5/11/2023 0 Comments Another word for paranoidPresident Franklin Roosevelt eschewed ‘radical’ and ‘progressive’ to claim the label ‘liberal’ for the New Deal welfare state. The Great Depression, World War II, and the early Cold War not only transformed domestic and international politics, but also changed the ways in which Americans conceptualized these developments. Liberals and radicals differed primarily about the composition of ‘the people’ and the amount of conflict needed to thwart or overthrow ‘the interests.’ Nonetheless, from the so-called Progressive era to the Great Depression, liberals (or progressives as they often preferred to call themselves) typically conceptualized an enduring conflict between ‘the people’ and ‘the interests.’ So did most radicals. Charles Beard stressed instead the conflict between classes or economic groups.Įspecially outside the academy, these modes of analysis overlapped. Then the Populist revolt of the late-nineteenth century strengthened an East-West regional interpretation that was codified in Frederick Jackson Turner’s frontier thesis. The conflict over slavery culminating in the Civil War produced a powerful North-South regional interpretation of American history. In this respect, as in many others, the United States was different. This simple formula, which originated in the French Revolution, had been more-or-less standard in Western Europe for over a century. Hofstadter’s catch phrase and the initially serious ideas behind it fitted into three intersecting trends in the post-World War II era.įirst, with Cold War liberals leading the way, the right-center-left model became the prevailing framework for conceptualizing American politics by the early 1950s. The question at hand is whether the term ‘paranoid style’ enhances or inhibits understanding of Trump, his coalition, and his presidency. Certainly President Trump promotes groundless conspiracy theories and claims to be unfairly persecuted, dispositions shared by many of his supporters. This essay represents not only another effort to bury the ‘paranoid style,’ but also (especially for those opposing the interment) an attempt at least to review the term’s problematic origins and consequences. Web and Production Editor: George Fujii Shortlink: Ribuffo, George Washington University Published on 13 June 2017 | Editors: Robert Jervis, Francis Gavin, Joshua Rovner, and Diane Labrosse Īmerica and the World-2017 and Beyond Donald Trump and the “Paranoid Style” in American (Intellectual) PoliticsĮssay by Leo P. Some of Trump’s conservative defenders have retaliated by calling his critics the true paranoid stylists. ![]() ![]() ![]() Application of the ‘paranoid style’ to Trump and his followers began in 2015 and has continued unabated. As someone who has tried to hammer in the stake for several decades, I can’t help noticing that the term has again risen from the grave as in a horror movie populated, not by vampires, zombies, and terrified teenagers, but by Donald Trump, superficial pundits, and terrified liberals and radicals. Richard Hofstadter’s famous catch phrase, the “paranoid style in American politics,” should be buried with a stake in its heart. In 1973, the American Psychiatric Association (APA) implements the “Goldwater Rule” in response, the principles of which the American Psychological Association (also, APA) “wholeheartedly agrees.” (Side note: APA style is Psychological). Fallout- Goldwater sues for libel and wins after the 1964 election. (Out of 12,356 psychiatrists polled with 2,417 total responses).
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |