Fiorina Government Essay

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12-3Parties as Problem Solvers

Morris P. Fionna

. . . S . e eo le view parties as self-PoliticaI parties receive conflicting reviews. om .p p ake essential compro-. rv ng entities that aenerate unnecessary conjhct, m . l:-;e i 0 1 . I a- important nation.a. . difficult and serve as obstac es to :-;o vino .mise mo1e 'JJ ' h fi aggreaating a van-bl s Others view party competition as t e means or o .pro em . . 1 alternatives coordinating action acrossety aj interests, generating po 1cy ' . bl I this

t d holding elected officials accounta e. nbranches of govern.men ' an ,f' . in. . l . t' t Morris Fiorina evaluates the role OJ partiesessay poht1ca saen is 11 .' . ' bl . . the First decade of the new mi enn1u1n.addressing the nations pro ems in J'. . - I \vrote an article entitled "The Decline ofs o ~ 1 E T\VENTY-F!VE 'iE.-\RS AGO . 1 . "I that article (henceforth refer-b1ry Amer ican Po incs nCollective Respons1 1 1 m bility in light

d DOCR) I uodated the classic arguments for part y e s p o n s ~ d h tence as , r d . usl deficient. . . . . LI] note t aof\vhich the politics of the 1970s looke -dser10 l y el not seen since before thehesion had droppe tO a ev fin the 1970s party co . . h d d, erated into a free-for-all olt national politics a egenCivil War. As a resu ' . . . brthelv sacrificed aeneral inter-. d b . . a in vvtuch paruc1pants 1 , bunprinc1ple argain inb . . . interests . The unified. . '. f particularistic consnruency .esrs m their pursuit 0 . . C re that failed to deal withf President J1mmv ar rDemocratic government o . fl . ,nd successive en ergv crises exem-1 bl uch as runaway m anon a .,nariona pro ems s M ot only- had policy failure

f arional politics oreover, nplif1ed the sorry state o n . .c bers of Conaress increasinglyl.k 1 b becaus e vormg ior mem bbecome more 1 re y, ur 1 ds of1'ncumbents mem-. . s and persona recor 'reflected the parti.cular1snc acnv1t1e bl their contribution to the fail-d 1. tl c ofbeino- held accounta e or hbers ha it e iear b 1 h 1 patheticallv resurrected t:: e1 r In that 1g t sym 'ures of nario na po itrcs. 1 '. 1 e.ntists who advocated moref 1 midcentury po inca sciarguments o y to 1 roblems \ V ~ r e amenable to g o v e r n m ~ n t ,

responsible ~ a r n e _ s 1 : - 1 ~ h o u g h : ~ \ : ~ strong presidents \vere more likely tosolution, unified political part_ y . d \.vhen they rook. th hallenaes fac1na the country, anact decisively to meet e c bd th : electorate for ratification or rejec-their collective performance recor s to d or blameh d d dea of .Vhom to rewar tion, the voters at least a a goo 1

.,,,Ir VewPcrspective.>on.

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l , " - Promoting the Genera! "ve!]are. - 'Parties as Problem So "er s, in Brnokin.gs lostiru'. iSource: );1orris P. Fionna, d E . M Patashnik (\Vashingron, D.C.: Alan s Gerber an nc ' < Government Peiformance, eas. - - . . h -iginal have been deleted.Eion Press, 2006), Z 3 7 ~ Z 5 3 . No::es appearing in t e o,

lviorris P. Fiorina 627Looking back at these essays, the 1980s clearly was the decade of party

responsibility for me. But . . . the prevalence of divided government in the latetwentieth century had raised doubts in my mind about the arguments articulated a decade earlier. These doubts cumulated into a change of position explicated at length in Divided Government and later writings. In brief, as the partiesbecame more distinct and cohesive during the 1980s, voters seen1ed to sho\.Vlittle appreciation for the changes. Rather than entrust control of governmentto one unified party, i\mericans were increasingly voting to split control of government-at the state as well as the national level. And \Vhether that \vas theiractual goal or no t -a matter of continuing debate-polls showed that majorities were happy enough with the situation, whatever political scientists thoughtof the supposed programmatic inefficiency and electoral irresponsibility ofdivided government. By the early 1990s, I had come to appreciate the electorate's point of view.

