Summary by: Lindsey Browning
Jerome L. Himmelstein, To the Right: The Transformation of American
Conservatism, 1990.
At the heart of the electoral gains of the conservative movement is their
successful use of conservative rhetoric in symbolic victories. However, this rhetoric has actually not
had much impact on the broad liberal inclinations of public thinking about most
major policy areas.
This book offers an
interpretation of the growth of conservatism in American politics in the last
half of the 20th Century. The
successful political environment for conservatism, known as the New Right,
enjoyed by the Republican Party in the 1980s can trace its roots back to the
so-called Old Right of the 1950s and 1960s. The restructuring and organizing of its
ideology in the 1950s laid the foundation, followed by a combination of social
movement, electoral transformation, and elite realignment morphed conservatism
from a radical idea with minimal public support to a popular political movement
in just three decades.
In the 1950s and early
1960s, most Sociologists believed that the era for ideologies had ended and was
replaced by a rough consensus over political and social issues. For this reason subsequent right wing
movements were considered only to be episodical disruptions of American
political life. Therefore, the
presence of the Radical Right was explained to be a fluctuating group of people
protesting social change. The
groups would return to the consensus when it had adjusted to the
transition. This theory, referred
to as “Status Politics,” is founded upon the assumption that Americans,
preoccupied with their status, use politics to express their anxieties of moving
up or down in their relative economic and social standings. Expression usually takes the form of
concern with moral decay or political subversion. Basically, in this view the right wing
was seen as fighting “modernity.”
By the late 1960s, however, sociologists began to drop the assumption of
consensus within the electorate as radical ideas in the social sciences started
to take root. Nonetheless, the
notion that the Right to politics was relatively small and insignificant
persisted. Most radical
sociology in the following years took on the belief that American capitalism
prospered with liberal constraints.
In this view the liberal reforms of the 20th century, once considered
harmful to capitalism, were now considered tools for stabilizing a capitalist
system upset by economic crisis or social unrest. Capitalists were to embrace
liberalism and a growing state because it helped it function with reforms like
government regulation of the economy, social-welfare legislation, and collective
bargaining. Conservative resistance
from the far right was still regarded as irrelevant, and ignored.
However, by the 1980s it was obvious that the political right had been
underestimated and misinterpreted the whole time. The elections of many conservative
leaders openly opposed to big government indicates big business had not been as
intertwined with corporate liberalism or American capitalism, and a growing
state as what was supposed in the years before. Moreover, while an advanced industrial
society necessarily encourages both the growth of large-scale organization
(“rationalism”) and a decline in religious beliefs (“secularism”), ideologies
that promote the opposite traits of individualism and zealous religiosity, may
still ascend to power. In
hindsight, conservatism was actually part of a growing social movement with a
clear ideology that lead to the New Right and the New Religious Right. The rise of the Right had been
unexpected by sociologists.
The roots of conservative thought started with opposition to the
“liberal” programs of the New Deal.
In actuality, the New Deal was a practical, fairly moderate set of
programs and reforms aimed at correcting the economic disaster of the Great
Depression. It did not create a
comprehensive welfare state like those many European capitalist countries were
instigating at the time. It was
actually less radical than many other proposals. Nonetheless, the New Deal transformed
politics in two ways: it expanded
the size of federal government; it caused the biggest political “realignment” in
America since the Civil War—giving the Democrats power for many years to
come.
There was a “delayed” reaction to the New Deal, because its opponents
were unable to organize an effective opposition from the time its programs began
to be implemented in 1932 until the 1950s.
While economic prosperity in the late 1930s and 1940s did slow public
support for additional New Deal programs to be added, there was not a counter
conservative movement to undo those programs already in place. After WWII the New Dealers had
successfully maintained support by pointing out that the expenditure of the
government during the war was proof that government spending could keep the
economy growing.
What came to dominate
politics by the 1950s was a public consensus named “Cold-war Liberalism” or
“Liberal Consensus.” There are four
elements of this consensus: (1) an
affirmation of American capitalism (as reformed after New Deal); (2) a belief
that economic growth would help with social conflict; (3) a positive role for government in
economic life— promotion of economic growth by pumping money into economy; (4)
an acceptance in the permanent American role in international affairs.
Because of this consensus,
conservatives were not able to pry public support away from the New Deal and
Democrats. Instead they resorted to
challenging the Democrats on the international level and began accusing them of
being “Soft on Communism.” (McCarthyism).
By the 1950s the New Deal realignment had greatly strengthened the
Democratic Party. The problem
conservatives were having was that their positions were not clearly
defined. They agreed with Democrats
about capitalism and anticommunism, but they gave both concepts different
meaning. Thus in the mid-1950s, conservatives began to realize they needed to
reorganize their efforts and find a different approach. In order to regain their political clout
they needed to build their own movement, locate support in new places, and
mobilize. Finally, several years
after they first began forming their opinions in response to the New Deal, the
term “conservative” was adopted for the official name of their ideology and a
set of common themes were accepted.
Thus, “conservatism” was reconstructed into a concise ideology: In economics, conservatives are
concerned with freeing the market from constraints of government. They equate less government with more
individual freedom and greater prosperity.
They advocate cutting taxes, domestic spending, and regulation for the
freedom of creating producing and achieving more individual and national wealth.
This view is known as economic libertarianism. With regard to Social Issues,
conservatives speak out against the decline of religion and its effect on family
values, gender roles, and morality.
This view is known as social traditionalism. On National Security, they
usually want greater spending on the military for cold war. This view is known as militant
anticommunism.
What binds all three
elements together is the belief that society is self-regulating and harmonious,
thrown out of balance by liberal unnecessary tampering. Indeed, implicit in their ideology are
two elements: (1) the central cause of America’s problems are liberal ideas; (2)
a belief in the possibility of a natural, pristine harmony within
institutions. (free
enterprise).
Since conservative ideology
has remained fundamentally the same since the 1950s, to understand conservative
ideological beliefs in the Reagan Era -- we need to look at how it was first
constructed and how its constituent elements fit together.
Although their core concern remained the same as it had been since the
New Deal, the conservatives of the 1950s sought to transform their case against
“collectivism” in two ways.
(“Collectivism” was term used to describe the growing tendency of the
state to organize and plan social life).
First, on international issues they moved from an “isolationist”
standpoint to an “anticommunist” standpoint. Historically, they had advocated against
the United States’ involvement in international affairs. However, this was not a political
possibility in the post-war era, as it became increasingly obvious that the U.S.
has an interest in world politics.
Conservatives, thus, switched from being isolationists to being
anticommunists. Before the
restructuring of 1950s this was an area of disagreement for conservatives. Many conservatives, while accepting that
the isolationist standpoint was no longer feasible, advocated a
“non-interventionist” position of limited foreign policy using limited
resources. They were wary of
political power and its unintended consequences. By contrast, the “interventionist” position called for
total mobilization and throwing all resources into fighting anticommunism. The official conservative position was
decided to be of the interventionist philosophy because there was more public
support for it. By clarifying their
position on this issue, conservatives were finally able to distinguish their
policies from the “containment” policies used by the Democrats.
