scholarly journals Review Essay: Whither Realignment?

1991 ◽  
Vol 11 ◽  
pp. 137-150
Author(s):  
Harold F. Bass
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Political Parties ◽  
Political Process ◽  
The United States ◽  
Party Competition ◽  
Political Life ◽  
Popular Discourse ◽  
History Of ◽  
Political Units ◽  
American Political Science

The “realignment era” in American political science began thirtyfive years ago, when Key (1955) proposed “A Theory of Critical Elections.” In his wake, realignment scholarship has proliferated far and wide (Bass 1991). The concept of realignment pervades contemporary scholarship on American political parties. The “textbook” treatment of the history of party competition in the United States posits periodic realigning elections that substantially alter group bases of party coalitions and establish enduring party systems. The initial analytical focus of the party in the electorate now extends to the party in government, linking elections with public policy. Since political parties constitute central integrating institutions in the political process, realignment has become a key conceptual lens for viewing and interpreting the whole of American political life. Indeed, it has escaped the bounds of scholarship and entered into popular discourse. Further, as subjects of realignment studies, the United States and its component political units now compete with numerous non-American systems.

scholarly journals The Danger of Analogical Myths: Explaining the Power and Consequences of the Sykes-Picot Delusion

AJIL Unbound ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 110 ◽  
pp. 132-136 ◽  
Author(s):  
Toby Dodge
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Middle East ◽  
The United States ◽  
Historical Background ◽  
Minor Role ◽  
Historical Significance ◽  
Historical Analogy ◽  
History Of ◽  
Political Units ◽  
Postcolonial States

Even before its hundredth year anniversary on 16 May 2016, the Sykes-Picot agreement had become a widely cited historical analogy both in the region itself and in Europe and the United States. In the Middle East, it is frequently deployed as an infamous example of European imperial betrayal and Western attempts more generally to keep the region divided, in conflict, and easy to dominate. In Europe and the United States, however, its role as a historical analogy is more complex—a shorthand for understanding the Middle East as irrevocably divided into mutually hostile sects and clans, destined to be mired in conflict until another external intervention imposes a new, more authentic, set of political units on the region to replace the postcolonial states left in the wake of WWI. What is notable about both these uses of the Sykes-Picot agreement is that they fundamentally misread, and thus overstate, its historical significance. The agreement reached by the British diplomat Mark Sykes and his French counterpart, François Georges-Picot, in May 1916, quickly became irrelevant as the realities on the ground in the Middle East, U.S. intervention into the war, a resurgent Turkey and the comparative weakness of the French and British states transformed international relations at the end of the First World War. Against this historical background, explaining the contemporary power of the narrative surrounding the use of the Sykes-Picot agreement becomes more intellectually interesting than its minor role in the history of European imperial interventions in the Middle East.

In His Day: Awareness of Wilson’s Duplicity

2016 ◽  
Vol 14 (3) ◽  
pp. 762-763 ◽  
Author(s):  
Desmond Jagmohan
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Political Science ◽  
The United States ◽  
Political Scientist ◽  
International Affairs ◽  
Woodrow Wilson ◽  
Princeton University ◽  
History Of ◽  
Complex Landscape ◽  
American Political Science

Woodrow Wilson is the only American political scientist to have served as President of the United States. In the time between his political science Ph.D. (from Johns Hopkins, in 1886) and his tenure as president (1913–21), he also served as president of Princeton University (1902–10) and president of the American Political Science Association (1909–10). Wilson is one of the most revered figures in American political thought and in American political science. The Woodrow Wilson Award is perhaps APSA’s most distinguished award, given annually for the best book on government, politics, or international affairs published in the previous year, and sponsored by the Woodrow Wilson Foundation at Princeton University.Wilson has also recently become the subject of controversy, on the campus of Princeton University, and in the political culture more generally, in connection with racist statements that he made and the segregationist practices of his administration. A group of Princeton students associated with the “Black Lives Matter” movement has demanded that Wilson’s name be removed from two campus buildings, one of which is the famous Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs (see Martha A. Sandweiss, “Woodrow Wilson, Princeton, and the Complex Landscape of Race,” http://www.thenation.com/article/woodrow-wilson-princeton-and-the-complex-landscape-of-race/). Many others have resisted this idea, noting that Wilson is indeed an important figure in the history of twentieth-century liberalism and Progressivism in the United States.A number of colleagues have contacted me suggesting that Perspectives ought to organize a symposium on the Wilson controversy. Although we do not regularly organize symposia around current events, given the valence of the controversy and its connection to issues we have featured in our journal (see especially the September 2015 issue on “The American Politics of Policing and Incarceration”), and given Wilson's importance in the history of our discipline, we have decided to make an exception in this case. We have thus invited a wide range of colleagues whose views on this issue will interest our readers to comment on this controversy. —Jeffrey C. Isaac, Editor.

