Overview

A timely analysis of the power and limits of political parties-and the lessons of the Civil War and the New Deal in the Age of Trump. American voters have long been familiar with the phenomenon of the presidential frontrunner. In 2008, it was Hillary Clinton. In 1844, it was Martin Van Buren. And in neither election did the prominent Democrat win the party's nomination. Insurgent candidates went on to win the nomination and the presidency, plunging the two-party system into disarray over the years that followed. In this book, Cedric de Leon analyzes two pivotal crises in the American two-party system: the first resulting in the demise of the Whig party and secession of eleven southern states in 1861, and the present crisis splintering the Democratic and Republican parties and leading to the election of Donald Trump. Recasting these stories through the actions of political parties, de Leon draws unsettling parallels in the political maneuvering that ultimately causes once-dominant political parties to lose the people's consent to rule. Crisis! takes us beyond the common explanations of social determinants to illuminate how political parties actively shape national stability and breakdown. The secession crisis and the election of Donald Trump suggest that politicians and voters abandon the political establishment not only because people are suffering, but also because the party system itself is unable to absorb an existential challenge to its power. Just as the U.S. Civil War meant the difference between the survival of a slaveholding republic and the birth of liberal democracy, what political elites and civil society organizations do today can mean the difference between fascism and democracy.

Full Product Details

Author:   Cedric de Leon
Publisher:   Stanford University Press
Imprint:   Stanford University Press
ISBN:  

9781503603554

ISBN 10:   1503603555
Pages:   232
Publication Date:   29 October 2019
Audience:   Professional and scholarly ,  Professional & Vocational
Format:   Hardback
Publisher's Status:   Active
Availability:   In Print  
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Table of Contents