Second, on domestic issues conservatives attempted to revise their
arguments against domestic “collectivism” and their defense of laissez-faire, or
“pristine capitalism.” They had
always criticized big government for hampering economic prosperity, and
advocated unregulated capitalism for promoting it, but the liberal consensus and
the fact that increased government spending coincided with economic health since
the New Deal made their position not very appealing or credible. What changed in the 1950s was that
conservatives sought to make their case for their position in a different way--
they attempted to make a moral case for their version of capitalism. They managed to do this by bringing
together two very different (even contradictory) kinds of conservative
language: a libertarianism
that emphasized individualism and freedom; and a
traditionalism that stressed moral order and
community. In this way,
conservatives attempted to isolate from traditionalism an emphasis on moral
truths and integrate it into a basically libertarian outlook.
The three central features of Libertarianism are: (1) The root problem of the modern world
is the loss of individual freedom, and a limited state is the pre-condition of
that freedom. The primary freedom
is economic and requires the unrestricted right to use one’s property, spend
one’s money, and sell one’s skills.
(2) Society is an association of self-directed individuals. It is not itself an entity; it has no
goals, interests, or rights as a whole.
Any effort to define a distinct common good undermines individual freedom
by providing the potential basis for collectivism. It is assumed that individuals have the
capacity for self-control and self-direction, and that while everyone pursues
their own personal goals they can live harmoniously in society. (3) The main supports of individual
freedom are the major elements of capitalism—private property, the market, and
the organization of economic life around private profit. The major threat to individual freedom
is the growing state direction of economic life.
Libertarianism is in essence a defense of a type of capitalism known as
“pristine capitalism.” It is
capitalism in which the market does not give way to a growing state role in
structuring economic relations and distributing income; individual
entrepreneurship does not give way to the bureaucratic corporation; competition
does not give way to monopoly; concrete, owner-controlled property does not give
way to abstract stock ownership.
The libertarian defense of pristine capitalism has often tended to be
materialist and secular in nature.
Capitalism is justified by its superior efficiency, its promotion of
technological innovation and material progress. The appeal is to individual
self-interest because capitalism maximizes individual prosperity. Libertarian arguments dominated
conservative and right-wing Republican views from the New Deal until the
1950s. They rejected collectivism
on the basis that it assumes there exists an ethical code in society and that it
is the role of the state to pursue goals based on this code.
The three central features of Traditionalism are: (1) The major problems of the modern
world are the decay of belief in a divinely rooted, moral order and the decline
of community. The loss of spiritual
values has left human beings without an overarching purpose and justification
for life other than the materialist goals of pleasure and success. There has been a decline of shared
beliefs and institutions like family, church and community that bind individuals
to each other. The effect is that
humans attempt to fill the void left by all this decay and decline with a
collective government, because it offers a false substitute sense of belonging
and an unnatural promise of utopia.
(2) The image of society is more than just an association of individuals
each pursuing their own self-interest.
There are moral or emotional bonds, shared beliefs, and public virtue to
hold society together. The task of
maintaining these shared beliefs may fall to the sate, or intermediate
institutions like families, neighborhoods, or churches. The individual capacity for self-control
and freedom requires such a society.
(3) A decay in beliefs and the decline in community are tied with the
growth of capitalism. Because
the loss of moral order undermines any basis for self-control, humans are left
open to external direction. The
assumption that happiness in this world is a valid right leads people toward
“collective capitalism” in which the state must increasingly get involved to
regulate.
Traditionalists claim that the right to private property is essential to
ward off these trends. However,
they do not defend capitalist property of stocks and
bonds.
There were many similarities and differences between the views of
Libertarians and Traditionalists.
On one hand, both were preoccupied with the growth of the sate as a
organizer and planner of social life; both believed there was an order of things
that left to itself would take care of itself; and both defended private
property and were skeptical of egalitarian attempts. On the other hand, (1) Libertarians
argued the central problem was the tendency to restrict individual freedom in
the name of a common good or shared values, and that such a tendency leads to
collectivism, while Traditionalists argued that collectivism arises from too
much individualism, not too little: the breakdown of shared beliefs leads to
preoccupation with material goals which then leads to collective
capitalism; (2) Libertarians believe that freedom and
individualism are hampered when there is presumed to be a common moral code,
while Traditionalists believe that moral order implies constraints on both
freedom and individualism; (3) The
two views have different notions of society. Libertarians believe society is an
association, while Traditionalists believe it is a community; (4) Libertarians take for granted that
the individual has the capacity for self-direction and self-control and their
condition for freedom is negatively defined as an absence of constraints.
Traditionalists, in contrast, do not have as much faith in individuals to direct
their lives alone without the help of shared beliefs and social bonds. Their freedom is positively defined in
such a way that certain conditions are necessary to enable individuals to be
free; (5) Libertarians avoid
defining moral standards of how individuals ought live because they are wary of
any collectivist implications of a common good. They believe the central concern of
social and political institutions should be to establish the conditions under
which individuals can pursue their own goals, not to define goals for them. Traditionalists, however, focus on
defining moral standards of how individuals ought to live because they are wary
of the collectivist implications of a moral vacuum. It believed that social and political
institutions should be based on the common good defined by society’s
values; (6) Everything about libertarianism requires
minimal state action, while traditionalism, although wary of the state when it is not supported by a society of
shared beliefs, it also defined a state of positive action in which the goal of
politics is more than simply ensuring a negative freedom; (7) Finally, libertarians saw pristine
capitalism as the solution to collectivism, while traditionalists had a more
complicated view. They were not
completely anti-capitalists, although they did view capitalism as opening the
door to collectivism by undermining the community, centralizing property,
reducing the majority of people to dependent wage and salary earners, and
propagating materialist values.
They opted for a distributist vision of a society in which there exists
personal property held by many.
There is obvious difficulty in combining these two languages into one
coherent conservative ideology that makes sense. However, the attempts to do so
were imaginative and clever. First,
they explained that the libertarian concern with individual freedom and the
traditionalist concern with moral order and virtue can be intertwined. On the one hand, pursuit of virtue is
impossible without freedom because an act cannot be virtuous unless freely
chosen, and on the other hand, freedom would be empty without a higher
goal. Put this way, in the
political sphere freedom is an end in itself, while in the
moral sphere, it is a means for the human pursuit of the
good.
The most important part of
this argument is to establish that the capitalism libertarians consider
essential to freedom must be seen as inherently good or even divinely ordained,
or else validation for it is debatable.
Striped of this assumption, there are only the materialist and secular
justifications for pristine capitalism that were previously ineffective in the
years leading up to the 1950s. As
long as the collectivism of a welfare state (democratic socialism) appears to
work, the only objections to it that can work are the abstract moral and
spiritual ones.
In this way, conservatives
figured out they could criticize the welfare state, even if it leads to a better
material life, on the basis that it undermines human dignity and
independence. If people decide that
the social engineering of collectivism is desirable, conservatives can still
muster support against it by arguing that freedom is “the true condition of
man’s created being.” When freedom
is glamorously depicted as a moral, religious, or patriotic concept, anything
that violates that freedom in its purest form can be designated
undesirable. Conservatives
basically sought to use traditionalist moral order to reposition individual
freedom as a priority above all other social goals; to make individual freedom
the one social goal for society.
Left without the use of
moral, spiritual or religious justifications for freedom, human happiness is the
only justification for freedom. The
single-minded pursuit of happiness degenerates quickly into the pursuit of mere
pleasure, which then leads to the demand for the state to solve problems
(collectivism). When human
happiness is the justification for freedom, people will eventually seek to limit
that freedom in order to achieve happiness, because pure freedom and wide
happiness cannot coexist in a society.
The ethical concerns about capitalism including inequitable distribution
of income can be avoided by justifying freedom morally.
What conservatives sought,
in short, was a religious justification of pristine capitalism. They were saying that the decline of
freedom and pristine capitalism coincides with the decay in the belief in
God. Paradoxically, the secular and
materialistic outcomes of pristine capitalism were given as a reason for moral
decay--- and the solution is pristine capitalism.
Libertarianism did not have
to give up its negative, economic concept of freedom, its individualist concept
of society or its pristine capitalism, but merely had to base its arguments on a
moral order rooted in religion.
Traditionalism had to give up virtually everything except its emphasis on
a moral order. However problematic
the combination was accepted by both schools of conservative thought because it
was the first argument that effectively could be used to criticize domestic
collectivism. The conservatives
portrayed a capitalism in which the pursuit of profit and individual success led
neither to imperfections in the competitive market nor to the decay of belief in
moral values. If reality
contradicted this ideal, it was easy to manipulate liberal policies, growth of
the state, and unreligious liberal ideas to be the blame. The strength of conservatism
is the capacity to picture a natural order in society that functions most
efficiently without government interference, and to blame any disruption of that
order on liberal elites, their policies, and their ideas.
After a clear ideology was formed in the 1950s, the growth of the
conservative movement progressed in two phases: In the “old” right phase, from the late
1950s through the early 1970s, conservatism finally became an effective
political contender; and in the
“new” right, from the mid-1970s into the 1980s, the movement reached full
maturity and became for a time a dominant force in American politics.
The central issues surrounding the first phase of the old right are why
the movement grew and why it failed to have more impact. In the early 1960s there was an
explosion of conservative activity.
There was some friction within the movement between the “radical right”
and less radical conservatives. The
radicals were convinced of a communist conspiracy that was taking control of
American life, while the more respectable conservatives targeted a liberal
political culture as the real problem.
However, the spectrum of disagreement did not deter conservatives from
focusing on the same enemy—the liberal establishment, supporting the same
causes, getting funds from the same sources, and sharing the same leaders and
ideas.
Although the movement
branched out into different types of voters, it started out with three primary
bases that gave it access to political channels and financial resources: first, they shared support among
Republicans; second, they drew financial support from the business community;
third, they appealed to the upper middle class of affluent, well educated and
professional/ business people.
Conservatives collected new
support from a variety of sources.
Many were attracted to the movement because of their anger at the growth
in drugs, pornography, promiscuity, and the overall decay in moral
standards.
There were also complaints
about society from the left side of the spectrum—the black rebellion, the
student movement, the counterculture, opposition to the Vietnam War. This radicalism of the late 1960s
condemned the continuing concentration of wealth, misplaced priorities, and
racial, class, and gender injustice, and the dissenters argued that emphasis on
growth was ruining the quality of life. Ironically, this activity on the
left actually created an even wider opening on the right. In response to the overwhelming growth
of factions on the left, many Democrats retreated to the right in protest—some
for patriotic reasons, some racial, and some concerned with law, order and
morality. For instance,
the backlash of the Democratic party’s advocacy of civil rights legislation
drove large numbers of white southerners out of the party.
Another ironic addition to
the conservative cause was people with a new appreciation of unregulated
capitalism after experiencing the rapid progress of industrialization,
urbanization, and population growth.
Although these advances would not have been possible without the
government spending that subsidized its growth, the state was beginning to be
thought of as impeding further growth.
Finally, conservatives
benefited from a broad public dissatisfaction with major institutions as a
result of the growing perception that government leaders were corrupt,
unresponsive, and subservient to special interests. Conservative calls for a smaller federal
government were seen as a solution.
The tumultuous political
environment during the 1960s and 1970s assisted the conservative movement in
capturing support on such a diverse range of concerns and issues, not because of
its particular ideological positions, but rather because of the common enemy it
was able to attack on all these different grounds. It was able to adopt a broad
antiestablishment rhetoric and appeal to a wide variety of
complaints.
Nonetheless, in spite of
this growth in the conservative movement, up until the mid-1970s, liberalism
continued to dominate.
Conservatives were disappointed by unsuccessful attempts to ward off the
Equal Rights’ Amendment, growth in government domestic spending, new regulatory
agencies concerned with occupational health and safety, equal opportunity, and
environmental protection.
The weaknesses of the conservative movement in the old right phase were:
(1) the movement failed to attach itself politically to two of its most likely
advocates of their cause, Richard Nixon and George Wallace; (2) Many of the discontents
conservatives spoke of were politically ambiguous, and if they led voters away
from liberalism and Democrats, they did not redirect them to conservatism and
Republicans; (3) Finally, there had
not been an economic downturn to undermine liberal economic philosophy and the
association of Democrats with national prosperity and
progress.
The central issues surrounding the second phase, the new right, is what
accounts for the dramatic change in the movements success. Conservative leaders
began to meet in 1973 and 1974 to figure out what needed to be done to finally
see electoral success for their movement.
They agreed that the conservative failure lay not in a lack of
opportunities but in a failure of leadership, organization, and effective
outreach to new constituencies.
They needed a network of organizations to make their conservative
presence felt, so that they could achieve an independent identity with enough
political clout to influence the direction of the Republican party and
politics. The conservative network
grew substantially in the latter half of the 1970s with the help of computer
data banks to keep up with conservative contributors, conservative PACs,
conservative organizations concerned with policy making, coordinating the
efforts of congressmen, organizing conservative programs, influencing the media,
pursuing conservative issues in the courts, as well as countless single-issue
organizations.
The New Right made a systematic effort to reach out to new constituencies
in many ways: (1) established ties
with the popular George Wallace;
(2) took a more active and direct approach in appealing to voters who
were traditionally Democrats but tended to be socially conservative on specific
issues, including abortion, the Equal Rights Amendment, feminism, drug use,
pornography, school textbooks, busing, affirmative action, gay rights, etc. They stressed specific issues to
specific constituencies; (3) Most
important, the New Right organized the growing evangelical Christians of the
late 1970s into a political force by establishing the Republican party as the
more moral “religious” party.
Nonetheless, the most striking characteristic of the New Right was
actually its continuity with the Old Right in ideology and leadership. Ideologically, the only two differences
that occurred in the New Right are the emphasis on particular social issues and
the adoption of supply-side economics.