Moving from one side of an argument. to the other in a decade suggests thatthe protagonist either was wrong earlier or (worse!) wrong later. But there isanother less uncomplimentary possibility-namely, that the shift in stance didnot reflect blatant error in the earlier argument so much as changes in one ormore unrecognized but important empirical premises, ;,vhich vitiate the largerargument. . . . . By 1990 I had come to believe that n important respects the parties we \.Vere observing in the contemporary era were different in compositionand behavior from the ones described in the political science litera ture we hadstudied in graduate school. Parties organized to solve the go vernance prob lemsof one era do not necessarily opera te in the same way as parties organized tosolve the problems of ater eras.

This chapter considers the capacity of he contemporary party system to solvesocietal problems and meet contemporary challenges. I do so by revisitingDOCR and reconsidering it against the realities of contemporary politics. I beginby briefly contrastingl\merican politics in the 1970s and the 2000s.

Politics Then and Nowuv''" reflected the politics of the 1970s, a decade that began with divided gov-ernment (then still regarded as something of an anomaly), proceeded through

resignations of a vice president and president followed by the brief adminis' ~ " _ , . , . , of an unelected president, then Sa\.V the restoration of the "normal

-unified Democratic government-in 1976, only to see it collapse at theof the decade in the landslide rejection of a presidency mortally wounded by,jnternational humiliation, stagflation, alld energy crises. Contemporary critics


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628 POLITICAL PARTIES

placed much of the responsibility for "failed" Carter presidency at the feet ofCarter himself-his obsession \:vith detail, his inability to delegate, his politicaltin ear, and so forth-but I felt then that the critics were giving insufficient attention to larger developments and more general circumstances that \vould haveposed serious obstacles for presidents \vho possessed much stronger executiveand political skills than Carter.

Political Conditions in the 1970sNot only didJimmy Carter's 1976 victory restore the presidencyto the Democrats,bu t large Democratic majorities also controlled both the House and Senate. Itseemed that the great era of government activism that had been derailed by thewar in Vietnam \Vould resume. Such \vas no t to be. After four years of politicalfrustration Carter was soundly defeated, the Republicans captured the Senate\Vith a remarkabl e gain of twelve seats, and the Democrats lost thirty-three seatsin the House. What happened?

Basically, the country faced a series of new problems, and the DemocraticParry failed to deal \Vith them in a manner satisfactory to electoral majorities inthe nation as a \vhole and in many states and districts. Gas lines in particular,an d the energy crisis in general, were something ne\v in modern Americanexperience, as \Vere double-digit inflation and interest rates near 20 percent.Middle-class tax revolts \Vere a startl ing development that frightened Democratsand energized Republicans, a succession of foreign policy setbacks led manyto fear that the United States was ill prepared to deal with new challengesaround the world. In the face of such developments Democratic majorities inCongress failed to deliver. Indeed, they seemed fixated on old, i neffective solutions like public works spending an d trade restrictions. Th e honeymoonbet\veen Carter and congressional Democrats ended fairly quickly, an d the partnership \Vas under strain for most of Carter's administration. Members workedto protect their constituencies from the negative effects of the ne\.v developments and worried rnuch less about the fate of Carter or the parry as a \vhole.A s Figure l shows, this \Vas a period of low parry cohesion, and although crossparry majorities \.Vere no t as con1mon as in the late 1960s, Figure 2 sho\.vs thatthey still were common.

The generation of congressiQnal scholars who- contributed to the literature ofthe 1950s an d 1960s ha d defended the decentralized Congresses of the periodagainst the centralizing impulses of presidential scholars and policy wonks. True,Congress did not move fast or efficiently, nor did it defer to presidential l e a d e r ~ship, but most scholars \Vould have characterized this as pragmatic incrementalism rather than the "deadlock of democracy." Congress reflected and wasresponsive to the heterogeneity of nterests in the country.