"Contents and Abstracts1The Crisis Sequence chapter abstractWhat explains the timing of political crises? Specifically, given the long-standing clash between pro- and antislavery interests since the American Revolution, why did the American Civil War begin in 1861 and not before? And why, despite long-standing trends in globalization, economic inequality, and immigration, is the Far Right coming to power only now? This chapter outlines the shared logic of both political crises, namely, that their timing depended on the sequence of partisan reactions and counterreactions following a challenge to the mainstream party system. 2The Appeal of Manifest Destiny. chapter abstractThe antebellum or Jacksonian two-party system was designed to avoid the politicization of slavery. But beginning in 1844, a new generation of Democrats advanced a legislative agenda based on Manifest Destiny, the notion that Americans were preordained by God to colonize the present-day continental United States and beyond. These so-called Young America Democrats hoped to oust their party elders by promising landless white voters a life of economic independence out West. Manifest Destiny, however, threatened to undo the party system and the slaveholding republic, because it raised the question of whether slavery would be permitted in the new territories. 3The Tug of Unionism. chapter abstractThe resulting colonization of what was then still northern Mexico touched off a bitter debate over whether slavery could be established there. White voters who had been seduced by the promise of Manifest Destiny thus remained in landless limbo, while the party system split into numerous factions. This chapter explains how the Whig Party exploited the political turmoil by offering a presidential candidate and a compromise that would preserve the Union. The Whigs rode the message of unionism back to power, roundly defeating the Democrats and reabsorbing the pro- and antislavery factions back into the mainstream party system. 4The End of the Slaveholding Republic. chapter abstractThis chapter suggests that the Whigs' reabsorption strategy backfired badly. The victory of unionism had the unintended effect of ending factional strife in the Democratic Party. Once back in power, the reunified Democrats doubled down on the politics of territorial expansion and passed the 1854 Kansas-Nebraska Act, which reignited the debate over slavery by allowing voters to decide whether territories, even in the North, would be free or slave. The Democratic resurgence and the Kansas-Nebraska Act led to two competing Whig counterreactions that tore the Union apart and led directly to the Civil War. 5The Contradictions of the New Deal. chapter abstractIn contrast to antebellum Democrats, Depression-era Democrats were able to contain the challenge posed by militant trade unions and third parties like the Farmer-Labor and Communist parties. Though the New Deal is often seen as the golden age of social democratic politics in the United States, this chapter argues that the Democrats used collective bargaining laws and social programs to divide and then reabsorb renegade workers into mainstream institutional politics. This was the class contradiction underpinning the New Deal, but the New Deal also contained important racial contradictions, for it reserved many of its benefits for white Americans. When the Democrats later promised to close these racial loopholes through civil rights legislation, the Republicans rose to power by promising to maintain whites' privileged access to New Deal programs and by undermining the power of the state to intervene in the market. 6The Miseducation of Barack Obama. chapter abstractIn the midst of the Great Recession, Barack Obama's insurgent campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination promised a New New Deal. The postracial neoliberal establishment of both parties did not take this challenge to their power lightly, however. They moved swiftly to reabsorb the president into mainstream politics. From the left, Clinton Democrats infiltrated the Obama administration from inside the White House. From the right, the Republican congressional leadership sought to harness the grassroots energy of the Tea Party to block the Obama agenda. By 2010, the Obama administration had embraced the status quo. 7The Election of Donald Trump. chapter abstractThis chapter suggests that the establishment's reabsorption strategy backfired. The Obama administration's neoliberal turn ensured that social inequalities grew and festered, leading to three left-wing insurgencies: Occupy Wall Street, Black Lives Matter, and the Bernie Sanders campaign. On the right, the introduction of the Tea Party into the halls of power encouraged the proliferation and intransigence of the Far Right, most famously of the ""birthers"" and Donald Trump himself. The resulting factionalization of the GOP ensured that no one conservative candidate could defeat Donald Trump's campaign for the Republican nomination. Subsequently, young voters, union members, and black voters who were alienated from the Democratic establishment either defected from the Democratic Party in the 2016 presidential campaign or stayed home on election day. This perfect storm led to the election of Donald Trump. 8The Paths out of Crisis. chapter abstractThis chapter explores the potential paths out of our present crisis. There is evidence to suggest that the United States is on a path of Caesarism, or rule by an authoritarian charismatic figure. There is also evidence that neoliberals within the Republican Party may succeed in containing Donald Trump's seemingly antineoliberal agenda. Less clear is a progressive path. The chapter ends with an alternative agenda based on the concept of economic democracy. Economic democracy is an intersectional vision of solidarity, in which the struggle for economic justice is inseparable from the fight for racial and gender equity."

Reviews

Cedric de Leon sees a crisis in contemporary American politics similar to the one leading up to the Civil War. His paths forward-led either by political party leaders or through a surge of political independence among voters-point toward very different futures for U.S. democracy. As argued in Crisis!, we are living in extraordinary political times. -- John Aldrich * <i>Why Parties? A Second Look</i> * Crisis! draws important parallels between the Civil War and our present moment: that the planter class of the 19th century initially resisted secession finds echoes today in actions of the superrich, many of whom once opposed Trump but have now come on board, setting in motion consequences that threaten their wealth and power. A fascinating book. -- Stephen Lerner, Kalmanovitz Initiative for Labor and the Working Poor * Georgetown University * Cedric de Leon offers a compelling narrative that sheds light on our present political moment and serves as a resource to anyone wishing to understand and end the crisis of confidence that has gripped American politics. -- Jim McGovern * United States Congressman * Cedric de Leon makes a bold and convincing argument about the sources of political crises and popular disaffection with the major political parties: it is the dynamics of the parties themselves, rather than voters' economic self-interest or cultural goals, that create moments of political breakdown. -- Ann Shola Orloff * coeditor of <i>The Many Hands of the State: Theorizing Political Authority and Social Control</i> *

