Cover: The End of Southern Exceptionalism: Class, Race, and Partisan Change in the Postwar South, from Harvard University PressCover: The End of Southern Exceptionalism in PAPERBACK

The End of Southern Exceptionalism

Class, Race, and Partisan Change in the Postwar South

Product Details

PAPERBACK

Print on Demand

$29.00 • £25.95 • €26.95

ISBN 9780674032491

Publication Date: 03/31/2009

Short

240 pages

39 line illustrations, 30 tables

World

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The transformation of Southern politics after World War II changed the political life not just of this distinctive region, but of the entire nation. Until now, the critical shift in Southern political allegiance from Democratic to Republican has been explained, by scholars and journalists, as a white backlash to the civil rights revolution.

In this myth-shattering book, Byron E. Shafer and Richard Johnston refute that view, one stretching all the way back to V. O. Key in his classic book Southern Politics. The true story is instead one of dramatic class reversal, beginning in the 1950s and pulling everything else in its wake. Where once the poor voted Republican and the rich Democrat, that pattern reversed, as economic development became the engine of Republican gains. Racial desegregation, never far from the heart of the story, often applied the brakes to these gains rather than fueling them.

A book that is bound to shake up the study of Southern politics, this will also become required reading for pundits and political strategists, for all those who argue over what it takes to carry the South.

Awards & Accolades

  • 2007 Best Book Award on Race, Ethnicity, and Political Representation & Participation, Race, Ethnicity, and Politics Section of the American Political Science Association
  • 2007 V.O. Key Award, Southern Political Science Association

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