Bill Clinton and the Culture Wars

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Bill Clinton and the Culture Wars
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Post-Reagan America The Issues

• Post-Cold War the end of ideology?
• New economy protectionism or globalisation?
• Party system a new Republican majority?

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Patrick J. Buchanan, GOP national convention, 1992

• There 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.

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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

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• The New Democrats
• A new southern strategy
• Generational change
• Moderate on cultural/social issues
• Economic appeal to middle class
• Agenda crime, welfare, free trade

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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

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• Its the economy, stupid
• v. the solidification of the religious / partisan
  alignment in American politics society

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• People out here dont 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

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Republican Divisions
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The 1988 Election
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The 1992 Election
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there is nothing wrong with America that cannot
be put right with what is right with America
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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

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1994 Republican Revolution
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Oklahoma City Bomb, April 19, 2005. 168 killed
800 injured
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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)

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The politics of triangulation

• Key issue budget deficits. Clinton accepted
  Gingrichs goal of balancing budget, but not
  means of getting there battle over protecting
  medicare and social security
• Government shut-down Jan-Feb 1996

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A vast right-wing conspiracy?
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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?

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Clintons 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

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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

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Clintons Legacy for the Democratic Party

• KEY QUESTIONS
• Responsibility for 1994 GOP gains?
• Did triangulation serve only his interest
  rather than Dems?
• Distanced Dems from old liberalism?
• Failed to convince party over foreign trade policy

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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?

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• Culture Wars.
• or was it the economy, stupid, after all?