Tn ;: vonnP"e:r P-eneration of scholars. howeve r, th e failingsof he decentralized

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1'.iiorris P. FiorinaFigure 1. The Decline and Resurgence of Party inGovernment Party Unity, 1954-98

Democrats-'

, - - - ; ' - ' - - - - I R ~ e p u b ! i c a n s

Year

629

Source: Harold W. Stanley and Richard G N" (Washington, DC: CQ Press, 2005), Table 5.s.iem1, eds., Vito/ Stat1st1cs on American Politics, 2005-2006

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50

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F i g u ~ e 2. The Decline and Resurgence of Partyin Government Party Votes, 1953-98

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faced the country, presidents were held ~ e s p o n s i b l e for solving these problems,but incumbent members of Congress seemingly could win reelection by abandoning their presidents and parties in favor of protecting parochial constituencyinterests. By emphasizing their individual records, members of Congress hadadapted to an era of candidate-centered politics. Historically speaking, they hadfar less to gain or lose from the effects of presidential coattails, nor need they bevery concerned about midterm swings against their president's party. Collecnveresponsibility traditionally provided by the political parties was at a low ebb.Pluribus was running rampant, leaving unum in the electoral dust.

Political Conditions NowIn retrospect, the trends decried in DOCR had already bottomed ou t by theCarter presidency. The cross-party majorities that passed President Reagan'sbudget and tax cuts may have obscured the fact, bu t party unity and partydifferences already were on the rise and continued rising in succeeding years(Figures 1 and 2). In a related development, the electoral advantages accruingto incumbency already were beginning to recede as national influences in voting reasserted themselves. And a ne.w breed of congressional leaders emergedto focus the efforts of their parties in support of or opposition to presidentialproposals. In 1993 President Clinton's initial budget passed without a s ~ ~ l eRepublican vote in the Ho1:ise or Senate, and unified Republican opposinoncontributed greatly to the demise of the administration's signature healthcare plan.And then came 1994, when the Republicans finally had success in an undertak-ing they had sporadically attempted for a generation- nationalizing the congressional elections. In the 1994 elections, personal opposition to gun control orvarious other liberal policies no longer sufficed to save Democrats in conservative districts whos e party label overwhelmed their personal positions. The newRepublican majorities in Congress seized the initiative from Presiden t Clinton tothe extent that he was asked at a press conference whether he was "still relevant." When congressional Republicans overreached, Clinton reasserted r e l -evance, beating back Republican attempts to cut entitlement programs andsaddling them with the blame1"or the government shutdowns of 1995-96.

At the time, the Republican attempt to govern as a responsible party srruckmany political scientists as unprecedented in the modern era, but, as Baer andBositis pointed out, politicshad been moving in that direction for several decades.Indeed, a great deal of what the 1950 APSA [American Political ScienceAssociation] repor t called for already had come to pass (Table 1). Now, a decade

Morris P. Fiorina 631Table 1. APSA Report after Forty Years

Fate of proposal Democrats Republicans SystemFull implementation 13 6 5Partial implementation 7 5 5De facto movement 8 9 5No change 3 10 3Negative movement 2 3 2

Source: Grossly adapted from Denise Baer and David Bositis, Politics and Linkage in a Democratic Socit ty(Upper Saddle River, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, I993), appendix.

later, it is apparen t that the Congress elected in 1994 was only the leading edgeof a new period in national politics. Party unity and presidential supp ort amongRepublicans hi t fifty-year highs d ~ g the first term of President George w.Bush, and in 2002 the president pulled off he rare feat ofleadinghis party to seatgains in a midt erm election. After his reelection in 2004, President Bush spoke in.terms clearly reminiscent of those used by responsible party theorists. On thebasis of a 51 percent popular majority, he claimed a mandate to make his tax cutspermanent and transform Social Security. Moreover, early in 2005 when thepresident was asked why no one in his administration had been held accountablefor mistakes and miscalculations about Iraq, he replied in words that should havewarmed the hearts of responsible party theorists: 'We had an accountabilitymoment, and that's called the 2004 election. And the American people listenedto different assessments made about what was taking place in Iraq, and theylooked at the two candidates, and chos e me , for which I'm grateful." No president in living memory had articulated such clear statements of collective partyresponsibility legitimized by electoral victory.

In sum, the collective responsibility DOC R found wanting in the 1970s seemsclearly present in the 2000s. Why, then, am I troubled by the operation of something I fervently wished for in the 1970s?

