Overview

How the Clinton administration betrayed its progressive principles and capitulated to the right When Bill Clinton was elected president in 1992, he ended twelve years of Republican rule and seemed poised to enact a progressive transformation of the US economy, touching everything from health care to trade to labor relations. Yet by the time he left office, the nation's economic and social policies had instead lurched dramatically rightward, exacerbating the inequalities so troubling in our own time. This book reveals why Clinton's expansive agenda was a fabulous failure, and why its demise still haunts us today. Nelson Lichtenstein and Judith Stein show how the administration's progressive reformers-people like Robert Reich, Ira Magaziner, Laura Tyson, and Joseph Stiglitz-were stymied by a new world of global capitalism that heightened Wall Street influence, undermined domestic manufacturing, and eviscerated the labor movement. Robert Rubin, Larry Summers, and Al Gore proved champions of this financialized world. Meanwhile, Clinton divided his own party when he relied on Republican votes to overhaul welfare, liberalize trade, and deregulate the banking and telecommunications industries. Even the economic boom Clinton ushered in-which tamed unemployment and sent the stock market soaring in what Alan Blinder and Janet Yellen termed a ""fabulous decade""-ended with a series of exploding asset bubbles that his neoliberal economic advisors neither foresaw nor prevented. A Fabulous Failure is a study of ideas in action, some powerfully persuasive, others illusionary and self-defeating. It explains why and how the Clinton presidency's progressive statecraft floundered in a world where the labor movement was weak, civil rights forces quiescent, and corporate America ever more powerful.

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9780691245522

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Reviews

""A Choice Outstanding Academic Title of the Year"" ""Dazzlingly impressive in its scope and depth. . . . A Fabulous Failure serves as an indispensable resource to anyone, providing fresh insight into topics like the health care debacle (including a careful discussion of why Obama succeeded where Clinton failed), the NAFTA debate, and the repeal of the Glass-Steagall Act, all of which have been covered elsewhere. At the same time, it spotlights issues such as trade policy with Japan and workplace management that have been given short shrift by other historians. ""---Lily Geismer, American Prospect ""In demonstrating both the internal and external limits on the Clinton administration’s ability to strengthen the welfare state, Lichtenstein and Stein have not only provided a singularly useful analysis of global capitalism at the end of the twentieth century — they have also shown how popular movements are crucial in realizing meaningful social change. . . . And in dissecting the passion play that was the Clinton administration, A Fabulous Failure provides an immensely usable history. Because the problems with which Clinton struggled — how to create growth and redistribute it in the context of a world characterized by strong economic competition — remain with us.""---Jason Resnikoff, Jacobin ""Splendid.""---James K. Galbraith, EH.net ""A progressive perspective on why the Clinton administration delivered so little. "" * Kirkus Reviews * ""A Fabulous Failure does a marvelous job delivering on both [Clinton’s] policy and politics in a highly readable narrative. ""---Paul A. Myers, Myersbooks History ""[A] very persuasive read.""---David Marx, David Marx Book Reviews ""The most comprehensive and scholarly account of the administration of President Bill Clinton focused on domestic policy that one could hope to read. . . . An excellent work."" * Choice * ""Timely and valuable. . . .An intricate account of the Clinton administration’s indeed many failures, as judged in retrospect.""---Grit Grigoleit-Richter, H-Soz-Kult

Author Information

Nelson Lichtenstein is Research Professor at the University of California, Santa Barbara. His books include State of the Union: A Century of American Labor (Princeton). Judith Stein (19402017) was Distinguished Professor of History at City College and the Graduate Center, City University of New York. Her books include Pivotal Decade: How the United States Traded Factories for Finance in the Seventies.

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