The New Right’s standpoint on social issues summoned the basic
traditionalist themes that were integrated into conservative ideology in
the 1950s. Moral order, community,
and constraint were used to discuss the social issues. On the other hand, any discussion of
economic issues utilized the libertarian themes. Similarly, they made use of the two
almost contradictory terms to capture broader support with a gender
division. The male perspective of
work was courted with libertarianism, while the female perspective of family was
courted with traditionalism.
This ideological division of labor was useful for combining constituent
support from unrelated voter issues.
Using libertarian language, conservatives could criticize compulsory
unionism for restricting freedom of choice for millions of American workers,
call for a more economic freedom, and praise individualism, opportunity, and
self-fulfillment. Then, in direct
contrast, using traditionalist language, they could promote very different
themes and still stay within the boundaries of conservatism. Talking about abortion rights they could
rationalize the restriction of free choice. They could talk about how society cannot
exist without recognition and adherence to a common good, which requires people
to act out of motives larger than their own narrow self-interest.
New Right leaders such as Ronald Reagan began to take notice in the
mid-1970s of the theory of supply-side economics. The basic argument was that high
marginal tax rates are a major cause of economic stagnation and hence tax cuts
are the key to economic prosperity.
They proclaimed that by cutting marginal tax rates, investment,
work and creativity could be stimulated -- and thus economic growth would
occur. A significant cut
could produce enough economic stimulus actually to increase government revenues
by greatly expanding the tax base.
A large tax base and low tax rates will yield as much revenue as a
smaller tax base and higher rates.
This new theory reoriented conservative economic thinking in two
ways: first, it made reducing the
size of government more acceptable because it emphasized cutting taxes (giving
money back to voters) before dealing with cutting of spending and programs
(taking money away from voters);
second, it conveyed optimism by suggesting that the problems of big
government could be solved with little pain. Before supply-side theories,
conservatives had to promote painful remedies, including tight money and
balanced budgets. Moreover, the
affects of a tax cut are felt by individuals and corporations, the poor
and the rich, and therefore can be a politically popular tool. It has allowed the party to disregard
deficits far larger than ever before politically feasible.
Tax cuts are in tune with the classic libertarian vision of pristine
capitalism by emphasizing that the state is largely an impediment to economic
health. Further, in justifying tax
cuts, conservatives imply that individual creativity and productivity, not
rational planning, are still the essence of capitalism. At the same time, traditionalist ideals
can be incorporated into supply-side economics with a construction of a moral
case for capitalism to go along.
For example, the Reagan administration in 1980 argued that “capitalism is
not only economically productive but morally good as well, since its creative
impulse is fundamentally altruistic and divinely
inspired.”
The newness of the New Right can be observed in the greater optimism and
activism of the period, more than in changes to the ideology. They just found a new way to market
their same old philosophies. They
began to attack “the establishment” and “the elite” in the name of the
people. In this way, the
wording invokes emotional reactions in the people— responding more to the
symbolic phrasing than to actual reality of the argument. Defining issues in such as way as to
invoke emotions by the mere choice of words is an effective marketing tool to
influence people’s opinions. The
description of an issue can be manipulated in this way to encourage popular
support just as easily as it can to discourage it. The “pro-choice” and “pro-life”
arguments both use this ploy to invoke emotional response. Without being fully informed about or
truly understanding both sides of the debate, a person could easily hear one
version of the issue and its stylized position term, and be influenced to be on
that side. Often the side of a
debate that generates the most support is the one that is the frequently heard
or with the most clever catch phrase, rather than the one that most people would
agree with if all the facts were known.
Reagan’s victory in 1980 completed the conservative ascent and was
proclaimed to be the greatest triumph for conservative thought since the
American Revolution. The
secret to the conservative movement’s transformation from contender to victor
does not lie in internal changes since it has changed little since the
1950s. Nor can the secret lie
simply in growing public discontent or social upheaval, of which the 1960s had
more than the late 1970s. It lies
instead in broader changes that teamed up various discontents into the tangible
form of activists, money, and votes.
The triumph of conservatism in the late 1970s and the early 1980s was
closely tied to three phenomena:
(1) the rise of the New Religious Right, which sprung from the emergence
of social issues and the reassertion of evangelical Christianity; (2) the conservative mobilization
of big business, which came about from the changing nature of American
capitalism perceived by capitalists themselves; (3) the revival of the Republican party,
which resulted from the complicated interplay of economic voting, realignment,
and dealignment in electoral politics..
The New Religious Right refers to a set of organizations that emerged in
the late 1970s, their leaders, and the movement that these leaders and
organizations fostered. Though this
movement made an attempted to sway a broad, religiously based conservative
thinking, its lasting impact was on the white evangelical and fundamentalist
Christians.
Although the New Religious Right took typically conservative stands on
all issues, its main emphasis closely paralleled the language of moral
traditionalism. There are three
reasons that this religious movement emerged at this time: (1) the organizing efforts of the New
Right leaders played a pivotal role in founding the new religious organizations
and in recruiting and training its leaders; (2) the organizational infrastructure of the
evangelical and fundamentalist subculture that had been growing for several
decades was utilized. Conservatives
discovered they could use the previously untapped religious and cultural
networks that already existed within these religious movements for mobilizing
their resources. The electronic
ministries, the superchurches, and the network of independent fundamentalist
churches provided the means through which conservatives could mount a
comprehensive campaign with a customized message; (3) the discontents, if they did not
actually increase during this time, at least became more politically salient
because of the emergence of the so-called social issues. In the 1970s and early 1980s, issues
like abortion, the Equal Rights Amendment, drug use, sexuality, the nature of
the family, and the content of public education. The prevalence of these issues became
important for a variety of reasons:
the partial transformation of America into a post-industrialist society
and the emergence of post-materialist values; complicated and contradictory
changes in gender roles; and growing polarization of Americans between the
religiously devout and the irreligious.
Both the rise of the social issues, and the long-term explosion of
evangelical and fundamentalist religious institutions led to the growth of the
New Religious Right. However, their
contribution is relatively mild.
The reconstruction of evangelical and fundamentalist religions, which
occurred between the 1940s and 1960s, produced only marginal political
realignment. While social issues
raised broader moral questions for all of the more traditionally religious, its
political influence never fully extended beyond its evangelical and
fundamentalist base. Its full
political impact was not experienced by among religious persons in general. Given the strong relationship between
social conservatism and religiosity, one might have expected that religious
persons on the whole would have been especially prone to shift their political
loyalties to the Republican party.
However, church attendance had a major impact on political realignment
only among the evangelicals. Even
if social issues did not have a direct impact on the general public, they may
help to mobilize activists who get people out to vote and help shape who they
vote for.
The political mobilization of big business in the mid-1970s gave
conservatives greater access to money and channels of political influence. Ronald Reagan’s election has been seen
as the end result of a decade-long corporate mobilization against the liberal
policies that had threatened to limit their profits in the 1960s and early 1970s
with the enlargement of the bargaining power of workers.
