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First published September 2006
The New Right, Fundamentalism, and Nationalism in Postmodern America: A Marriage of Heat and Passion
Anton K. JacobsView all authors and affiliations
Volume 53, Issue 3
https://doi.org/10.1177/0037768606066846
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Abstract
English
Religious fundamentalism in the United States early in the 20th century went into cultural eclipse. Mainline Protestant numbers were large. Both wings increased throughout the first half of the 20th century. In this period the political right also remained in the shadows. After the 1960s, the mainline Protestant denominations began to suffer decline. Western civilization moved into a cultural phase of postmodernity, and the politically liberal suffered fragmentation. The political right had a clear and uncompromising ideology. The political right began to organize in new ways, and courted the resurgent religious right, encouraging them to become more political. The religious right also had a clear and uncompromising ideology. There was a convergence of issues and interests, and both share a jingoism that functions as a powerful bond and as an effective cultural weapon. They are currently in a de facto political marriage.
French
Au début du 20ème siècle, le fondamentalisme religieux aux Etats-Unis a connu une éclipse de l'influence culturelle. Les protestants des Grandes Eglises comptaient le plus de membres. Ensuite, tout au long de la première moitié du 20ème siècle, les deux segments de l'Eglise protestante ont vu leurs rangs s'étoffer. Pendant ce temps, la droite politique se tenait dans l'ombre. Après les années 60, les dénominations protestantes des Grandes Eglises ont commencé à décliner. La civilisation occidentale évoluait vers une phase culturelle de postmodernisme, tandis que la frange politique 'libérale' se divisait. Face à elle, la droite politique avait une idéologie claire et sans compromis. Cette droite politique commença à s'organiser différemment et se mit à courtiser la droite religieuse résurgente, poussant ses adeptes à s'engager davantage au plan politique. De son côté, la droite religieuse avait, elle aussi, une idéologie claire et peu encline au compromis. Il y avait donc une convergence de préoccupations et d'intérêts. De plus, l'une et l'autre ont en commun une forme de chauvinisme qui fait à la fois office de ciment interne et d'arme culturelle efficace. Il existe actuellement un mariage politique de fait entre la droite politique et la droite religieuse.
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1.My terminology here: conservative Protestantism = evangelicalism and fundamentalism; religious right = the resurgent politically and culturally active fundamentalists, combating various aspects of modernity/postmodernity.
2.By “mainline”, I mean essentially the same as Roof and McKinney's “old Protestant mainline” (1987: 80): Episcopalians, United Church of Christ, Presbyterians, Methodists, Lutherans, Disciples of Christ, American Baptists, Reformed.
3.As Micklethwait and Wooldridge note, “melancholy, long, withdrawing roar” is from Matthew Arnold's poem, “Dover Beach”, about the decline of religion in Victorian England (2004: 354).
4.A young woman I was dating in the late 1960s informed me that her father, when he learned that I was opposed to the Vietnam War, phoned my draft board and told them I should be investigated because I was probably a Communist.
5.As quick and fierce as the right is at calling liberals treasonous, one can see why William Buckley spent over 20 percent of his Up from Liberalism detailing instances when liberals attempted similar tactics (1968: 5–45).
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