Cedric de Leon makes a bold and convincing argument about the sources of the political crises and popular disaffection with the major political parties: it is the dynamics of the parties themselves, rather than voters' economic self-interest or cultural goals, that create moments of political breakdown. -- Ann Shola Orloff * coeditor of <i>The Many Hands of the State: Theorizing Political Authority and Social Control</i> * Cedric de Leon sees a crisis in contemporary American politics similar to the one leading up to the Civil War. His paths forward-led either by political party leaders or through a surge of political independence among voters-point toward very different futures for US democracy. As argued in Crisis!, we are living in extraordinary political times. -- John Aldrich * <i>Why Parties? A Second Look</i> * Cedric de Leon offers a compelling narrative that sheds light on our present political moment and serves as a resource to anyone wishing to understand and end the crisis of confidence that has gripped American politics. -- Jim McGovern * United States Congressman * Crisis! draws important parallels between the Civil War and our present moment: that the planter class of the 18th century initially resisted secession finds echoes today in actions of the superrich, many of whom once opposed Trump but have now come on board, setting in motion consequences that threaten their wealth and power. A fascinating book. -- Stephen Lerner, Kalmanovitz Initiative for Labor and the Working Poor * Georgetown University *

Cedric de Leon sees a crisis in contemporary American politics similar to the one leading up to the Civil War. His paths forward-led either by political party leaders or through a surge of political independence among voters-point toward very different futures for US democracy. As argued in Crisis!, we are living in extraordinary political times. -- John Aldrich * <i>Why Parties? A Second Look</i> * Crisis! draws important parallels between the Civil War and our present moment: that the planter class of the 19th century initially resisted secession finds echoes today in actions of the superrich, many of whom once opposed Trump but have now come on board, setting in motion consequences that threaten their wealth and power. A fascinating book. -- Stephen Lerner, Kalmanovitz Initiative for Labor and the Working Poor * Georgetown University * Cedric de Leon offers a compelling narrative that sheds light on our present political moment and serves as a resource to anyone wishing to understand and end the crisis of confidence that has gripped American politics. -- Jim McGovern * United States Congressman * Cedric de Leon makes a bold and convincing argument about the sources of political crises and popular disaffection with the major political parties: it is the dynamics of the parties themselves, rather than voters' economic self-interest or cultural goals, that create moments of political breakdown. -- Ann Shola Orloff * coeditor of <i>The Many Hands of the State: Theorizing Political Authority and Social Control</i> *

Cedric de Leon sees a crisis in contemporary American politics similar to the one leading up to the Civil War. His paths forward-led either by political party leaders or through a surge of political independence among voters-point toward very different futures for U.S. democracy. As argued in Crisis!, we are living in extraordinary political times. -- John Aldrich * <i>Why Parties? A Second Look</i> * [De Leon offers] a sober analysis that centers its story on the relationships between a party and its base. If we are to find a way out of this 'time of monsters,' one way would be through movements that recognize these 'crisis points' and use them to break out of a system of political hegemony that has largely ignored climate change, allowed the growth of unsustainable levels of inequality and is actively disenfranchising people across the globe. The challenges for such movements are enormous, but the time has never been more ripe. -- John Kincaid * <i>Social Forces</i> * Crisis! draws important parallels between the Civil War and our present moment: that the planter class of the 19th century initially resisted secession finds echoes today in actions of the superrich, many of whom once opposed Trump but have now come on board, setting in motion consequences that threaten their wealth and power. A fascinating book. -- Stephen Lerner, Kalmanovitz Initiative for Labor and the Working Poor * Georgetown University * Cedric de Leon offers a compelling narrative that sheds light on our present political moment and serves as a resource to anyone wishing to understand and end the crisis of confidence that has gripped American politics. -- Jim McGovern * United States Congressman * Cedric de Leon makes a bold and convincing argument about the sources of political crises and popular disaffection with the major political parties: it is the dynamics of the parties themselves, rather than voters' economic self-interest or cultural goals, that create moments of political breakdown. -- Ann Shola Orloff * coeditor of <i>The Many Hands of the State: Theorizing Political Authority and Social Control</i> *

Author Information

Cedric de Leon is Director of the Labor Center and Associate Professor of Sociology at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. He is the author of The Origins of Right to Work (2015) and Party and Society (2014) and co-editor of Building Blocs: How Parties Organize Society (Stanford, 2015). Prior to becoming an academic, he was by turns an organizer and local union president in the American labor movement.

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