Description
Book SynopsisTrade Review"Cowie--like the best work of the mid-century historian Richard Hofstadter, whom he frequently cites--has written not so much a work of American history as a brilliant meditation about a central dilemma of American history."--In These Times "Jefferson Cowie offers a grand interpretation of the road blocks to change... A rich survey, studded with insights culled from a generation of scholarship."--Michael Kazin, Bookforum "Cowie sings the achievements of the New Deal in a tragic register, emphasizing its transformative power while lingering on its compromises... Cowie's vision is coherent and arresting, and helps to make sense of recurring puzzles in American political experience. As a literary-intellectual posture, moreover, his fatalism is downright infectious."--Democracy "Important."--Harold Meyerson, American Prospect "One of the year's most important political books."--E.J. Dione Jr., Washington Post "Engaging and highly readable, Cowie's book provides an excellent, thought-provoking introduction to American economic and political history."--Choice
Table of ContentsPROLOGUE Philadelphia, 1936 1 INTRODUCTION Rethinking the New Deal in American History 9 CHAPTER 1 The Question of Democracy in the Age of Incorporation 35 CHAPTER 2 Kaleidoscope of Reform 63 CHAPTER 3 Working-Class Interregnum 91 CHAPTER 4 Constraints and Fractures in the New Liberalism 123 CHAPTER 5 The Great Exception in Action 153 CHAPTER 6 Toward a New Gilded Age 179 CHAPTER 7 The Era of Big Government Is Not Over (But the New Deal Probably Is) 209 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS 231 NOTES 235 INDEX 263
