Building a Business of Politics: The Rise of Political Consulting and the Transformation of American Democracy

by Adam Sheingate

Overview

Political races in the United States rely heavily on highly paid political consultants. In Building a Business of Politics, Adam Sheingate traces the history of political consultants from its origins in the publicity experts and pollsters of the 1920s and 1930s to the strategists and media specialists of the 1970s who transformed political campaigns into a highly profitable business. Today, consultants command a hefty fee from politicians as they turn campaign cash from special interest groups and wealthy donors into the advertisements, polls, and direct mail solicitations characteristic of modern campaigns. The implications of this system on the state of American democracy are significant: a professional political class stands between the voters and those who claim to represent them. Building a Business of Politics is both a definitive account of the consulting profession and a powerful reinterpretation of how political professionals reshaped American democracy in the modern era.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780190217211
Publisher:	Oxford University Press
Publication date:	12/01/2015
Series:	Studies in Postwar American Political Development
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	272
File size:	781 KB

About the Author

Adam Sheingate is a professor and chair of Political Science at Johns Hopkins University. He is the author of The Rise of the Agricultural Welfare State.

Table of Contents

Preface 1.) The Business of Politics 2.) Publicity and the Public 3.) Professional Propaganda 4.) The Art and Science of Politics 5.) A Business Takes Shape 6.) Advertising Politics 7.) The Consolidation of Control 8.) The Business of Digital Politics 9.) The Evolution of Political Work Appendix: Estimating the Size of the Political Consulting Industry Notes Index

Editorial Reviews

"This riveting book tracks a key development—changes to the world of political consulting—that has reshaped political life in the United States. Written with historical depth, analytical acuity, empirical richness, and normative sensibility, its compelling appraisal about the conduct of competitive politics, past and present, could not be more timely."
—Ira Katznelson, Ruggles Professor of Political Science and History, Columbia University and author of Fear Itself: The New Deal and the Origins of Our Time

"Employing a political scientist's rigor and an historian's sensibility and research, Building a Business of Politics adroitly captures the evolution of political consulting from its origins at the start of the twentieth century to the digital world it operates in today."
—Brian Balogh, Professor of History, University of Virginia

"Much of what drives the 2016 campaign each day can be seen in the election of 1916. In this revealing history, Adam Sheingate looks behind the candidates to the class of political professionals who have shaped our elections and government over the century since."
—Sasha Issenberg, author of The Victory Lab: The Secret Science of Winning Campaigns

From the Publisher