Political Parties and the State: The American Historical Experience

by Martin Shefter

Overview

This book collects a number of Martin Shefter's most important articles on political parties. They address three questions: Under what conditions will strong party organizations emerge? What influences the character of parties--in particular, their reliance on patronage? In what circumstances will the parties that formerly dominated politics in a nation or city come under attack? Shefter's work exemplifies the "new institutionalism" in political science, arguing that the reliance of parties on patronage is a function not so much of mass political culture as of their relationship with public bureaucracies.

The book's opening chapters analyze the circumstances conducive to the emergence of strong political parties and the changing balance between parties and bureaucracies in Europe and America. The middle chapters discuss the organization and exclusion of the American working classes by machine and reform regimes. The book concludes by examining party organizations as instruments of political control in the largest American city, New York.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781400821228
Publisher:	Princeton University Press
Publication date:	12/27/1993
Series:	Princeton Studies in American Politics: Historical, International, and Comparative Perspectives , #34
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	316
File size:	797 KB

About the Author

Martin Shefter is Professor of Government at Cornell University. He is author of Political Crisis/Fiscal Crisis: The Collapse and Revival of New York City (Columbia), co-author, with Benjamin Ginsberg, of Politics by Other Means: The Declining Importance of Elections in America (Basic Books), and editor of Capital of the American Century: The National and International Influence of New York City (Russell Sage).

Table of Contents

List of Tables and Figures
Preface
Ch. 1 Political Parties and States 3
Pt. I Party and Patronage in Europe and America 19
Ch. 2 Patronage and Its Opponents: A Theory and Some European Cases 21
Ch. 3 Party, Bureaucracy, and Political Change in the United States 61
Pt. II Economic Interests and Political Organization in the United States 99
Ch. 4 Trade Unions and Political Machines: The Organization and Disorganization of the American Working Class 101
Ch. 5 Regional Receptivity to Reform in the United States 169
Pt. III Political Parties and Political Control 195
Ch. 6 Political Incorporation and Political Extrusion: Party Politics and Social Forces in Postwar New York 197
Ch. 7 New York City's Fiscal Crisis: Countering the Politics of Mass Mobilization 233
Notes 259
Author Index 293
Subject Index 297

What People are Saying About This

Margaret Weir

Shefter's is a unique voice in the study of American politics. [He] offers an original and rich perspective on American political development by pointing to the ways parties and the state shaped the timing and form of political incorporation of key social groups.
— Margaret Weir, The Brookings Institution

From the Publisher

"Shefter's is a unique voice in the study of American politics. [He] offers an original and rich perspective on American political development by pointing to the ways parties and the state shaped the timing and form of political incorporation of key social groups."—Margaret Weir, The Brookings Institution

Editorial Reviews

"Shefter's is a unique voice in the study of American politics. [He] offers an original and rich perspective on American political development by pointing to the ways parties and the state shaped the timing and form of political incorporation of key social groups."--Margaret Weir, The Brookings Institution

From the Publisher