The Populist Persuasion: An American History [Paperback]

Michael Kazin (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 1996

This text gives an account of populism in American politics from the Revolutionary War to the present day. The roots of populism are found in the left, voicing the dreams and demands of exploited workers, the poor and the dispossessed. More recently, the populist tradition has been harnessed by the right, fuelled by the anti-Communist rhetoric of the Cold War, and the ascendancy of the Christian right. This development is traced through the presidential campaigns of George Wallace, to the forthright populism of Ronald Reagan.

--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

If populism now seems "something of a fashion statement," Kazin (Barons of Labor) ably reveals its rich and textured history. Activists from varied backgrounds have sought to invoke and speak to the masses since the late-19th-century People's Party mobilized agrarians and artisans. Kazin chronicles the place of populism in the labor and socialist movements of the Progressive era, prohibitionism and the crusades of radio cleric Charles Coughlin. After WWII, populism switched from left to right: the Cold War begat Sen. Joseph McCarthy, the New Left failed to "speak authentically," given their middle-class backgrounds, and George Wallace and Ronald Reagan tapped mass anxieties about race and taxes. In a society often said to be in decline, populism becomes "a language of the disspirited," but Kazin observes that progressive intellectuals must take account of populism if our society's problems are to be solved. Illustrations.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Library Journal

Kazin (history, American Univ.) has written a thoughtful and important book on one of the more consequential movements in American politics-populism. Tracing the emergence of populist campaigns from the 19th century to the present day, he looks at such movements as the labor movement, the prohibitionist crusade, Catholic radio populist Father Coughlin, the New Left, and the recent advance of conservative populism, as identified with such figures as George Wallace and Ronald Reagan. Kazin opens by saying, "I began to write this book as a way of making sense of a painful experience: the decline of the American Left, including its liberal component, and the rise of the Right." Anyone interested in either political tendency will find this book both informative and engaging. It is a powerful, elegantly written, and observant study that never fails to retain the reader's interest. The book's one major flaw is its naive and overly sanguine treatment of the American Communist Party. Its major selling point is its suggestive analysis of right-wing populism. Recommended for all collections.
Kent Worcester, Social Science Research Council, New York
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 400 pages
• Publisher: Basic Books (January 1996)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0465059988
• ISBN-13: 978-0465059980
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6.1 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.2 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,712,267 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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24 of 25 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Much better then What's the Matter with Kansas, March 13, 2005

By 

Hulka (Washington DC) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Populist Persuasion: An American History (Paperback)

Kazin's book is really a history of populist rhetoric, not populism per se. Thus, the title, the Populist PERSUASION!

Thankfully, Kazin does not ridicule populism as RICHARD HOFSTADTER did in his book, The Age of Reform. But Kazin still relies too heavily on the urbane cosmopolitan view of most liberals that populism is more a style of rhetoric to appeal to the uneducated rubes than a coherent set of political ideas or reforms.

Real populism more then an rhetorical style! It was a political movement of common people to control their own lives within a democratic market system with specific objectives like the crop banks and the sub-treasury plan. The Farmer-Laborer Alliances of the late 19th Century, and the People's Party that resulted, always referred to their reform movement as 'cooperation', not socialism. They were largely inspired by ideas of Thomas Jefferson, and the founding fathers. In this context, populism should be viewed as a struggle between democratic capitalism vs. speculative and monopoly capitalism, not a style of political rhetoric.

For an understanding of Populist reforms and political agenda, one would be better served by LAWERENCE GOODWYN's book, The Populist Moment: A Short History of the Agrarian Revolt in America.

That is not to say that Kazin's book is not an important book. To the best of my knowledge, Kazin is the only book to documented the 20th Century abandonment of populist impulses to the anti-semitism of Father Caughlin, and after the culture wars of the 60's, and the identity politics of the 70's to the likes of George Wallace and Rush Limbaugh.

As such, it is a valuable political history that does much to explain our modern "Blue/Red State" deadlock then more recent books, like Thomas Franks' What's the Matter with Kansas? How Conservatives Won the Heart of America, or John Sperling's The Great Divide: Retro vs. Metro America.

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Creative history, well written, August 24, 2007

By 

Privacy Hawk (Rochester, NY USA) - See all my reviews

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This review is from: The Populist Persuasion: An American History (Paperback)

Kazin extends his masterful understanding of the mental world of Gilded Age America, following the populist approach all the way to the Reagan era and beyond. For my money, I'd be happier if he had also placed more context around the rise of populism; after all, is not the idea of liberal democracy itself poulist, on some level? But he starts with what he knows best- the mental space occupied by William Jenning Bryan and those who understood his appeal. (Kazin knows Bryan well; I consider his biography the best of breed.)

The Populist Persuasion attempts to show that political populism is not just a movement of farmers and workers in the Gilded Age, but rather it is a way of seeing social and economic issues and offering a solution that addresses the needs of the amorphous "people." As such, it is a political persuasion that survives its initial application and lends itself to the needs of (among others) the socially conscious Christian, the labor organizer, and the new-left activist. This is useful, but as historical analysis it is inherently imprecise, after the manner of compelling political synthesis.

I do wish he or his editor had not attached the subtitle "An American History." It is not near that much of a synthesis, and it would have been much weaker if it were. It is a study that describes and extends populism IN American history into the recent past.

Kazin elsewhere acknowledges his personal secular liberal bias, and indeed it results in one of the few tenuous moments in the book when he portrays populism's "capture" at the hands of the modern political right. His critique is measured and fair, I think, but the viewpoint from which he writes is evident. Fair enough.

Kazin has a rare gift for making this kind of mental exercise clear and accessible without oversimplifying. He is a gifted historical writer, and this is a fine example of his craft. I like the book well enough that it is a required case-study for my US political history survey. High praise.

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Power To The People, March 8, 2007

By 

Clinton Ervin "maximus" (Murfreesboro, TN USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Populist Persuasion: An American History (Paperback)

THIS IS YOUR COUNTRY. DON'T LET THE BIG MEN TAKE IT AWAY FROM YOU. This quote, taken from the introduction to chapter 5 of Michael Kazin's book, epitomizes the spirit of the people and their "persuaders" in The Populist Persuasion. This work traces the uses of populist language from the antebellum era through the 1990s. It is the story of populism, not Populism (as in exclusively the 1890s movement), a flexible mode of persuasion used to convince large numbers of people to join a social and political movement. It is, as the previous reviewer lamented, a rhetorical style, not an ideology at all. The author does not take this lightly. He stresses that populism must be taken seriously and especially admonishes Democratic leaders for allowing it to be co-opted by conservatives. Populism "leaps ideological boundaries" (193), and that,as much as anything, is the lasting lesson of this provocative book.

This is a strong work, examining many popular movements, which prima facie, have little to do with each other. This is a fresh interpretation, not so much an examination of new historical sources. The author explains the central term as follows: "populism can be and probably must be a potent means to the end of a more democratic polity...but it can't be the end itself." It has been used over the years to manipulate the public into action, and according to Kazin, often action adverse to their own interests.

I recommend this book to anyone interested in political analysis or the history of mass movements. Kazin admits to regret that populism came to be better exploited by the right than the left since WWII, but that does not mean that this book is biased. The only problem I can see is with what's included and excluded. With such a broadly defined "impulse," almost any movement could be labeled "populist." Even though Kazin is a "power to the people" leftist who decries the decline of the American left, this book is fair and balanced. I'm not sure he'd like that "FOX-like" moniker, though!