Redeeming American Political Theory

Abstract

American political theory has been accused of being uniformly liberal; but its history is diverse and is worth studying to understand the development of political science and the institutions it reflects (representative government, federalism, judicial review, and slavery). While modern social science expresses a slow democratization of values, it has been compatible with many ideologies. This can be seen in Jefferson's anthropology, Madison's theory of collective rationality, and Hamilton's empirical political economy. Jacksonian democracy encouraged social history, while its opponents devised an elitist political sociology. Southern defenders of slavery were the earliest to develop a deterministic and authoritarian sociology, but after the Civil War Northern thinkers emulated them with Social Darwinism and quests for causal laws to grasp constant change in industrial society. Though social critics abounded, democratic empirical theory emerged in the universities only in the generation of Merriam and Dewey, who founded contemporary political science.