Party Realignment in the United States and Britain

1985 ◽  
Vol 15 (1) ◽  
pp. 97-115 ◽  
Author(s):  
Philip Williams
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Political Parties ◽  
Political System ◽  
Party System ◽  
The United States ◽  
The Other ◽  
Party Realignment ◽  
History Of

Realignment theory is a recent but flourishing sub-branch of the study of American political parties. Over the last thirty years, the original suggestions of its inventor, V. O. Key, have been elaborated and refined in several directions and through several phases, gradually being modified to take variations in historical circumstances more carefully into account. Problems of the same kind often occur, and are likely to prove even less manageable, when efforts are made to apply the theory to another political system and culture as authors from both countries (and from neither) have in recent years tried, more or less explicitly, to use it to explain developments in the British party system. Some techniques travel quite well, and some useful insights can be obtained by looking afresh at familiar patterns in the light of similar experiences elsewhere. But the differences between the two nations and states preclude any rigorous attempt to apply a theory derived from the history of one country with a view to explaining the experiences of the other.

Education and Transparency: Changes in Campus Iconography

2016 ◽  
Vol 14 (3) ◽  
pp. 766-767 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dianne Pinderhughes
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Political Science ◽  
The United States ◽  
Political Scientist ◽  
International Affairs ◽  
Woodrow Wilson ◽  
Princeton University ◽  
History Of ◽  
Complex Landscape ◽  
American Political Science

Woodrow Wilson is the only American political scientist to have served as President of the United States. In the time between his political science Ph.D. (from Johns Hopkins, in 1886) and his tenure as president (1913–21), he also served as president of Princeton University (1902–10) and president of the American Political Science Association (1909–10). Wilson is one of the most revered figures in American political thought and in American political science. The Woodrow Wilson Award is perhaps APSA’s most distinguished award, given annually for the best book on government, politics, or international affairs published in the previous year, and sponsored by the Woodrow Wilson Foundation at Princeton University.Wilson has also recently become the subject of controversy, on the campus of Princeton University, and in the political culture more generally, in connection with racist statements that he made and the segregationist practices of his administration. A group of Princeton students associated with the “Black Lives Matter” movement has demanded that Wilson’s name be removed from two campus buildings, one of which is the famous Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs (see Martha A. Sandweiss, “Woodrow Wilson, Princeton, and the Complex Landscape of Race,” http://www.thenation.com/article/woodrow-wilson-princeton-and-the-complex-landscape-of-race/). Many others have resisted this idea, noting that Wilson is indeed an important figure in the history of twentieth-century liberalism and Progressivism in the United States.A number of colleagues have contacted me suggesting that Perspectives ought to organize a symposium on the Wilson controversy. Although we do not regularly organize symposia around current events, given the valence of the controversy and its connection to issues we have featured in our journal (see especially the September 2015 issue on “The American Politics of Policing and Incarceration”), and given Wilson's importance in the history of our discipline, we have decided to make an exception in this case. We have thus invited a wide range of colleagues whose views on this issue will interest our readers to comment on this controversy. —Jeffrey C. Isaac, Editor.

scholarly journals The Good, Bad, and Ugly of Populism: A Comparative Analysis of the U.S. and Slovakia

2017 ◽  
Vol 17 (2) ◽  
pp. 166-183 ◽  
Author(s):  
Aaron T. Walter
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Comparative Analysis ◽  
Political Parties ◽  
Political Process ◽  
The United States ◽  
Political Campaigns ◽  
Late Nineteenth Century ◽  
Neoclassical Realism ◽  
The People ◽  
Personalization Of Politics

Abstract The dynamics of political campaigning is as unique as the people and party platforms that inhabit the campaign period. The progress of certain political personalities or of political parties themselves insure a positivity to the political process in contrast to statism. Not all change is welcome surely, but the fact that such activity occurs within pluralist democracy is a sign of vitality in both practice and principle. One such change in recent political campaigns has been the increased popularity of candidates and parties espousing populist platforms and rhetoric. While in the United States, such represented interest is historically based from the late nineteenth century, in Slovakia it is more recent, but no less significant in its historical roots. In the following paper the methodology of a comparative analysis is employed to investigate populism within the United States and Slovakia while utilizing the theoretical context of neoclassical realism that has populism in the national context: personalization of politics, catch-all policies, media centricity, professionalization and political marketing.