' -The Problems with Today's Respop.sible Parties

ln 2002 a Republican administration ostensibly committed to free enterpriseendorsed tariffs to protect the U.S. steel industry, a policy condemned by economists across the ideological spectrum. Also in 2002 Congress passedand PresidentBush signed an agricultural subsidy-\>ill that the left-leaning New York Times


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632 POLITICAL PARTIESdecried as an "orgy of pandering to special interest groups," the centrist USA.Today called "a congressional atrocity," and the r i g h t ~ l e a n i n g Economist characterized as "monstrous." In 2003 Congress passed and the president signed a s p e ~cial interest-riddled prescription drug plan that \.vas the largest entitlementprogram adopted since ivledicare itself in 1965, a fiscal commitment that immediately put the larger Medicare program on a steep slide to\.vard bankruptcy. In2004 congressional F.epublicans proposed and President Bush suppor ted a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage, a divisive proposal that had nochance of passing. ~ A . . f t e r his reelection, President Bush declared his highest priority \.vas to avert a crisis in a Social Security system he insisted \Vas bankrupt, byestablishing a systen1 of personal accounts, while disinterested observers generally pronounced the situation far from crisis and in need of relatively moderatereform-especially compared to Medicare. In 2005 the Republican Congresspassed and President Bush signed a pork-filled transportation bill that contained6,371 congressional earmarks, forty times as many as contained in a bill vetoedbv an earlier Republican president in 1987. Meanwhile, at the time of this writing

~ ~ m e r i c a n s continue to die in a war of choice launched on the basis of ambiguousintelligence that appears to have been systematically interpreted to support apreviously adopted position. . r The orecedina are onlv some of the more note\.vorthy lowlights or public

' b 'policies adopted or proposed under t he responsible party gover nment ofZ000-05.All things considered, if someone \vished to argue that politics in the 1970s \Vasbetter than today, I \vould find it hard to rebut them. Why? A . . r e today's problemsand challenges so much more difficult than those of he 1970s that the decentralized, irresponsible parties of that time would have done an even poorer job ofmeeting them than the more responsible parties of today? Or are today's responsible parties operating in a manner that \Vas not anticipated by those of us who\Vished for more responsible parties? In the remainder of his chapter, I will focuson the latte r possibility.

What Didn't DOCR Anticipate?\Vith the benefit of hindsight, one potentially negative effect of political c o m p e ~ti tion bv cohesive differentiafed parties is to raise the stakes of politics. Certainly,m a j o r i t ~ control 'of institutions always is valuable; committee chairs, agendacontrol: staff budgets, and numerous other benefits go to the majority. But ifmajority control of the House or Senate means relatively little for p o l i c y m a ~ gbecause moderate Republicans and Democrats hold the balance of power, whichparty formally holds control means less than \Vhen policy is decided within each

lviorris P. Fiorina 633party caucus. Similarly, the knowledge that the president's program either willbe rubber-stamped by a supportive congressional majority or killed by an opposition majority makes unified control of all three institutions that much morevaluable. The fact that the parties have been so closely matched in the pastdecade makes the competition that much more intense.

With the political sta..lces ratcheted upward, politics naturally becomes moreconflictual. Th e benefits of winning and the costs of losing both increase.Informal norms and even formal rules come under pressure as the legislativemajority strives to eliminate obstacles to its agenda. Meanwhile, the minority isfirst ignored, then abused. House Democrats under Jim Wright marginalizedHouse Republicans in the 1980s, and the Republicans have enthusiasticallyreturned the favor since taking control in 1994. Mean\.vhile Senate MajorityLeader Bill Frist threatens the minority Democrats with the "nuclear option"-arules change that effectively eliminates the filibuster on presidential appointments. In sum, the increasing disparity between majority and minority statusfurther raises the electoral stakes and makes politics more conflictual.

In retrospect, it is probable that the development of more responsible partieswas a f a c t o r ~ c e r t a i n l y not the only one-that contributed to the rise of thepermanent campaign. With majority status that much more valuable, andminority status that much more intolerable, the parties are less able to afford ahiatus bet\veen elections in which governing takes precedence over electioneering. All else now is subordinated to parry positioning for the next election. Freetrade principles? Forge t about them if Pennsylvania and Ohio steel workers areneeded to win the ne xt election. Budget deficits? Ignore them if a budget-bustingprescription drug plan is needed to keep the opposition from scoring points withsenior citizens. Politics al\vays has affected policies, of course, bu t today the link-age is closer and stronger than ever before.

