What Happened to the Vital Center?: Presidentialism, Populist Revolt, and the Fracturing of America [Paperback]

What Happened to the Vital Center?demonstrates that American politics has become so rancorous because it has been unable to heal wounds opened up by Sixties-era protest and institutional change. While many scholars suggest that the answer to our current predicament is greater presidential power, this work shows that doubling down on the myth of transcendent presidential leadership is likely to exacerbate, not heal, our wounds. Instead, the authors recommend that a reconstituted party system may once again permit political leaders to prevent the worst excesses to democracy that now routinely roil the country.Taking the reader through a long view of American history,What Happened to the Vital Center?offers a novel and important contribution to the ongoing scholarly and popular discussion of how America fell apart and what might be done to end the Cold Civil War that fractures the country and weakens the national resolve.InWhat Happened to the Vital Center?, Nicholas Jacobs and Sidney Milkis tackle a foundational question within American political history: Is current partisan polarization, aggravated by populist disdain for constitutional principles and institutions, a novel development in American politics? Populism is not a new threat to the country's democratic experiment, but now insurgents intrude directly on elections and government. During previous periods of populist unrest, the US was governed by resilient parties that moderated extremist currents within the political system. This began to crumble during the 1960s, as anti-institutionalist incursions into the Democratic and Republican organizations gave rise to reforms that empowered activists at the expense of the median voter and shifted the controlling power over parties to the executive branch. Gradually, the moderating influence that parties played in structuring campaigns and the policy process eroded to the point where extreme polarization dominated and decision-making power ml³A