Subsequently, a popular point of view describes a major shift in the
balance of power in the U.S. since the rise of conservative power. In recent years there has been a
significant erosion of the power of those on the bottom half of the economic
spectrum—including not only the poor, but the working and middle classes as
well. At the same time there has
been a sharp increase in the power of the economic elites—those that fall in the
top fifteen percent of the income distribution. The growing economic crisis of the 1970s
provided the opportunity for political representation of the interests of the
business community and the affluent to win approval of drastic change in
economic policy, especially regressive tax reforms and cuts in
domestic spending. This
lopsided redistribution has been attributed to five things: (1) the growing betrayal of upper
middle-class loyalties to the Republican party; (2) the Republicans’ growing
edge of financial and organization resources over the Democrats; (3) the
polarization within the Democratic party; (4) the declining clout of organized
labor; (5) finally, above all, the political mobilization of big business and
its systematic effort to reshape the American political
agenda.
In the late-1970s, big
business did, indeed, successfully promote policies it deemed in its interests,
including cutting tax rates on profits and investment income, defeating labor
law reform, preventing the creation of a consumer protection agency, limiting
the growth of government domestic spending, and promoting deregulation of
specific industries.
The immediate reasons for
business mobilization are obvious.
In the middle of the 1970s corporate leaders saw a political crisis in
the face of economic stagnation.
U.S. dominance of the world economy was starting to wane. Economic growth, profits, and employment
dropped, demands on government escalated.
The previous arrangements of business-labor compromise, and the Keynesian
welfare state (the government management of the business cycle and social
welfare programs) had begun to lose effectiveness. While those arrangements had once suited
capitalism, began to create intractable government expenses, which made labor
costs hard to cut. In addition, new
regulatory agencies that sprung up in the late 1960s and early 1970s received
wide spread business contempt. The
capitalist enterprise was being threatened by a society of Americans who had
come to expect an ever-increasing standard of living and security, and who made
demands on government when the market did not provide what they expected. As government spending and regulation
increased to keep up with their demands, the rate of private investment
fell. Businesses felt powerless as
they were forced by government to act in ways detrimental to their
interests. Thus, businesses were
faced with both economic and political despair—the combination of which inspired
them to act.
They concluded that the political crisis was a result of democracy
itself, which undermines the power of business in capitalist countries. They also pointed to an ideological
cause for the political crisis: political approval and understanding of business
was at an all time low. The people
were distrustful of business because they didn’t understand the importance of
capitalism and business to their own lives. Business described this political crisis
in broad terms, and thus sought a broad response.
Big Business began to mobilize politically in the mid-1970s. They sought to influence the political
process by expending greater resources, increasing their level of political
organization, and establishing new means of influence. They threw all their support into the
conservative movement, agreeing with its stance on limited government. They
mobilized together in a hegemonic way overlooking the differences within the
many different types of business.
They attempted not only to influence specific pieces of legislation but
also to shape policy discussion and formation in a way hospitable to big
business.
There are four main areas that business concentrated its efforts of
political mobilization:
(1)
Direct lobbying of Congress on the behalf of big business as a whole was one key
element. The Business Roundtable,
an organization that represented the vast majority of large corporations,
emerged in 1972 and became a powerful lobbying force in shaping
legislation. (2) Corporate campaign
contributions to candidates became more ideological and more carefully
coordinated. The campaign reform
laws of the early 1970s introduced Political Action Committees to the campaign
finance world and a vast resource for businesses to promote their interests with
the Legislature. (3) Big Business
also stepped up its efforts to shape the assumptions underlying political
discussion of economic issues. They
supported public television series that advocated free enterprise, they produced
films and other educational materials for classroom use, they endowed dozens of
professorships of private enterprise at leading colleges and universities, and
most importantly, they used “advocacy advertising” which sells political beliefs
and thus appeals to the public as citizens rather than as consumers. Its aim is not to provide direct
benefits to any company, but rather to help sponsor a political climate
conductive to business as a whole.
(4) Finally, the most important element of the big-business mobilization
was the flow of corporate money to conservative research organizations. The expansion of the conservative
network of policy-oriented research and discussion organizations was the major
way in which big business was able to influenced major government policies. A substantial amount of money was
directed for the support of supply-side economics theory, which became central
to the ideology of the Reagan administration, as well as to studies of the free
market, conservatism and the study of religion. The rise these so-called political
“think-tanks” went beyond attempts of shaping specific individual policies. They provided broad justification for
conservative ideals, proposals for specific policies, public policy issues for
distribution to members of Congress, the executive branch, and the press. They were, also, a major source for
high-level appointees in the Reagan administration. Conservative think-tanks provided an
effective interface between the world of big business and the world of
conservative ideologues. In the
process, it made big business more ideological and conservatism more
influential.
The rise of the conservative
corporate mobilization destroyed every existing theory of the state and class in
sociological tradition at that time.
One popular theory that was prevalent before mobilization, called
“pluralism,” argues that capitalists are not a ruling class and their political
power is limited for three reasons:
(1) Business is seen to be only one among many interest groups capable of
influencing politics. There are
many power structures, which come to play in assorted importance on each issue
of public policy. Different groups
of society have levels of involvement in the varying issues according to their
relevance to each group’s own interests. (2) Balance of power has been
shirted from those who control property, to those who control technical
innovation and the flow of ideas.
There was a change in the mode of access to power means that
inheritance is no longer a determining factor, and at the same time, a change in
the nature of power-holding itself (technical skill rather than property,
political position rather than wealth)--- both of which led to the breakup of
the capitalist-based ruling class.
(3) Even if ownership of productive property might give capitalists a
high potential for control, they have a low potential for unity. The general rule is that classes rarely
act in a unified manner, unless their modes of gaining wealth and privilege are
in jeopardy. The lack of class
unity means that capitalists are likely to seek short-term economic gains from
the government, rather than getting involved in shaping long-term public
policy.
The capitalist class is
prevented from being a ruling class by both the external constraints of
competition with other interest groups, and their internal inability to act in a
hegemonic fashion. Pluralist
theory makes it easy to understand why business might at some point find itself
in need of mobilization. An
important assumption of pluralism is that business is not as successful as other
groups to shape policy, because business is disorganized and lacks the capacity
to organize as a class. They are
assumed to be only able to organize into political groups within the individual
industries. In contrast, the most
important feature of the political mobilization of big business in the 1970s and
1980s was precisely its hegemonic nature.
Big businesses were able to organize across-the-board to seek a
reorientation of American politics.
The pluralist theory, thus, does not have much use for explaining the
relationship between the capitalist class and the state.
Contrary to the ideas of pluralism, political sociologists, since the 1960s, have generally assumed that capitalists are a “ruling class” that has dominated American politics throughout the 20th century. Two more types of theories expand on this “ruling class” premise in different ways: (1) Structuralist theories argue that ruling classes’ interests were routinely ensured by a state that acted without outside political influence from the capitalist class; (2) Instrumentalist theories, in contrast, argue that capitalists are sufficiently active and politically organized to pursue their class interests effectively. They contend that the capitalist class decisively influences state policies through a network of private policy-making bodies. Through this policy formation process, the capitalist class determines the framework of government policy-making and public discussion on major issues. The issue is not who controls the state or how the state is constrained to guarantee capitalist interests, but rather through what processes are the class interests of capital effectively formulated and transmitted to the state.