A second problem with cohesive parties that offer voters a clear choice is that~ o t e r s may no t like clear choices. The APSA report asserted that responsible parnes would offer voters "a proper range of choice." But what is "proper"? Votersmay not want a clear choice between repeal ofRoe v. Wade and unregulated abortion, between private Social Security accounts a nd ignori...ng inevitable problems,benveen launching \vars of choice and ignoring developing threats. Despitemuch popular commentary to the contrary, the issue o s i t i o ~ S of electorateas a \vhole are not polarized; voters today remain, as.,,al\vays, generally moderate,or, at least, ambivalent. But candidates and their parties are polarized, and theconsequence is candidate evaluations and votes that are highly polarized, whichis what we have seen in recent elections.Even if voters were polarized on issues and wished the parties to offer clearchoices, they would still be dissatisfie-4. if here were more than one issue and the


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63 4 POLITICAL PARTIES

opinion divisions across issues were notthe same. For example, contemporaryRepublicans are basically an alliance benveen economic and social conservatives,and Democrats an alliance benveen economic and social liberals. So, in \vhichparty does son1eone wh o is an economic conservative and a social liberal belong?

economic liberal and a social conservative? Such people might well prefermoderate positions on both dimensions to issue packages consisting of on e position they like a great deal and another they dislike a great deaLThe bottom line is that the majoritariarrism that accompanies responsible parriesmay be ill suited for a heterogeneous society. With only one dimension of conflicta victory by one party can reasonably be interpreted to mean that a majority prefersits program to that of he other parry. But \\Tith more than one dimension a victoryby one party by no means guarantees majority support for its program(s).Indeed, . . given variations invoter intensity on different issues, a party can \Vill byconstructing a coalition of n i n o r i t i e s ~ t a k i n g the minority position on each issue.

A.merican politics probabl y appeared to have a simpler and clearer structureat the time the APSA report \Vas \Vritten. Race \Vas not on the agenda. Social andcultural issues \Vere largely dormant in the midcentury decades, their importance di1ninished by the end of immigration in the 1920s, the Great Depression,and World \Var IL i\. bipartisan consensus surrounded foreign and defense policy. Under such conditions it is understandable that a midcenrury political c i e n ~tist could have felt that all the country needed was nvo parties that advocatedalternative economic programs. For example; in 1962 political historian JamesMcGregor Burns wrote, "It is curious that majoritarian politics has \Von such arepucation for radicalism in this country. Actually it is moderate politics; it looksradical only in relation to the snail-like progress of Nladisonian politics. TheJeffersonian strategy is essentially moderate because it is essentially competitive;in a homogeneous society it must appeal to the moderate, middle-class n d e p e n ~dent voters \vho hold the balance ofpo\ver."To most contemporary observers the United States looks rather less o m a g e ~neous than it apparently did to observers ofBurns's era. Compared to 1950, ourpresent situation is ;no e complex with a more elabora te political issue space andless of a tendency to appeal to the moderate voter, _as we discuss below.

Burns's o n t e ~ t i o n that majoritarian politics is moderate politics is quite : t e r ~esting in light of the contemporary discussion of the polarization of i\mericanpolitics. Although the electorJ:re is not polarized, there is no question that thepolitical c l a s s ~ t h e variegated collection of candidates, activists, interest group-'::spokespersons, and infotainment media-is polarized. And, where \Ve can e a ~ ; :sure i t \vell, there is little doubt that the political class has become i n c r e a s i n ~ r {polarized over the past several decades. Figure 3 illustrates the oft-noted fact that;>,.moderates have disappeared from Congress: the area of overlap where o n s e r v a ' ; - ; ~ ; ~ , ,rive Democrats and liberal Republicans meet has shrunk to almost nothing, a n d . ~ _ , f

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Aiorris P. FiorinaFigure 3. Polarization of Congress since the 1960s

87th House of Representatives (1961-1962)Democrats Republicans

-.5Liberal106th House of Representatives (1999-2000)

DemocratsConservative

Republicans

-.5

Source: Keith Poole, http://voteview.com/dwnornin.htm. Conservativei--ithas done so at rh .:2_- e same Orne as the parties were b

