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Rightward Bound: Making America Conservative in the 1970s
Often considered a lost decade, a pause between the liberal Sixties and Reagan’s Eighties, the 1970s were indeed a watershed era when the forces of a conservative counter-revolution cohered. These years marked a significant moral and cultural turning point in which the conservative movement became the motive force driving politics for the ensuing three decades.
Interpreting the movement as more than a backlash against the rampant liberalization of American culture, racial conflict, the Vietnam War, and Watergate, these provocative and innovative essays look below the surface, discovering the tectonic shifts that paved the way for Reagan’s America. They reveal strains at the heart of the liberal coalition, resulting from struggles over jobs, taxes, and neighborhood reconstruction, while also investigating how the deindustrialization of northern cities, the rise of the suburbs, and the migration of people and capital to the Sunbelt helped conservatism gain momentum in the twentieth century. They demonstrate how the forces of the right coalesced in the 1970s and became, through the efforts of grassroots activists and political elites, a movement to reshape American values and policies.
A penetrating and provocative portrait of a critical decade in American history, Rightward Bound illuminates the seeds of both the successes and the failures of the conservative revolution. It helps us understand how, despite conservatism’s rise, persistent tensions remain today between its political power and the achievements of twentieth-century liberalism.
Interpreting the movement as more than a backlash against the rampant liberalization of American culture, racial conflict, the Vietnam War, and Watergate, these provocative and innovative essays look below the surface, discovering the tectonic shifts that paved the way for Reagan’s America. They reveal strains at the heart of the liberal coalition, resulting from struggles over jobs, taxes, and neighborhood reconstruction, while also investigating how the deindustrialization of northern cities, the rise of the suburbs, and the migration of people and capital to the Sunbelt helped conservatism gain momentum in the twentieth century. They demonstrate how the forces of the right coalesced in the 1970s and became, through the efforts of grassroots activists and political elites, a movement to reshape American values and policies.
A penetrating and provocative portrait of a critical decade in American history, Rightward Bound illuminates the seeds of both the successes and the failures of the conservative revolution. It helps us understand how, despite conservatism’s rise, persistent tensions remain today between its political power and the achievements of twentieth-century liberalism.
384 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2008
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
May 29, 2013
"Texts assigned in the new classes extolled the entrepreneur as a rare and special type, not content with the ordinary round of bureaucracy in corporate life. In this guise, the entrepreneur inherited the mantle of Jeffersonian virtue from the independent farmers and the Populist rebellion -- a hero for the age of the mass office, a foil to sissified bureaucrats and the distant Shylocks of Wall Street." (67)
"Whether African Americans protesting 'negro removal,' white ethnics resisting busing, middle-class whites fighting the demolition of townhouses, or mixed-race coalitions fighting urban expressways, all expressed a deep distrust of mega-institutions, expertise, universal social programs, and private-public consensus. They shared their dislike equally for big business, big labor, and big government, championing instead grassroots institutions. They lionized voluntary service, self-determination, and 'do-it-yourself' bootstrap neighborhood rehabilitation." (114-5)
"Detente's achievement in providing some basic international stability empowered these criticisms [human rights and neoconservatism]. This is one of the central ironies of the period. A reduction in prior fears of nuclear holocaust and major war in Europe allowed more attention to issues of human rights and basic ideals. The broader international contacts encouraged by detente facilitated the formation of human rights organizations (like Amnesty International) and conservative networks (like the Committee on the Present Danger). These groups were the children of detente and also the primary poles of opposition -- on the Left and the Right -- to American foreign policy in the 1970s." (230-1_
"Whether African Americans protesting 'negro removal,' white ethnics resisting busing, middle-class whites fighting the demolition of townhouses, or mixed-race coalitions fighting urban expressways, all expressed a deep distrust of mega-institutions, expertise, universal social programs, and private-public consensus. They shared their dislike equally for big business, big labor, and big government, championing instead grassroots institutions. They lionized voluntary service, self-determination, and 'do-it-yourself' bootstrap neighborhood rehabilitation." (114-5)
"Detente's achievement in providing some basic international stability empowered these criticisms [human rights and neoconservatism]. This is one of the central ironies of the period. A reduction in prior fears of nuclear holocaust and major war in Europe allowed more attention to issues of human rights and basic ideals. The broader international contacts encouraged by detente facilitated the formation of human rights organizations (like Amnesty International) and conservative networks (like the Committee on the Present Danger). These groups were the children of detente and also the primary poles of opposition -- on the Left and the Right -- to American foreign policy in the 1970s." (230-1_
October 1, 2013
It is an interesting book to learn more about how America went to the right politically. However it isn't really a book, but more a set of articles. Some of them are good, but some of them aren't. I miss a good mapping of subjects. Furthermore I feel that there are some articles missing who argue the opposite, to make the book stronger. History isn't about giving you the answer, history books are about the fact that you have to think for yourself. See which article convinces you the most and that is what missing in this book. However, it is a good introduction to learn more about America in the seventies of the last century.
May 11, 2011
Despite the cover and title, it is not the kind of book it looks like. This peer-reviewed collection of related scholarly essays provides a nice perspective on the rise of right-wing politics from the 1960s to the 2000s, covering such aspects of the creation of "family values," white ethnic concerns, and the gradual rise to orthodoxy of anti-unionism as the New Deal coalition fell apart.
May 1, 2013
Some essays here are better than others. I think there are probably better books studying the rise of conservatism in the U.S. (certainly ones more favorable to the ideology), but "Rightward Bound" is a good starting place for someone unaware of the history.
April 2, 2010
read some not all of the essays. those foreign policy-focused (buckaloo, zelizer) were the more interesting.
September 21, 2017
I was assigned this book in college (2010 or so) but never had the chance to read it cover to cover. now in 2017 it is so, so appropriate and I have a whole new lense to read it with. would highly recommend in this age of trump! do note that it's a academic book, so it's a compilation of academic essays, though it is definitely easier to read than many academic books!
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews