ballot access.
To counter act this, party primaries are more open than in other countries.
California has been moving to "jungle primaries" where voters get to choose between the top vote getters in the primary so election day isn't just a D blowout.
I think there's a big downside to that system. Factions within caucus aren't clear from the outside, so if you think that representatives aren't doing a statisfactory job it's not clear who you should vote against. Politicians like that aspect of the current system.
To make an impact you need local activism and involvement. If you start up any group realize that people will try to hijack it.
https://status451.com/2017/11/11/radical-book-club-what-righties-can-do/
Or, the simpler solution is just to set up approval voting. No need for a jungle primary.
Furthermore, the influence of local activism is really understated. The simple fact is that a lot of political movements depend on a certain "critical mass" being reached in the grassroots before it can go mainstream. Intuitively, this seems to suggest that US politics is not in fact near a breaking point in terms of people sick of the system, despite what the media might have you think.
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At least for the US, the primary reason here is Duverger's Law.
As for the former, I don't have any answers, and the only one I've ever seen proposed, I find somewhat implausible — that being that actual turnout has indeed declined, but growth in ballots fraudulently cast in the names of non-voting voters rise to compensate.
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