Diverging Pathways: The Peculiar and Problematic Gap between Comparative Politics and American Political Development

2013 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kimberly J. Morgan
Keyword(s):  
Comparative Politics ◽  
Political Development ◽  
American Political Development

Comparing America: Reflections on Democracy across Subfields

2019 ◽  
Vol 17 (3) ◽  
pp. 788-800 ◽  
Author(s):  
Didi Kuo
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Comparative Politics ◽  
Political Development ◽  
Ethnic Politics ◽  
American Political Development ◽  
The United States ◽  
The Public ◽  
Contemporary Politics ◽  
The Public Sphere

Is America in a period of democratic decline? I argue that there is an urgent need to consider the United States in comparative perspective, and that doing so is necessary to contextualize and understand the quality of American democracy. I describe two approaches to comparing the United States: the first shows how the United States stacks up to other countries, while the second uses the theories and tools of comparative politics to examine relationships between institutions, actors, and democratic outcomes. I then draw on research in three literatures—clientelism and corruption, capitalism and redistribution, and race and ethnic politics and American Political Development—to lay out a research agenda for closing the gap between the subfields of American and comparative politics. In doing so, I also argue for richer engagement between academics and the public sphere, as opportunities for scholars to provide commentary and analysis about contemporary politics continue to expand.

scholarly journals The Trump Presidency and American Democracy: A Historical and Comparative Analysis

2018 ◽  
Vol 17 (02) ◽  
pp. 470-479 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert C. Lieberman ◽  
Suzanne Mettler ◽  
Thomas B. Pepinsky ◽  
Kenneth M. Roberts ◽  
Richard Valelly
Keyword(s):  
Comparative Politics ◽  
Political Development ◽  
American Politics ◽  
American Political Development ◽  
Political Community ◽  
Interactive Effects ◽  
The Political ◽  
American Democracy ◽  
Political Spectrum ◽  
Democratic Norms

To many observers across the political spectrum, American democracy appears under threat. What does the Trump presidency portend for American politics? How much confidence should we have in the capacity of American institutions to withstand this threat? We argue that understanding what is uniquely threatening to democracy requires looking beyond the particulars of Trump and his presidency. Instead, it demands a historical and comparative perspective on American politics. Drawing on insights from the fields of comparative politics and American political development, we argue that Trump’s election represents the intersection of three streams in American politics: polarized two-party presidentialism; a polity fundamentally divided over membership and status in the political community, in ways structured by race and economic inequality; and the erosion of democratic norms. The current political circumstance threatens the American democratic order because of the interactive effects of institutions, identity, and norm-breaking.

Comparative Politics and American Political Development

2014 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kimberly J. Morgan
Keyword(s):  
Welfare State ◽  
Comparative Politics ◽  
Political Development ◽  
Qualitative Methodology ◽  
Ethnic Politics ◽  
American Political Development ◽  
State Building ◽  
The Us ◽  
The Welfare State ◽  
Area Of Study

The subfields of comparative politics and American political development (APD) have many intellectual affinities, as APD brought many of the questions and methods of comparative politics to the study of the US. In recent years, however, the two subfields have gone down separate research pathways, owing to the decline of political development as an area of study in comparative politics, the growing prevalence of large-Nresearch, and the specialization, and isolation, of academic subfields. However, two areas in which comparative politics and APD have had extensive dialogue—qualitative methodology and the welfare state—show there is much to gain from greater linkages between the two subfields. Fruitful dialogue could take place in other areas, including the study of state-building, democratization, and ethnic politics.

Reconsideration of the Research Trajectory on the Carceral State

2020 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 192-207
Author(s):  
Juliette Barbera
Keyword(s):  
Political Science ◽  
Political Development ◽  
American Political Development ◽  
The Political ◽  
Carceral State ◽  
Research Framework ◽  
Research Production ◽  
Fields Of Study ◽  
Theoretical Perspectives ◽  
And Control

For decades, both incarceration and research on the topic have proliferated. Disciplines within the Western sciences have studied the topic of incarceration through their respective lenses. Decades of data reflect trends and consequences of the carceral state, and based on that data the various disciplines have put forth arguments as to how the trends and consequences are of relevance to their respective fields of study. The research trajectory of incarceration research, however, overlooks the assumptions behind punishment and control and their institutionalization that produce and maintain the carceral state and its study. This omission of assumptions facilitates a focus on outcomes that serve to reinforce Western perspectives, and it contributes to the overall stagnation in the incarceration research produced in Western disciplines. An assessment of the study of the carceral state within the mainstream of American Political Development in the political science discipline provides an example of how the research framework contributes to the overall stagnation, even though the framework of the subfield allows for an historical institutionalization perspective. The theoretical perspectives of Cedric J. Robinson reveal the limits of Western lenses to critically assess the state. The alternative framework he provides to challenge the limits imposed on research production by Western perspectives applies to the argument presented here concerning the limitations that hamper the study of the carceral state.

scholarly journals Just Mothering: Amy Coney Barrett and the Racial Politics of American Motherhood

Laws ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 10 (2) ◽  
pp. 36
Author(s):  
H. Howell Williams
Keyword(s):  
Middle Class ◽  
Political Development ◽  
American Political Development ◽  
White Family ◽  
Public And Private ◽  
Close Analysis ◽  
History Of ◽  
Republican Motherhood ◽  
A Site ◽  
Confirmation Hearings

Justice Amy Coney Barrett’s nomination and confirmation featured frequent references to her role as a mother. This article situates these references within the trajectory of American political development to demonstrate how motherhood operates as a mechanism for enforcing a white-centered racial order. Through a close analysis of both the history of politicized motherhood as well as Barrett’s nomination and confirmation hearings, I make a series of claims about motherhood and contemporary conservatism. First, conservatives stress the virtuousness of motherhood through a division between public and private spheres that valorizes the middle-class white mother. Second, conservatives emphasize certain mothering practices associated with the middle-class white family. Third, conservatives leverage an epistemological claim about the universality of mothering experiences to universalize white motherhood. Finally, this universalism obscures how motherhood operates as a site in which power distinguishes between good and bad mothers and allocates resources accordingly. By attending to what I call the “republican motherhood script” operating in contemporary conservatism, I argue that motherhood is an ideological apparatus for enforcing a racial order premised on white protectionism.

Letters to the Editors

1987 ◽  
Vol 2 ◽  
pp. 337-342
Author(s):  
Eric Monkkonen
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Political Development ◽  
American Political Development ◽  
Local State ◽  
Political Issues ◽  
Political News ◽  
Island Communities ◽  
Over Time

Samuel Kernell's article “The Early Nationalization of Political News in America,” in Studies in American Political Development: An Annual (1986), 1: 255–78, raises issues that are at once interesting and puzzling. He measures the number and length of all political articles in leading Cleveland newspapers through the middle decades of the nineteenth century in order to ask about the amount of newspaper attention paid to local, state, and national political issues. He observes that local issues were predominant only very early in the nineteenth century and that they declined quickly over time. Kernell concludes that politics nationalized far earlier than historians like Robert Wiebe had ever thought. Wiebe's “island communities” were gone by 1845. It is a clever piece of research of substantial significance.

The Phantom at The Opera

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sidney Tarrow
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Political Development ◽  
American Political Development ◽  
Short Term ◽  
The Social

Movements and parties have given rise to two largely separates specialties in the social sciences. This Element is an effort to link the two literatures, using evidence from American political development. It identifies five relational mechanisms governing movement/party relations: two of them short term, two intermediate term, and one long-term. It closes with a reflection on the role of movement/party relations in democratization and for democratic resilience.

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