However, when one compares what happened in the 1970s with political
mobilization of business to these theories, both ruling class falls short. The fact that it was advantageous for
business to employ a new mobilization implies that the resulting arrangement was
an improvement with heightened, better-coordinated, better-organized political
activity (if it wasn’t they would not have done it). The problem is that if before the
change, capitalism was already actively and politically pursuing big business
interests (instrumentalists)—the change would have been redundant; and if before
that change, capitalism was achieving its interests through the state
(structuralists)—the change would have been unnecessary.
In addition, the sense of
powerlessness felt by the executives was not compatible with either concept of
the capitalist “ruling class.”
Also, both sociological theories of a capitalist ruling class believed
that economic problems would yield statist solutions. They both assume that in response to
economic crisis or social unrest, either the capitalist class or the capitalist
state will seek to expand the role of government with liberal social-welfare,
regulatory policies, or corporatist efforts at planning. However, in contradiction, the response
to political and economic problems in the mid-1970s was to limit the role
of government, not utilize it to overcome the problems. The approach big business took instead,
bypassed what it had previously used to encourage economic growth, “corporate
liberalism”--- government involvement and subsidization of investment, research
and development, labor training, and infrastructure.
The instrumentalist theory had the most significant advantages of the
three theories when used to explain the corporate political mobilization. The hegemonic element of the
mobilization was not hard to explain with the instrumentalist view, because it
had always assumed hegemonic action on the part of big business. Also, because of the instrumentalist
image of long-term class-wide unity, the theory has no difficulty explaining how
the mobilization seemed to make a disorganized class suddenly organized. Finally, since the instrumentalist view
argues that the policy formation network is the major way in which the
capitalist class can influence the state.
Accordingly, any shift in the political role of big business should make
itself felt by changes in the network.
This is exactly what did occur when the political mobilization was taking
place in the 1970s.
Instrumentalism stops short of explaining: why capitalists, if a ruling class,
would have to mobilize; why their
mobilization took a conservative direction; why corporate executives felt so
powerless; and why big business as
a whole did not merely take a political initiative to change specific problems,
but also transformed the capitalist politics of all business.
All three available images of the capital class as a political actor—pluralism (passive and not a dominate class); structuralism (passive and a dominate class); instrumentalism (active and a dominate class)—have difficulties fully explaining the political mobilization movement. The passive images of the capitalist class make it difficult to understand how capitalists suddenly developed the capacity to act in a hegemonic way. The active image fails to explain why capitalists had to mobilize in a concerted way. The assumption (by all theories) that capitalists had reconciled themselves to liberal domestic policies and state intervention in general conflicts with how easily businessmen rejected liberalism in the 1970s and does not shed light on why they embraced conservatism rather than industrial policy and corporatism.
Two assumptions help in resolving those problems: (1) different government policies are
best for capitalism at different times in history. The policies that serve capitalism vary
over time, depending on the specific problems involving capital, and the
specific resources available for resolving these problems at a given historical
moment; (2) the degree to which
capitalists can act in a hegemonic way depends on the nature of those
policies. At issue in this case, is
not whether capitalists are really a ruling class—a question of political
impact—but rather the extent to which they are capable of acting in a unified,
mobilized way—a question of political organization. Big business adopts liberal or
conservative polices with different degrees of unity, mobilization, and
enthusiasm.
There is always less
enthusiasm for liberal policies, than conservative ones for two reasons. First, liberalism usually involves a
tradeoff for capitalists. There are
several examples of liberal reforms that are beneficial to business: social
insurance programs help to enhance consumer demand by elevating the spending
power of consumers and to alleviate social unrest; unions dampen conflict in the
workplace; and regulatory agencies limit harmful competition. However, these reforms are done with the
cost of a transfer of resources, power, or legitimacy away from
capitalists to other groups.
When liberal corporatism is in place, capitalism thrives, but capitalist
activity and capitalists themselves lose respect among the public. Conservatism, on the other hand, does
not involve contradictions of this kind.
Their policies that call for less regulation, fewer entitlements, and
weaker unions, instead transfer resources, power, or legitimacy to
capitalists. They do not carry
the same costs for capitalists as liberal policies do. Second, another reason for less
enthusiasm for liberal policies is an inherent distrust of government by
capitalists.
The fact that liberal reforms rarely gained enthusiastic business was not
very important since the support of no more than a framework of influential
corporate leaders are needed in order to pass them----because the reforms
received enough support from other constituencies. By contrast, Conservative policies both
required and encouraged broad-based capitalist movement. They required mobilization because
business is the natural constituency for such policies; they encouraged it
because there is not a conflict between short-term and long-term interests and
because they coincided with the instinctive reaction of the capitalist
class.
In short, big business moved
from corporate liberalism to corporate conservatism, because changing social
conditions made conservatism more parallel with their interests. This reallocation also involved a
significant mobilization of resources, energy, and enthusiasm on the part of an
already organized capitalist class.
There was corporate support for the shift because conservatism requires
none of the trade-offs for big business that liberalism, even when it is
historically appropriate, demands. Finally, conservatism won
support from corporatism, because of the deep antistatist bias of American
business.
The image of big business as
political actor that emerges from this is not clearly defined. The relationship between big business
and the state is more variable and subject to historical contingency than is
implied by the notion of a ruling class.
The capacity of big business to organize itself broadly, to address basic
issues of policy, and to bring its influence to bear on American politics is
much greater than implied by pluralism.
This aspect of social reality is more complicated than the theories about
it.
While the New Religious
Right and corporate conservatism were undergoing changes in the 1970s and 1980s,
so was the relationship between conservatism and the Republican party. The conservative movement played a
pivotal role in the resurrection of the Republican party. The central questions are what kinds of
gain were made, and what changes in the electorate made these gains
possible.
Applying these questions to at the Reagan years, these questions are
often altered into a question of whether or not American politics underwent an
electoral realignment during Reagan’s two terms. The focus becomes finding out if there
had been a fundamental shift in political allegiances (realignment) in the late
1970s and 1980s. Concluding
that there had been is to say that the Reagan victories reflected shifts in
political and ideological allegiances—voters who elected Reagan did so because
of preference to Republicans and conservatism. By contrast, concluding that there had
not been a realignment is to say that the shift reflected a range of
“short-term” judgments by voters about individual leaders, specific issues, and
immediate social conditions. The
voters’ economic judgments can further be described as taking place in a period
of weakening political loyalties, also called dealignment.
However, the problem with
this approach is that the question of whether or not a realignment had occurred
gives insight into only one aspect of the actual nature of Republican gains and
the electoral changes that made them possible. Using only the realignment issue leads
to incorrect or incomplete insight into the broader issues it attempts to
explain. It confuses the situation
in three ways: First, it encourages
seeing the broader political landscape all-or-nothing terms; Second, it
encourages viewing electoral races as either ideological polarized and
issue-oriented, or as simply reaction to the present state of economy and
personal judgments on candidates; Third, it does not provide insight into the
original question about the gains of the Republican party.
