Bill Clinton and the Culture Wars

Post-Reagan America: The Issues

• Post-Cold War: the “end of ideology”?

• “New” economy: protectionism or globalisation?

• Party system: a new Republican majority?

Patrick J. Buchanan, GOP national

convention, 1992There is a religious war going on in our country for the soul of America. It is a cultural war, as critical to the kind of nation we will one day be as was the Cold War itself… The agenda Clinton & Clinton would impose on America--abortion on demand, a litmus test for the Supreme Court, homosexual rights, discrimination against religious schools, women in combat--that's change, all right. But it is not the kind of change… we can tolerate in a nation that we still call God's country.

The “Culture War”

• Orthodox v progressive believers: authority of scripture

• Correlated with urban v rural America; “red states” v “blue states”

• Role in Republican strategy• 1990s issues: gays in military, gay

marriage, abortion, sex education, school prayer… adultery

http://livingroomcandidate.movingimage.us/election/index.php?nav_action=election&nav_subaction=overview&campaign_id=176

The “New Democrats”:

• A new “southern strategy”

• Generational change

• Moderate on cultural/social issues

• Economic appeal to middle class

• Agenda: crime, welfare, free trade

Clinton and the Culture War

Clinton came to symbolise counterculture: drugs, “draft-dodging”, marital infidelities… BUT:

• Southern Baptist upbringing, appeal to multiple religious constituencies

• In Arkansas politics: had learned to appeal to conservative Democrats

• A “third way”: e.g. Abortion should be “safe, legal…. and rare”

“It’s the economy, stupid”

v. the solidification of the religious / partisan alignment in American politics & society

“People out here don’t care about the idle rhetoric of ‘left’ and ‘right’ and ‘liberal’ and ‘conservative’ and all the other words that have made our politics a substitute for action.”

Bill Clinton, 1991

Republican Divisions

The 1988 Election

The 1992 Election

http://livingroomcandidate.movingimage.us/election/index.php?nav_action=election&nav_subaction=overview&campaign_id=176

“there is nothing wrong with America that cannot be put right with what is right with America”

But what did “New Democrat” mean?

• “Culture Wars” issues: gays in military, “partial-birth” abortion, gun control: Clinton on “liberal” side?

• “Liberal” on fiscal issues?: lack of interest in balanced budgets, raised taxes

• “Big government”?: universal health insurance proposals

…lost “moderate” image without shoring up liberal base

1994 “Republican Revolution”

Oklahoma City Bomb, April 19, 2005. 168 killed; 800 injured

The politics of “triangulation”

• “Common ground” speeches on key issues: abortion, capital punishment, gun control, “V-chips” (but vetoed “partial birth” abortion bill)

• 1996: “the era of big government is over” (but supported raising minimum wage)

• Signed 1996 welfare cuts (or “Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act”)

The politics of “triangulation”

• Key issue: budget deficits. Clinton accepted Gingrich’s goal of balancing budget, but not means of getting there: battle over protecting medicare and social security

• Government shut-down Jan-Feb 1996

“A vast right-wing conspiracy”?

Impeachment

• An unlikely alliance: Cultural conservatism plus licentious media

• Importance of public opinion• Constitutional legacy?• Reinforced kulturkampf• Public disillusionment with politics• Contributed to decline of presidential

prestige?

Clinton’s Agenda

• Accepted the reality of globalisation: NAFTA, normalising trade with China

• Intervention in Kosovo, military strikes against Iraq

• Failed to get Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty ratified by Senate

Clinton and the Party System

• Republican ascendancy? Critical election theory: 1968? 1980? 1994? Or the basis for a new post-Reagan Democratic majority?

• 1968 onwards: an era of divided government, with 1994 signifying tilt to GOP?

• Clinton as a “preemptive president” (Stephen Skowronek): “third way” politics, “triangulation”

Clinton’s Legacy for the Democratic Party

KEY QUESTIONS:1. Responsibility for 1994 GOP gains?2. Did “triangulation” serve only his

interest rather than Dems? 3. Distanced Dems from old liberalism?4. Failed to convince party over foreign

trade policy

The 1990s

• An interlude between Cold War and “War on Terror”

• Continued rise in inequality• Economic growth, low unemployment,

interest rates AND inflation• Clinton: a trimmer who ducked the big

questions and wasted an opportunity to revive liberalism, OR a gifted politician who tacked an effective middle way between liberals and the dominant conservatives?

Culture Wars….

or was it the economy, stupid, after all?