From wildcatting Texas oilmen to Colorado rock climbers, from
hipster capitalists to populist moralizers, westerners have proven
themselves to be a highly individualistic breed of American--as
much in their politics as in their vocations or lifestyles. This
first book on the landscape of the American West's politics looks
beyond red state/blue state assumptions to explore how westerners
have expanded the boundaries of the political and emerged as a
harbinger of America's electoral future.
Representing a wide range of specialties--popular culture,
business history, the environment, ethnic history, agriculture, and
more--these authors portray a politically heterogeneous region and
show how its multiple traditions have strongly shaped the nation's
body politic. Viewing politics as more than cyclical
electioneering, they draw on historical evidence to portray
westerners imaginatively rethinking democratic practice and
constantly forging new political publics.
These twelve essays move western political history beyond the
usual discussions of elections and parties and the standard issues
of water, progressivism, and states' rights. Some explore claims to
western authenticity among those associated with western
conservatism-not just regional heroes like Barry Goldwater and
Ronald Reagan, but farmers and evangelicals as well. Others examine
the transformation of the West's minority communities to reveal a
liberalism that celebrates diversity and articulates claims for
social justice. The final chapters reveal the complexity of
contemporary western political culture, challenging longstanding
assumptions about such notions as space, nature, and the
liberal-conservative divide.
Here then is the paradox of western politics in all its
enigmatic glory, with frontier individualism going head-to-head
with multiethnic diversity in debates over divergent views of
"western authenticity," and wild cards put into play by
counterculturists, cyber-libertarians, fiscally conservative
gun-toting Democrats, and environmentalists. "The Political Culture
of the New West" shows how westerners have expressed themselves
within a complex, often contradictory, and constantly changing
political culture-and helps explain why no electoral outcome in
this part of America can be predicted for certain.
General
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