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Research in Political Economy
Supplement 1
(two volumes)


Reagan, Bush, and Right-Wing Politics:
Elites, Think Tanks, Power and Policy

Philip H. Burch, Rutgers University

(Introduction and summary for both Parts appear in Volume 16 of the Research.)

In this multi-volume work the author, a Rutgers University professor, argues that organized right-wing interests, sometimes called the Counter-Establishment, rose to power during the Reagan and first Bush years, and exerted great influence in these two administrations, particularly the former.

In the first volume on "key executive appointments", Burch takes a close look at the economic background and think-tank ties of many of the people appointed to high posts in these rightist regimes, men connected to some part of America's new Counter-Establishment, a complex headed by such groups as the American Enterprise Institute, the Committee on the Present Danger, the Heritage Foundation, the Hoover Institution, the Institute for Contemporary Studies, the Federalist Society for Law and Public Policy, and the (Joseph Coors-backed) Mountain States Legal Foundation. This skewed recruitment pattern also held true for many of the second- and third-tier posts in the Reagan's administration and, to a lesser extent, Bush's.

In the second volume on "Supreme Court nominations and major policy making", Burch found the connections to right-wing think tanks, not only for the Court but also in such important fields as foreign policy, military spending, and economics and taxation. He also presents detailed case studies of the political and economic forces at work in the Iran-Contra affair, the Star Wars program, and Reaganomics.

These volumes provide a rich source of information which would enable any reader or researcher to make a compartive analysis of the make-up and operation of the second Bush administration.


PART A: THE AMERICAN RIGHT-WING TAKES COMMAND: KEY EXECUTIVE BRANCH APPOINTMENTS

    Preface and Forward

    SECTION I: THE REAGAN ADMINISTRATION
  1. President Reagan and the Key White House Staff (first term)
  2. Reagan's Departments of State, Treasury, and Defense (first term)
  3. Reagan's White House Staff and Key Inner Cabinet (second term)
  4. Reagan's Department of Justice (and related agencies)
  5. Reagan's Departments of the Interior and Energy (and EPA)
  6. Reagan's Departments of Commerce, Labor, and Agriculture (and ancillary agencies)
  7. Reagan's Departments of Education, Health, and Human Services, HUD, and Transportation
    SECTION II: THE BUSH ADMINISTRATION
  1. The 1998 Election, George Bush, and His White House Staff
  2. George Bush's Inner Cabinet (and other related posts)
  3. Bush's Outer Cabinet Departments

    442 pages, Index, December 1997


PART B: THE AMERICAN RIGHT-WING AT COURT AND IN ACTION: SUPREME COURT NOMINATIONS AND MAJOR POLICYMAKING
    Preface and Forward

  1. The Reagan/Bush Supreme Court: A Bench Happily Filled?
  2. Reaganomics: Financial Reform or 'Voodoo' Economics?
  3. The Reaganite Military Buildup: An American Folly?
  4. The 'Red Specter' in the Caribbean: Grenada and the Iran-Contra Affair

    305 pages, Index, December 1997

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