Business, the Democratic Party, and the New Deal: An Empirical Critique of Thomas Ferguson's “Investment Theory of Politics”

1991 ◽  
Vol 34 (4) ◽  
pp. 473-492 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael J. Webber
Keyword(s):  
New Deal ◽  
Democratic Party ◽  
The United States ◽  
Political Contributions ◽  
Political Processes ◽  
Investment Theory ◽  
Material Interests ◽  
Dominant Parties ◽  
Capital Intensive ◽  
The New Deal

This paper contributes to the continuing debate on how structures of economic power are connected to political processes in the United States by examining a widely respected theory concerning the financial support for the two dominant parties during the New Deal. Thomas Ferguson's “investment theory of politics” purports to demonstrate that capital-intensive, internationalist firms supported the Democrats while the labor-intensive, nationalist firms supported the Republicans. Campaign finance contributions for the 1936 Presidential election were used as an empirical indicator of the political preferences and material interests of business firms. It was found that there was little evidence to support Ferguson's claims. While there were firms where all political contributions went to the Republicans, it was highly unusual to have firms that contributed only to Democrats. There was also a total absence of Democratic industries. It is suggested that other variables need to be considered in determining the material bases of the major political parties, particularly the Democratic.

Industrial Structure and Party Competition in the New Deal: A Reply to Webber

1991 ◽  
Vol 34 (4) ◽  
pp. 493-526 ◽  
Author(s):  
Thomas Ferguson
Keyword(s):  
Data Analysis ◽  
Political Parties ◽  
New Deal ◽  
Industrial Structure ◽  
Statistical Design ◽  
Party Competition ◽  
Investment Theory ◽  
New Material ◽  
Capital Intensive ◽  
The New Deal

This paper is a response to Webber's (1991) critique of Thomas Ferguson's (1983, 1984, 1986) essays on the New Deal and his “investment theory” of political parties. It argues that Webber's evidence is invalid and that his statistical design is conceptually flawed. The sample is defective: it includes many people it should not and it excludes others who should have been reckoned in, notably many Texas oilmen. His procedure for ascertaining corporate partisanship is inadequate, since, among other problems, it excludes large payments made to the 1936 Democratic campaign by firms such as Standard Oil of New Jersey and General Electric. The campaign finance data he relies upon are also far less complete than he implies. An entirely new data analysis is presented, incorporating not only Webber's data, but much new material from archives. The results confirm Ferguson's central thesis about the 1936 election: contributions to the Democrats in 1936 do indeed come from firms that are more internationally-oriented and capital-intensive than those contributing to the Republicans.

VI. Political Parties and Elections

1943 ◽  
Vol 37 (1) ◽  
pp. 68-80
Author(s):  
Clarence A. Berdahl
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Political Parties ◽  
New Deal ◽  
American Politics ◽  
Democratic Party ◽  
The United States ◽  
The Third ◽  
The New Deal

Even before the actual outbreak of the war in Europe, there were indications of uneasiness among our politicians over the approaching storm. The Democrats, in their platform of 1936, and in speeches and actions of President Roosevelt (especially his “quarantine” speech of October, 1937), showed themselves somewhat more aware than the Republicans that the United States might somehow be involved; but, in the end, both parties united on the neutrality policy designed to keep us isolated and therefore presumably safe from the aggressions already clearly under way. Before the national conventions of 1940, however, Dunkirk and the fall of France made seriously possible the conquest of England and the surrender of the British navy, and the consequent danger to the United States began to influence materially the course of American politics. Within the Democratic party the third-term tradition was forgotten and Mr. Roosevelt was renominated, largely because of the war situation and his experienced leadership in respect to the problems involved. The Democratic party not only continued to stand aggressively for the New Deal, but had somehow become a “war party,” in the sense of anticipating possible war for the United States and preparing for it both by increasing our own defenses and by aiding those countries already resisting aggression.

African Americans in the Great Depression and New Deal

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mary-Elizabeth B. Murphy
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
African Americans ◽  
Great Depression ◽  
New Deal ◽  
Democratic Party ◽  
The United States ◽  
Government Programs ◽  
The Great Depression ◽  
Black Life ◽  
The New Deal

For African Americans, the Great Depression and the New Deal (1929–1940) marked a transformative era and laid the groundwork for the postwar black freedom struggle in the United States. The outbreak of the Great Depression in 1929 caused widespread suffering and despair in black communities across the country as women and men faced staggering rates of unemployment and poverty. Once Franklin Delano Roosevelt (FDR), a Democrat, was inaugurated as president in 1933, he launched a “New Deal” of ambitious government programs to lift the United States out of the economic crisis. Most African Americans were skeptical about benefiting from the New Deal, and racial discrimination remained rampant. However, a cohort of black advisors and activists critiqued these government programs for excluding African Americans and enacted some reforms. At the grassroots level, black workers pressed for expanded employment opportunities and joined new labor unions to fight for economic rights. As the New Deal progressed a sea change swept over black politics. Many black voters switched their allegiance from the Republican to the Democratic Party, waged more militant campaigns for racial justice, and joined interracial and leftist coalitions. African Americans also challenged entrenched cultural stereotypes through photography, theater, and oral histories to illuminate the realities of black life in the United States. By 1940, African Americans now wielded an arsenal of protest tactics and were marching on a path toward full citizenship rights, which remains an always evolving process.