What Did They Wish For? Party Government, Polarization and the American Political Science Association

2020 ◽  
Vol 54 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
MARK WICKHAM-JONES
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Political Parties ◽  
Political Science ◽  
Party System ◽  
The United States ◽  
American Political Science Association ◽  
Party Government ◽  
Core Issue ◽  
American Political Science ◽  
Responsible Party

In tracing the development of increased polarization in the United States, numerous scholars have noted the apparent importance of the American Political Science Association's (APSA's) Committee on Political Parties. The committee's influential (and often criticized) report, Toward a More Responsible Two-Party System, called for a wholesale transformation of political parties in the United States. On its publication in October 1950, political scientists quickly concluded that, taken together, the committee's recommendations represented a reworking of a distinct approach, usually known as “party government” or “responsible party government.” (The origins of responsible parties dated back to Woodrow Wilson's classic 1885 text Congressional Government.) Since then, the notion of party government has become a core issue in the study of American political parties, albeit a contentious one. A recent survey ranked the APSA document at seventh as a canonical text in graduate syllabi concerning parties.

Rebuilding the American State: Evidence from the 1940s

1991 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 301-339 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ira Katznelson ◽  
Bruce Pietrykowski
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Political Science ◽  
Federal Government ◽  
The United States ◽  
Vantage Point ◽  
Linear Scale ◽  
Woodrow Wilson ◽  
National State ◽  
History Of ◽  
American Political Science

From the vantage point of a critical moment in the history of statebuilding in the United States, we wish to take a fresh look at questions about the resources and wherewithal of the national state. Within modern American political science, a focus on state capacity is at least as old as the landmark essay by Woodrow Wilson on “The Study of Administration” and as current as the important scholarly impulse that has revived interest in the state at a time of struggle about the size and span of the federal government. The dominant motif of these various accounts of American statebuilding has been a concern with organizational assets, which usually are assayed by their placement on a linear scale of strength and weakness.

The Early American Origins of Entitlements

1996 ◽  
Vol 10 (2) ◽  
pp. 360-404
Author(s):  
Laura S. Jensen
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
National Level ◽  
The United States ◽  
Political Life ◽  
Health Security ◽  
The Public ◽  
Early American ◽  
History Of ◽  
The 1960S ◽  
First Time

There is perhaps no topic that has generated more sustained interest and controversy in the United States during the past three decades than the public policies called “entitlements.” From the Great Society innovations of the 1960s to the guaranteed income plan of the 1970s to the “health security” proposal of the early 1990s, debate over the issue of which U.S. citizens should be entitled to what kind of national-level benefits has been a constant in American political life. Though consensus has occasionally been reached, moments of accord have been fragile and fleeting. Late 1995 and early 1996 found both President William Clinton and a large, bipartisan majority of Congress targeting poor Americans and their benefits, advocating an “end to welfare as we know it.” Yet interbranch disagreement over the way that “welfare” reform should be implemented reached such heights that the annual U.S. budget development process broke down, resulting in repeated shutdowns of government agencies and the threat that, for the first time in the history of the American nation, the United States would default on its obligations to its creditors.

Comment on Reiter

1985 ◽  
Vol 15 (4) ◽  
pp. 418-419
Author(s):  
Nelson W. Polsby
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Political Parties ◽  
The United States ◽  
Party Politics ◽  
Secular Trends ◽  
Recent History ◽  
History Of ◽  
American Party ◽  
Presidential Nominations

I am sure that all of us who have been attempting to make sense of American party politics these last couple of decades welcome Professor Reiter's contribution, and look forward to the publication of his book. As I understand the argument he is making, at least four positions are possible with respect to the recent history of political parties and Presidential nominations in the United States: (1) that no changes have occurred; (2) that long-term secular trends account for all changes; (3) that party reforms account for all changes; and (4) that a combination of longer-term trends and party reforms account for changes. Perhaps in order to hold the attention of readers, Professor Reiter has chosen to contrast positions (2) and (3).

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document