In reality the causes of the Republican gains were a “political mosaic”
in which the ultimate outcome is a result of different aspects of the political
environment of the time that were simultaneously influencing the electorate in
different ways. The
realignment issue is one of the ingredients in the mosaic. Among some groups, especially white
southerners and evangelists, “selective” realignment did occur in favor
of Republicans. The
dealignment issue contributes as well. Among other voters, a growing tendency
to make race-by-race judgments about specific candidates, rather than relying on
deeper party loyalties, demonstrated the growth of dealignment, which probably
helped Republicans since their superior control of money and greater
organization allowed them to target undecided voters in close races by making
use of new political technologies.
In addition, the general tendency of voters to engage in a economic
voting, a third aspect in the mix, was also advantageous to
Republicans because it allowed the transfer of the reputation as the “party of
prosperity” from the Democrats to the Republicans in the 1980s, and may have had
a long-term impact on the political impressions of young voters who were just
beginning to form their opinions during this time.
The Reagan elections did not reflect a critical realignment like that of
the 1930s, which realigned voters’ party identifications to the advantage of
Democrats; the republican party did not become a new majority party; the social
bases for support of the two parties did not shift fundamentally; and the public
opinion did not shift significantly to the right. First of all, while the Republicans
dominated the presidency in the 1970s and 1980s, it did not make progress in
Congress or the state legislatures.
Electorally, it did not succeed in becoming the major political
party. Second, the 1986 elections
demonstrated the limitations of the Republican gains. In spite of Ronald Reagan campaigning in
22 states for Republicans in congressional midterm elections only one year after
he overwhelmingly won reelection of the presidency, his effort was a
failure. In fact, there was even an
opposite effect, in which the Democrats managed to pick up enough extra seats in
the election to gain control of the Senate. Third, political coalitions did not
undergo any major shifting during the 1980s. The same electoral cleavages that were
formed by the New Deal persisted and the relative Democratic advantage among
these voters remained. Fourth, nearly all measures of ideology and issue
positions used by public-opinion polls showed no substantial move to the
right. The gains in Republican
party identification and presidential victories came almost entirely from the
sector of the electorate least attuned to issues and ideology. Democrats, far from losing support for
their ideology and issues, actually made up ground.
Nonetheless, while the
Republican party did not become the new majority party, it still managed to
shake the electorate up enough to help close the gap in party
identification. According to Gallup
polls, between the years 1950 and 1984, Democrats usually held at least 40
percent of the electorate nationally, mainly hovering in the 45 percent range,
while Republican identification always remained below 35 percent. The summer of 1984, however, showed a
more even contest. Democrats, who
had gotten used to their party’s consistent 14 to 22 point advantage, were
shocked to see that Republicans only trailed them by 4 points; they had 35
percent party identification electoral base to the Democrats 39 percent.
Shifts like that in party
identification only shows electoral change (realignment) if that shift governs
political behavior, which was not the case here. Instead, there was a weakening of party
identification and a deterioration of its relationship to political behavior in
the 1970s and early 1980s—hence, a dealignment. The “swing vote” became very important
to winning elections. The number of
people calling themselves independents has significantly increased and now is
usually in the range of 30 percent.
People describing themselves as strong supporters of either party
declined from 38 percent in 1964, to 29 percent in 1984. Many voters change their identification
frequently as they shift their vote preference. In the course of all this, split-ticket
voting and incumbency voting has rose.
The percentage of incumbents in the House who won their reelection with
at least 60 percent of the popular vote rose from 59% in 1956, to 86% in
1986. The volatility of the
electorate made it difficult for either party to put together a consistent
coalition. As Reagan left the White
House, the gap between the two parties opened back up to 29 – 42 percent with
Democrats in the lead once again.
The ease with which dramatic shifts occurred throughout the 80s
demonstrates the volatility created with dealignment.
The evidence of dealignment can be used to argue that the Reagan
elections had little ideological implications, but simply reflected the changing
state of economy. Looking at it
from this perspective, the crucial factor in American elections is voters’
perceptions of economic conditions, a behavior known as economic
voting. The election of Reagan
in 1980 can be attributed to the economic conditions of Carter’s presidency, in
which voters weren’t so much voting for Reagan as they were against Carter. Likewise, the election of 1984 can be
attributed to the satisfaction of voters with the fact that the economy
rebounded. Key factors used by
voters to determine whether they should punish or reward its leaders are the
inflation rate, the unemployment rate, the growth in personal disposable income,
and personal perceptions of the current economic condition.
Looking at the Republican gains in the perspective of selective
realignment, dealignment, and economic voting, the changes are less impressive
than a true critical realignment like the one in the 1930s. Nonetheless, they helped to make the
Republican party a bigger yet faster political vehicle for conservatives to ride
to power.
When Reagan left office, the conservative movement appeared to be
entrenched but exhausted. On
the positive side, many of the achievements and assumptions of conservatism had
integrated into the framework of American politics. The consistent emphasis in the during
the Reagan years on tax cuts and budget deficits had made liberal domestic
agenda politically difficult. Large
military buildup had increased the baseline spending level (status quo) about
which debates over increases or decreases in the status quo level of spending
were based—raising the standards of acceptability and expectation. Reagan’s federal court appointees put a
long-term conservative stamp on Supreme Court decisions. Overall, conservative views on most
issues have gained legitimacy and acceptability.
On the negative side, the forward momentum of the conservative movement
was largely exhausted. The Reagan
years ended with neither a solid Republican nor conservative popular majority
much better than it had been when it began. The Republican nomination of George
Bush, who was not very conservative, for the next president indicated that the
Republican party was not committed to further advancement of the conservative
movement, and it highlighted a shortage in effective conservative leaders.
Looking at the condition of the various elements of conservatism previously discussed as the Bush presidency began, a clearer picture of the Right in aftermath of the Reagan era emerges.
At the conclusion of the Reagan era, the New Right seemed to be in
dismay and disarray, and looked as if its days were numbered at the onset of the
Bush years. The situation reflected
the fact that for the first time in 20 years the conservative movement lacked a
leader. Conservatives failed to
unite around a successor in the Republican primaries of 1988, and thus, in the
following years they were faced with less influence within the Republican party
and in politics in general. Dismay
also arose from how they might assess the actual achievements of the Reagan
administration. His second term was
mired in scandal and crisis with the Iran-Contra revelations portraying
unflattering insider accounts of the Reagan White House. In addition, the second term consisted
of hardly any program or sense of direction. Its main achievement was an arms control
agreement with the Soviet Union, which contradicted every aspect of conservative
ideology. Also, during that term
conservatives were electorally unsuccessful in other levels of government. Moreover, important New Right
organizations, faced with considerable financial problems in the late 1980s,
were forced to scale back their activities.