Verán ustedes las chozas más humildes. El discurso de pobreza en la diplomacia pública cardenista dirigida a Estados Unidos

2019 ◽  
Vol 35 (2) ◽  
pp. 255-281
Author(s):  
Sylvia Dümmer Scheel
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
New Deal ◽  
Public Diplomacy ◽  
The United States ◽  
The Public ◽  
The Poor ◽  
The Face ◽  
The Government ◽  
Lazaro Cardenas ◽  
The New Deal

El artículo analiza la diplomacia pública del gobierno de Lázaro Cárdenas centrándose en su opción por publicitar la pobreza nacional en el extranjero, especialmente en Estados Unidos. Se plantea que se trató de una estrategia inédita, que accedió a poner en riesgo el “prestigio nacional” con el fin de justificar ante la opinión pública estadounidense la necesidad de implementar las reformas contenidas en el Plan Sexenal. Aprovechando la inusual empatía hacia los pobres en tiempos del New Deal, se construyó una imagen específica de pobreza que fuera higiénica y redimible. Ésta, sin embargo, no generó consenso entre los mexicanos. This article analyzes the public diplomacy of the government of Lázaro Cárdenas, focusing on the administration’s decision to publicize the nation’s poverty internationally, especially in the United States. This study suggests that this was an unprecedented strategy, putting “national prestige” at risk in order to explain the importance of implementing the reforms contained in the Six Year Plan, in the face of public opinion in the United States. Taking advantage of the increased empathy felt towards the poor during the New Deal, a specific image of hygienic and redeemable poverty was constructed. However, this strategy did not generate agreement among Mexicans.

Confluencia geopolítica entre Cárdenas y Roosevelt:

2019 ◽  
Vol 35 (2) ◽  
pp. 231-254
Author(s):  
Andreu Espasa
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
New Deal ◽  
Spanish Civil War ◽  
The United States ◽  
Political Crisis ◽  
World War ◽  
Military Alliance ◽  
Bilateral Relations ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
The New Deal

De forma un tanto paradójica, a finales de los años treinta, las relaciones entre México y Estados Unidos sufrieron uno de los momentos de máxima tensión, para pasar, a continuación, a experimentar una notable mejoría, alcanzando el cénit en la alianza política y militar sellada durante la Segunda Guerra Mundial. El episodio catalizador de la tensión y posterior reconciliación fue, sin duda, el conflicto diplomático planteado tras la nacionalización petrolera de 1938. De entre los factores que propiciaron la solución pacífica y negociada al conflicto petrolero, el presente artículo se centra en analizar dos fenómenos del momento. En primer lugar, siguiendo un orden de relevancia, se examina el papel que tuvo la Guerra Civil Española. Aunque las posturas de ambos gobiernos ante el conflicto español fueron sustancialmente distintas, las interpretaciones y las lecciones sobre sus posibles consecuencias permitieron un mayor entendimiento entre los dos países vecinos. En segundo lugar, también se analizarán las afinidades ideológicas entre el New Deal y el cardenismo en el contexto de la crisis mundial económica y política de los años treinta, con el fin de entender su papel lubricante en las relaciones bilaterales de la época. Somewhat paradoxically, at the end of the 1930s, the relationship between Mexico and the United States experienced one of its tensest moments, after which it dramatically improved, reaching its zenith in the political and military alliance cemented during World War II. The catalyst for this tension and subsequent reconciliation was, without doubt, the diplomatic conflict that arose after the oil nationalization of 1938. Of the various factors that led to a peaceful negotiated solution to the oil conflict, this article focuses on analyzing two phenomena. Firstly—in order of importance—this article examines the role that the Spanish Civil War played. Although the positions of both governments in relation to the Spanish war were significantly different, the interpretations and lessons concerning potential consequences enabled a greater understanding between the two neighboring countries. Secondly, this article also analyzes the ideological affinities between the New Deal and Cardenismo in the context of the global economic and political crisis of the thirties, seeking to understand their role in facilitating bilateral relations during that period.

