American political development
American political development is a subfield of political science that studies the historical development of politics in the United States. In American political science departments, it is considered a subfield within American politics and is closely linked to historical institutionalism.
Scholarship in American political development focuses on "the causes, nature, and consequences of key transformative periods and central patterns in American political history." Karen Orren and Stephen Skowronek, co-founders of the subfield's flagship journal, define American political development as the study of "durable shifts in governing authority" in the United States. The subfield emerged within American political science in the 1980s, alongside a general renewal of work in historical institutionalism, as an "insurgent movement" that sought to refocus attention on the study of historical American politics and to use such historical study to recast the study of contemporary political phenomena.
APD shares overlaps with the research agendas of comparative politics, historical sociology, and political history. However, scholarship in APD differs from political history in that the former's "primary concerns are analytical, conceptual, and theoretical rather than historical." Methodologically, the subfield tends to use within-case analysis and conduct causes-of-effects research.
Major journals in the subfield include the flagship journal Studies in American Political Development, founded in 1986, and The Journal of Political History, founded in 1989. As of 2005, the Politics and History section of the American Political Science Association was the eighth-largest in membership out of 35 total sections.
Major works
Some major works in the subfield, as indicated by reading lists for comprehensive exams in graduate schools, are as follows:Building an American State by Stephen Skowronek.Alternative Americas: A Reading of Antebellum Political Culture by Anne Norton.The Rhetorical Presidency by Jeffrey K. Tulis.Ronald Reagan, The Movie: And Other Episodes in American Political Demonology by Michael Rogin.Belated Feudalism : Labor, The Law, And Liberal Development In The United States by Karen Orren. Protecting Soldiers and Mothers by Theda Skocpol.The Politics Presidents Make by Stephen Skowronek.Republic of Signs by Anne NortonCivic Ideals by Rogers Smith.Shifting the Color Line by Robert C. Lieberman.The Roots of Reform by Elisabeth Sanders.The Political Economy of American Industrialization by Richard Bensel.The Forging of Bureaucratic Autonomy by Daniel Carpenter.Disjointed Pluralism by Eric Schickler.The Search for American Political Development by Karen Orren and Stephen Skowronek.The Divided Welfare State by Jacob Hacker.The Minority Rights Revolution by John Skrentny.Hellfire Nation: The Politics of Sin in American History by Max M. EdlingPolitics in Time by Paul Pierson.Nature and History in American Political Development by James Ceaser Black and Blue: African Americans, the Labor Movement, and the Decline of the Democratic Party by Paul Frymer.This Is Not A President; Sense, Nonsense, and the American Political Imaginary by Diane RubensteinThe Political Foundations of Judicial Supremacy by Keith WhittingtonCivil Rights and the Making of the Modern American State by Megan Ming Francis. Legacies of Losing in American Politics by Jeffrey K. Tulis and Nicole Mellow.Rot and Revival: The History of Constitutional Law in American Political Development by Anthony Michael Kreis.