However, the most important
reason for the disarray of the New Right was that it had failed to adjust its
political style as the conservative movement ascended from the stance of the
outsider. The strategies used to
originally jump start conservatism and propel it into the highest office were no
longer useful once conservatism was in a governing position. The conservative strategies adopted in
the late 1970s that were ideal in the beginning involved mounting opposition and
criticism against the “establishment.”
What conservatives in the late 1980s failed to realize was that these
strategies turned into political liabilities after they had thoroughly
infiltrated that establishment.
They failed to adopted a “governing” conservatism to follow their
“opposition” conservatism. The New
Right was not ready to lead and it never had been; it was, however, as always
ready to oppose.
Two examples of the New
Right’s inability to shed its outsider pose were especially
disadvantageous: First, their
failure to support the very conservative Jack Kemp in the 1988 Republican
primaries on the basis that he was not aggressive enough in attacking political
enemies, and his message was too positive.
Second, the failure of the nomination of conservative Republican John
Tower as secretary of defense in early 1989 was another instance, in which
clinging to their opposition strategy backfired. Here, a conservative activist lobbied
against the nomination of one of his own because the nominee’s past was not up
to certain moral standards. The
fact that a personal belief about morals was so readily translated into a
divisible public attack reflects the outsider mentality.
While the New Religious Right entered the Bush years as a still
potent source of Republican votes, conservative activists, and institutional
power, it also still functioned more like an evangelical-fundamentalist
Right. The antiabortion issue took
center stage and replaced the anti-ERA movement as the primary focus in their
political agenda. Evangelists and
fundamentalists gave Bush 81 percent of their votes— a higher amount than Reagan
had received from them in the 1984 election. However, the influence of the New
Religious Right remained limited in its scope. Financial trouble had dismantled many of
the television preachers and programs the movement had previously used for
advocating its ideas.
Thus, expansion of the New Religious Right appears to be limited, but it
likely will remain a political force.
In the remaining Reagan years corporate conservatism remained an
important political force, but its aggressiveness, partisanship, and in some
ways unity waned. While economic
issues in the mid-1970s unified big business, the economic issues in Reagan’s
second term split it. Disagreements
among corporations and industries injured the Business Roundtable, divided
corporate lobbyists, and pitted policy planning groups against one another. In addition, in the electoral aspect,
big business was less coordinated in their efforts to elect conservative
Republican challengers to House and Senate seats. The tendency of business to support
incumbents returned as the norm, and corporate PACs started to give less money
to challengers, conservatives, Republicans, and close races. Last minute surges of corporate money to
close races halted in late-1980s.
One factor for the reversal of big business electoral strategies was the
fact that Democrats began to effectively fight for more business money by taking
more pro-business stances and stressing to big business that without Democratic
cooperation, Republicans cannot help business interests. By reverting to their incumbent strategy
big business was not becoming more neutral, they still favored Republicans over
Democrats. They gave the least
amount of money to Democrat challengers—they avoided investing in new additions
of Democrats and liberals. However, even though corporate conservatism had been
diluted slightly, the networks of organizations important to its ideas and
policies continued to be supported by business money. Corporate conservatism, thus,
persisted into the 1990s, but its activism tends to be more episodic and less
enthusiastic than it had been.
The Republican party left the Reagan years with the gains it had
accumulated during the rise of the Right largely in tact. Democrats’ edge in party identification
was much smaller, Republicans had confiscated the reputation of the party of
prosperity and continued to enjoy the benefit of economic doubt, most
importantly, Republicans maintained its financial, organizational, and
technological superiority. On the
other hand, the fact that Bush’s coattails in the 1988 election were shorter
than any winning candidate’s had ever been demonstrated an overall volatility in
party identification in either party.
Republicans saw that the white evangelicals and while southerners had
held strong into the 1990s.
Traditional divisions along class and religion lines remained for the
most part in tact.
The implications of the 1988 elections for conservatism are
debatable. On the one hand, one can
argue that Bush’s win was not ideologically significant, because of economic
voting and the fact that some of Bush’s positions were not ideologically
consistent with conservatives or Republicans and therefore those who voted for
him weren’t necessarily condoning conservatism. On the other hand, one can argue that
those elections sent out a clear conservative or anti-liberal message. >From this
view, Bush turned his 17 point disadvantage in the polls into a 5 point lead by
effectively labeling Dukakis a liberal and attaching to it derogatory
connotations to that label.
Democrats were only successful in races for lower offices, because they
are not as much about ideology and issues, and more about personal images,
incumbency, and constituency services, than the presidential race. This claim implies that Republicans do
better in elections that are ideological and issue oriented. Both points of view have an element of
truth to them. The actual
implications of the 1988 election are really mixed. Conservatives have won an important
battle, but they are losing the war.
They have succeeded in turning the name “liberal” into a derogatory
political label that hurts anyone it becomes attached to. They have, however, failed to push
public opinion on most issues to the Right.
Conservative voters are more consistent in their support of conservative
public figures, than liberals are of theirs. Conservatives have won an important
symbolic victory, but it has proven to be limited. Republican negative rhetoric and the
failure of liberals to promote a positive meaning for their position have
contributed to “Liberal” being a less appealing label than “conservative.”
However, how Americans feel about ideological labels, often has nothing
to do with how they think about the specific issues. Conservatives have actually not had much
impact on the broad trends in public thinking about most major policy
areas. Therefore, the
electorate success Republicans achieve over Democrats has more to do with their
ability to promote images about each party, than with increased support for
their issues. For example,
conservatives used many propaganda tactics to muster support for their hard-core
military position. With their
anticommunist rhetoric conservatives tried to invoke hatred by labeling the
Soviet Union as “evil,” and tried to invoke fear by claiming that the fate of
humanity resides on the American ability to win the cold war. While such this approach has sometimes
had great appeal, it has failed to budge public support for more than the
quickest and cheapest assertions of American power in the world. Another example of the inability of
conservatism to change public opinion points out that in spite of the potent
appeal of conservative rhetoric about the decline of traditional family values
and the rise of a unreligious and unmoral culture, it did not lead to public
support for the conservative social agenda. Similarly, 15 years of conservative
antiabortion activity failed to move public opinion about the issue more than a
few percentage points. It appears
that Americans don’t want their morals to be defined and legislated by
government, and seem to seek a more careful balance of personal freedom and
social constraint than offered by the Right. Yet another example goes straight to the
heart of conservatism. The image of
limited government presented by conservatives has had appeal, especially when
talking about cutting taxes.
Nonetheless, despite 8 years of Reagan and conservative rhetoric, a
substantial majority of Americans believe government has broad responsibilities
for providing certain levels of social welfare. Most Americans oppose cutbacks in
government spending in most social programs. While many voters may have been swayed
by rhetoric, the support is usually only on the surface—in practice, most
Americans expect an activist government.
Over the years, Republicans and conservatives have gradually been forced
to adjust their policies accordingly.
In conclusion, Americans are
symbolically conservative, but substantively liberal. Basically, conservatives have failed to
alter the political tendencies of Americans, even though they have won important
symbolic battles; and Liberals are usually more in step with these political
tendencies, even though they have failed to articulate an effective political
vision.