Sorting Out the Mixed Economy

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Amy C. Offner
Keyword(s):  
Latin America ◽  
Latin American ◽  
New Deal ◽  
The United States ◽  
Business Associations ◽  
Welfare Programs ◽  
The Road ◽  
Social Welfare Programs ◽  
The Third World ◽  
The New Deal

In the years after 1945, a flood of U.S. advisors swept into Latin America with dreams of building a new economic order and lifting the Third World out of poverty. These businessmen, economists, community workers, and architects went south with the gospel of the New Deal on their lips, but Latin American realities soon revealed unexpected possibilities within the New Deal itself. In Colombia, Latin Americans and U.S. advisors ended up decentralizing the state, privatizing public functions, and launching austere social welfare programs. By the 1960s, they had remade the country's housing projects, river valleys, and universities. They had also generated new lessons for the United States itself. When the Johnson administration launched the War on Poverty, U.S. social movements, business associations, and government agencies all promised to repatriate the lessons of development, and they did so by multiplying the uses of austerity and for-profit contracting within their own welfare state. A decade later, ascendant right-wing movements seeking to dismantle the midcentury state did not need to reach for entirely new ideas: they redeployed policies already at hand. This book brings readers to Colombia and back, showing the entanglement of American societies and the contradictory promises of midcentury statebuilding. The untold story of how the road from the New Deal to the Great Society ran through Latin America, the book also offers a surprising new account of the origins of neoliberalism.

Counting on Relief: Industrializing the Statistical Interviewer during the New Deal

2011 ◽  
Vol 24 (2) ◽  
pp. 281-310 ◽  
Author(s):  
Emmanuel Didier
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
New Deal ◽  
White Collar ◽  
The United States ◽  
The Other ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
White Collar Workers ◽  
Statistical Studies ◽  
The One ◽  
The New Deal

ArgumentWhen the New Deal administration attained power in the United States, it was confronted with two different problems that could be linked to one another. On the one hand, there was a huge problem of unemployment, affecting everybody including the white-collar workers. And, on the other hand, the administration suffered from a very serious lack of data to illuminate its politics. One idea that came out of this situation was to use the abundant unemployed white-collar workers as enumerators of statistical studies. This paper describes this experiment, shows how it paradoxically affected the professionalization of statistics, and explains why it did not affect expert democracy despite its Deweysian participationist aspect.

The Evolution of the “American Empire”

1973 ◽  
Vol 67 (5) ◽  
pp. 1-7 ◽  
Author(s):  
José A. Cabranes
Keyword(s):  
Democratic Party ◽  
Pacific Islands ◽  
The United States ◽  
American Empire ◽  
The Pacific ◽  
Before And After ◽  
The Right ◽  
Colonial Government ◽  
Franklin Roosevelt ◽  
The New Deal

Today, the anniversary of the death of Franklin Roosevelt, is especially appropriate for a discussion of the political evolution of two territories whose development, before and after his death, was shaped by Roosevelt’s enlightened vision of world public order. The Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands (TTPI) was an inheritance of a war waged by the United States in affirmation of “the right of all peoples to choose the form of government under which they live.” Puerto Rico’s progressive dismantlement of colonial government had its origins in the New Deal. It was furthered by Roosevelt’s support of Puerto Rico’s Popular Democratic Party and a policy favoring self-determination and decolonization entrusted by Roosevelt to a succession of sympathetic and imaginative administrators. Both territories emerged in the postwar period as natural objects of the concern of the world community which Roosevelt helped to organize.

SOCIAL POLITICS IN A TRANSOCEANIC WORLD IN THE EARLY COLD WAR YEARS

2010 ◽  
Vol 53 (2) ◽  
pp. 401-421 ◽  
Author(s):  
JONATHAN BELL
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Cold War ◽  
Case Studies ◽  
New Deal ◽  
The United States ◽  
Welfare States ◽  
Political Agenda ◽  
Left Wing ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
The New Deal

ABSTRACTThis article argues that those termed ‘liberals’ in the United States had the opportunity in the late 1940s to use overseas case studies to reshape the ramshackle political agenda of the New Deal along more specifically social democratic lines, but that they found it impossible to match interest in the wider world with a concrete programme to overcome tension between left-wing politics and the emerging anti-totalitarianism of the Cold War. The American right, by contrast, conducted a highly organized publicity drive to provide new meaning for their anti-statist ideology in a post-New Deal, post-isolationist United States by using perceived failures of welfare states overseas as domestic propaganda. The examples of Labour Britain after 1945 and Labour New Zealand both provided important case studies for American liberals and conservatives, but in the Cold War it was the American right who would benefit most from an ideologically driven repackaging of overseas social policy for an American audience.

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