- ~ _ _ . ' _ i d e e d , figures like thes e ofi:e . d . ecom1ngmore responsible--"'" n are cite as mdicat f%; Why would polarization ac ors o party responsibility.JJnde company parry responsibility' Lo . all .,,;. ed, the APSA report asserted th t "[ ] d d . . gic y itneed not.'.' . a neee clarifi f ._grselfwill not cause the parties to _,,,.,. fu canon o parry policy in :


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636 POLITICAL P:i..RTIES " . ,, nd "professionals" no,, d " ofessionals" or punsts aben..veen "amateurs an pr 1 1 b use the amateurs have won, or pernceptua va ue ecalonger have the same co . t At the time the respon-1 h rofessionals nO\V are puns s. .haps more accur ate y, t e P . did res on the basis of their. arties nominated can a .sible party theorists wrote, p I d or in more competl-d their connections to party ea ers, , . . dservice to the party an . hen a party \Vas bitterl y divide ,. 1 br Aside from nmes -r...v . .rive areas, the ir e ecta 11ty. f didate's suitability. Marena!. ldon1 a litmus rest o a can .issue positions were se domi nant but civil service,. 1 f offices, patronage--r...vere 'morivanons-contro o . . l social \velfare programs, and. . . conflict of mrerest aws, .public sector uruonizanon, al aterial re-r...vards that once mou-h ve lessened the person m 1ther devel opment s a . . d .d )ooical motivat ions are re a-. . pohncs. To ay, 1 eo b -vated many of those active m . 1 C didates must have the right set of. rant than previous y. an ldtively more impor d f the potential supporters wou pre-t upport an many o dissue stances to attrac s ' . m a mushy mo erate.fer to lose with a pure ideological candidate than to wm W1h lv s no doubt feel the same.Some candidates t emse e b . h'ft n party electoral strat-h e contributed to a as1c s I i .These developments av . d t ry the conventional w1s-United States. At mi cen u ,egy in the contempo rary . d 'th political science theory-thatd b , Burns was in accor W l hdom expresse ] d the center to capture t e. . . duces parties to move towarnvo-party compennon m f h tury \Ve sa\V a shift to what nowB . h last decade o t e cen d .median voter. ut in t e . n the party base- omgr g strategy of concentrating 0seems to be the preva1 m d ou t by core par ty constituen-. aximize loyalty an tu m\Vhatever is necessary to m - . f S ote on o-ay marriage was an. ed forc1n o- o a enate v bcies. Thus, the a f o r e m e n n ~ n c 1 1 Christian b ase of he Republican1 toward the evano-e 1caentirely symbo ic gestu re . .co- . was a costly signal that the BushI h d nothino- to do \V1th govern1nc, ItParty. t a o . .administration \Vas on thei r side. . . . e their vote, only to. lono-er strive to maximiz

Seemingly, today's parnes no o At one time a ma.ximal victorys than the other partv.suffice-to get more vote .b 1 the vi ctors' clain1 that the voterswas desirable because it would add credi 1 1 t ) ~ 1 d remarks of Presidentd B the previous y quotehad given them a ma n ate. ~ t a ~ 's politicians consider any victory, narrowBush indicate, at least some o to ayor not, a mand ate. . . d .d 1 PUes behave differently from thed f issue acnv1sts an 1 eo 0 oParties compose o . 1 fthe mid-t\ventieth century.. d the political science itera ture o bliparties tha t occup1e .cc th of the American pu c;h ty appealed to a d111erent swaAt midcentury, eac par k d Republicans to middle-class,. il to blue-collar \VOr ers an f frDemocrats pnmar y h 1 oc'al groupings were _ar omBecause sue arge s 1professionals and managers. c h d to tolerate internal heterogene:

