Federalism and American Political Development

2014 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Brian Robertson
Keyword(s):  
Economic Growth ◽  
Political Parties ◽  
Interest Group ◽  
Trade Unions ◽  
Political Development ◽  
American Political Development ◽  
Citizenship Rights ◽  
State Laws ◽  
Political Conflicts ◽  
Market Driven

Federalism has influenced American political development deeply because it has been used as a powerful, enduring weapon in battles over politics and policy. The Constitution authorized the national government to exercise the tools of national sovereignty, but authorized the states to govern most of everyday life. This constitutional arrangement has encouraged interstate competition and market-driven economic growth, while it has impeded policies aimed at mitigating economic hardship and inequality. Federalism encouraged fragmented political parties and a pluralistic interest group system, splintering both organized business and trade unions and thus many political conflicts. State policy initiation has left domestic policy profoundly fragmented and unequal. Decentralized power allowed states to implement separate and inferior citizenship rights for different categories of citizens, most prominently, racial minorities and women. In turn, state laws and their legacy frequently shape national efforts to mitigate these inequalities.

Interest Groups and American Political Development

2015 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dara Z. Strolovitch ◽  
Daniel J. Tichenor
Keyword(s):  
Interest Groups ◽  
Interest Group ◽  
Political Development ◽  
American Political Development ◽  
Advocacy Organizations ◽  
Organized Interests ◽  
Early American ◽  
Marginalized Groups ◽  
American Interest ◽  
Group Politics

Do interest groups enhance or impede the democratic exercise of power? This chapter addresses this long-debated question by examining what longitudinal and American Political Development (APD) approaches contribute to the study of interest groups and what studies of organized interests illuminate about APD. We survey the dominant approaches to interest groups within political science, examine organized interests and lobbying in the early American republic, and document the rise of the modern interest group system at the beginning of the twentieth century. We then explore the role played by advocacy organizations in the trajectories of progress for marginalized groups. We show that APD scholarship has offered fresh insights about patterns and transformations of American interest group politics, and argue that our understanding of the development of American politics will benefit from more robust conversations between the traditional interest group literature and longitudinal and APD approaches to group politics.

Rural Free Delivery as a Critical Test of Alternative Models of American Political Development

2001 ◽  
Vol 15 (01) ◽  
pp. 103-112
Author(s):  
Samuel Kernell
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Political Parties ◽  
Political Development ◽  
American Political Development ◽  
Government Contracts ◽  
Election Campaigns ◽  
Critical Test ◽  
Party Organizations ◽  
Career Moves ◽  
Local Party

During roughly the half-century straddling the turn of the twentieth century, America’s national government underwent a dramatic transformation. It proceeded on two fronts, politics and administration. At the beginning of the era, politicians were deeply enmeshed in a system of patronage and graft reflecting their indebtedness to the local and state political parties without whose support their careers would have languished. Local party organizations recruited and sponsored candidates, ran election campaigns, and directed subsequent career moves among its cadre of politicians. In return, these politicians used their offices to stoke the party machine with a steady supply of patronage appointments and government contracts. By the end of the era, a variety of state and national reforms had effectively dismantled the patronage system.

The Power of the Party: Conflict Expansion and the Agenda Diversity of Interest Groups

2019 ◽  
pp. 106591291986714 ◽  
Author(s):  
E. J. Fagan ◽  
Zachary A. McGee ◽  
Herschel F. Thomas
Keyword(s):  
Political Parties ◽  
Interest Groups ◽  
Interest Group ◽  
Political Party ◽  
Related Activity ◽  
Electoral Incentives ◽  
Political Conflicts ◽  
Policy Conflicts ◽  
Policy Content ◽  
Conflict Expansion

To what extent do political parties have an effect on the policy-related activity of interest groups? Drawing from ideas of conflict expansion and the structure of extended party networks, we argue that political parties are able to pull interest groups into more policy conflicts than they otherwise would be involved in. We posit that parties are able to draw interest groups to be active outside of established issue niches. We suggest that several mechanisms—shared partisan electoral incentives, reciprocity, identification with the means, and cue-taking behavior—lead groups to participate in more diverse political conflicts. By linking data on interest group bill positions and the policy content of legislation, we generate a novel measure of 158 interest groups’ alignment with political parties. We find that the more an interest group is ideologically aligned with a political party, the more diverse their issue agenda becomes.

Political Parties in American Political Development

2014 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Karol
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Political Parties ◽  
Interest Groups ◽  
Progressive Era ◽  
Political Development ◽  
American Politics ◽  
American Political Development ◽  
New Form

This article examines the role of political parties in America’s political development, with emphasis on parties as institutions. It considers three developments in American politics: the emergence of mass parties that flourished during the so-called Party Period in the mid-nineteenth century; the decline and increasing regulation of traditional parties since the Progressive Era; and the revival of parties in a new form since the 1970s. It also analyses how parties have influenced—and have been influenced by—major institutions such as Congress, the Presidency, the national bureaucracy, and interest groups. The article concludes by discussing two key concerns of scholars of American political development: development and exceptionalism.

State Formation and the Decline of Political Parties: American Parties in the Fiscal State

1994 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 195-230 ◽  
Author(s):  
John J. Coleman
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
Political Parties ◽  
Political Development ◽  
Party System ◽  
American Political Development ◽  
Central Issue ◽  
World War ◽  
The Status ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Analytical Frameworks

The shifting salience of political parties is a central issue in American political development. From the debates over colonial “parties” to debates over the relevance of realignment theory in the 1980s and 1990s, scholars have attempted to assess the impact of political parties on political development. One topic that has provoked particularly extensive debate is the status of parties since World War II. Scholars point to confidence gaps, realignment, and institutional displacement, among other factors, to explain the postwar decline of political parties. But there are problems: Analytical frameworks explaining decline cannot account for recent signs of party resurgence; frameworks explaining resurgence typically account for little of the decline. Those focused on one aspect of the party system (e.g., parties in Congress) rarely offer insights on other aspects (e.g., parties in the electorate). What is needed is an approach that places parties within their structural settings. If these settings change, parties may change.

Political power in Yugoslavia

1967 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 205-218 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jovan Djordjević
Keyword(s):  
Political Parties ◽  
Political Institutions ◽  
Trade Unions ◽  
Political Development ◽  
Political System ◽  
Political Action ◽  
Political Organizations ◽  
Pressure Groups ◽  
Set Up ◽  
General Perspective

The institutional process is essentially an outcome and a reflection of political action. It is therefore understandable that political institutions have always interested not only political thinkers and politicians, but also those nations and groups which are struggling to set up, reorganize or abolish any given political institutions.Their importance lies, too, in the fact that they reflect fundamental political aspirations and relationships. They are more or less the true image of a political system and of the structure of a society at a given epoch. But when seen in a more general perspective, institutions are merely the framework of power, The complexity of and problems inherent in society, its permanent need for further material, cultural and political development have led to an expansion of the institutional structure of political society. This expansion is brought about by political organizations, especially by political parties, as well as by other organizations, such as trade unions, citizens’ associations, pressure groups, etc.

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