It clearly surprises some of us that the Southern oligarchs are thriving and have such a control over the demography of The Southern states. From Wikipedia: "In 1942 Key published the first edition of his textbook, Politics, Parties, and Pressure Groups, in which he emphasized that politics was a contest and the main players were organized interest groups. The book decisively shaped the teaching of political science by introducing realism in analysis of politics, introducing the "interest group" model, and introducing behavioral methods based on statistical analysis of election returns."
Key's opus, Southern Politics in State and Nation (1949) was a microscopic examination, state by state, of the expansion of Southern politics. This Dixiefication was documented using interviews and statistics. In Public Opinion and American Democracy (1961) he analyzed the link between the changing patterns of public opinion and the governmental system. Key found that the Michigan model (the theory that voters' preferences were determined by psychological factors) was unsupported by the data. In Key's view, that model took the politics out of political science. In his last (posthumous) work, The Responsible Electorate: Rationality in Presidential Voting 1936–60 (1966), Professor Key analyzed public opinion data and electoral returns to show that voters' choices were rational political decisions rather than responses to psychological stimuli. However, the choices in the South are manipulated by powerful and wealthy interests.
Professor Key refuted the hypothesis that "Southern backwardness" could be attributed to poor whites. Rather, he asserted that a rich oligarchy of "Southern Bourbons" manipulated working class whites. The Southern voters are unified, and dominated by, a small but wealthy class of people who deliberately act to preserve the economic and social order. They use well-entrenched techniques to inflame the race fears, and to prey upon the gullibilities of people whose education is deliberately marginalized.
www.librarything.com/profile/keylawk
Key's opus, Southern Politics in State and Nation (1949) was a microscopic examination, state by state, of the expansion of Southern politics. This Dixiefication was documented using interviews and statistics. In Public Opinion and American Democracy (1961) he analyzed the link between the changing patterns of public opinion and the governmental system. Key found that the Michigan model (the theory that voters' preferences were determined by psychological factors) was unsupported by the data. In Key's view, that model took the politics out of political science. In his last (posthumous) work, The Responsible Electorate: Rationality in Presidential Voting 1936–60 (1966), Professor Key analyzed public opinion data and electoral returns to show that voters' choices were rational political decisions rather than responses to psychological stimuli. However, the choices in the South are manipulated by powerful and wealthy interests.
Professor Key refuted the hypothesis that "Southern backwardness" could be attributed to poor whites. Rather, he asserted that a rich oligarchy of "Southern Bourbons" manipulated working class whites. The Southern voters are unified, and dominated by, a small but wealthy class of people who deliberately act to preserve the economic and social order. They use well-entrenched techniques to inflame the race fears, and to prey upon the gullibilities of people whose education is deliberately marginalized.
www.librarything.com/profile/keylawk
