Title Leftism reinvented : Western parties from socialism to neoliberalism / Stephanie L. Mudge

Published Cambridge, Massachusetts : Harvard University Press, 2018 ©2018

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Description 1 online resource (xxviii, 524 pages) : illustrations Contents Socialist, economistic, and neoliberalized leftism -- Making the infrastructure of socialist leftism, 1880s-1920s -- European leftism's first reinvention, 1920s-1960s -- Economistic leftism, American-style, or, making the Democrats "left" -- Reformatting economics, reinventing leftism -- New economists, new experts, new Democrats -- Making Western European leftism "progressive" -- Conclusions and implications Summary Left-leaning political parties play an important role as representatives of the poor and disempowered. They once did so by promising protections from the forces of capital and the market's tendencies to produce inequality. But in the 1990s they gave up on protection, asking voters to adapt to a market-driven world. Meanwhile, new, extreme parties began to promise economic protections of their own--albeit in an angry, anti-immigrant tone. To better understand today's strange new political world, Stephanie L. Mudge's Leftism Reinvented analyzes the history of the Swedish and German Social Democrats, the British Labour Party, and the American Democratic Party. Breaking with an assumption that parties simply respond to forces beyond their control, Mudge argues that left parties' changing promises expressed the worldviews of different kinds of experts. To understand how left parties speak, we have to understand the people who speak for them. Leftism Reinvented shows how Keynesian economists came to speak for left parties by the early 1960s. These economists saw their task in terms of discretionary, politically-sensitive economic management. But in the 1980s a new kind of economist, who viewed the advancement of markets as left parties' main task, came to the fore. Meanwhile, as voters' loyalties to left parties waned, professional strategists were called upon to "spin" party messages. Ultimately, left parties undermined themselves, leaving a representative vacuum in their wake. Leftism Reinvented raises new questions about the roles and responsibilities of left parties--and their experts--in politics today.-- Provided by publisher Bibliography Includes bibliographical references (pages 397-497) and index Notes Online resource; title from PDF title page (EBSCO, viewed April 24, 2018) Subject Liberalism -- Western countries Liberalism -- Economic aspects -- Western countries Right and left (Political science) -- Western countries Political parties -- Western countries POLITICAL SCIENCE -- Political Process -- Elections. POLITICAL SCIENCE -- Political Process -- General. POLITICAL SCIENCE -- Public Policy -- Economic Policy. Liberalism Liberalism -- Economic aspects Political parties Right and left (Political science) Western countries Form Electronic book ISBN 0674984838 9780674984837

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