. lly the party plat


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of a bill \Vhose basis \Vas mostly political. More recently, President Bush introduced his campaign to add personal accounts to Social Security by claiming thatSocial Security was bankrupt and that personal accounts were a means of restoring the system to fiscal solvency. Although many experts see merit in idea ofpersonal savings accounts, most agreed that implementing them would increaseSocial Security's fiscal deficits in the coming decades. Even greater agreementsurrounded rejection of the claim that Social Security was bankrupt. ~ A l t h o u g hpolitically difficult, straigh tforward programmat ic changes in the retirementthe tax base, or the method of indexing future benefits \.vould make SocialSecuritv solvent for as Iona as actuaries can reasonably predict., bMoreover, because parties today focus on their ability to mobilize the alreadycommitted, the importance of performance for voting declines in importance relative to ideology and political identity. It was telling that in 2004 John Kerry frequently was criticized for not having a plan to end the \.var in Iraq that wasappreciably different from President Bush's. This seems like a new requirement. In1952 did D\viaht EisenhO\Ver have a specific plan to end the \var in Korea that dif..bfered from President 'fruman's? "I \Vill go to Korea" is not exactly a plan. In 1968did Richard Ni.-xon have a specific plan to end the \.Var in Vietnam that differed fromPresident Johnson's? A "secret plan" to end the war is not exactly a precise blueprint that voters could compare to the Johnson policy. Some decades ago votersapparently felt that an unpopular war was sufficient reason to punish an incumbent, regardless of whether the challenger offered a persuasive "exit strategy."

A final consideration relates to the prec eding ones. Because today's parties arecomposed relatively more of issue activists than of broad demographic groupinas thev are not as deeply rooted in the mass of the populat ion as was the caseb ' ,for much of our history. The United States pioneered the mass party, but, asSteven Schier has argued, in recent decades the parties have practiced a kind ofexclusive politics. The mass-mobilization campaigns that historically characterized American elections gave way to the high-tech media campaigns of the latet\Ventieth century. Voter mobilization by the political parties correspondinglyfelL Late-century campaigns increasingly relied on television commercials, andthere is some evidence that such ads demobilize the el_ectorate. In a kind of"backto the future" development, the nvo most recent presidential elections have st;;:_enrenev.red party effort to get out the vote, with a significant impact, at least in2004. But n1odern co1nputing capabilities and rich databases enable the parties topractice a kind of targeted mobilization based on specific issues that \.Vas moredifficult to do in earlier periods. It is not clear that such activities make the partiesmore like those of yesteryear, or whether they only reinforce the trends I havepreviously discussed. One-third of he voting age population continues to eschewa party identificat ion, a figure that has not appreciably changed in three decades.

1\1orris P. Fiorina 63 9Discussion

In sum, the parties today are far closer to the responsible party mode l than thoseof the 1970s, a deve lopmen t that some of us wished for some decades ago, bu t itwould be difficult to argue that today's party system is more effective at solvi..J.gproblems than the disorganized decentralized party system that it replaced.Rather than seek power on the basis of coherent programs, the parties at timesthrow fundamental principles to the wind when electoral considerations dictate,just as the decentralized parties of he mid-twentieth century did. At other timesthey hold fast to divisive positions that have only symbolic importancePresident Bush reiterated his support for a constitutional amendment to ban gaymarriage in his 2005 State of the Union a d d r e s s ~ f o r fear of alienating ideologically committed base elements. On issues like Social Security and the \Var in Iraq,facts are distorted and subordinated to ideology. Mandates for major policychanges are claimed on the basis of narrow electoral victories.

To be sure, I have painted with a broad brush, and my interpretations ofrecent political history may prove as partial and inaccurate as some of thoseadvanced in DOCR. In particular, I am sensitive to the possibility that unified Democratic government under present conditions might be significantly different from the unified Republican government we have x p e r i e n c e d ~ N i l s Gilmanargues that the features of responsible parties discussed above are reallyRepublican features. But even if true, this implies that an earlier generation ofpolitical scientists failed to appreciate that Republican and Democratic responsible party government would be significantly different, le t alone identify theempirical bases for such differences. \Vhat this reconsideration has demonstratedto me is the difficulty of making broad recommendations to improve Americanpolitics, even when seemingly solid research and argument underlie many of hecomponent parts, which is the reason I will venture no such recommendationshere. It is possible that this paper is as much a product of ts temporal context asDOCR was. As Aldrich argues, the political parties periodically re invent themselves better to deal with the problems they face. That, in fact, is my hope-thatthe next reinvention of the parties results in organizations that are better thanthe current-models a t dealing \.vith the problems ou r society faces.' "

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