Replies

Many thanks for the ping. This is going to take quite a bit more study than I have time for at the moment, but three things stand out: first, that the French model of the First, Second, and Third Republics does indeed map rather nicely to certain phases of American governmental history at least insofar as the boundary events of the Civil War and the New Deal are concerned with their concomitant restructuring of federal powers. I confess to being unfamiliar with Theodore Lowi's work and intend to do something about that at first opportunity. A lovely model on the face of it.

Second is a past historical example of a government that experiences steady growth in terms of size, responsibility, and the abilities of interest groups to influence both its makeup and scope. There is an analog if somewhat imperfect: the Chinese government prior to 1906 comes to mind, an entity that in its final form was a monolithic monster of Byzantine complexity, ubiquitous control, bureaucratic rigidity, and an overall ossification that made it incapable of timely responses to new versions of old threats. The upshot of that was that control of the entire machinery was vied for between several competing and aggressive outside entities - the Manchus come to mind, and in another sense the British later - while leaving the underlying structure still pretty much in place. Chinese nationalism is only now recovering from the perceived humiliation of an enormous vehicle with outsiders at the wheel who didn't always have its interests uppermost in mind.

It's a little difficult envisioning the United States following that path. For one thing the underlying cement for Chinese society was a religious conformity in Confucianism that is nowhere present in the United States, whatever the pretensions of secular humanism. Without that cement it is hard to imagine a similar phenomenon. More likely, in my view, and it certainly tracks with the antecedents of U.S. history, is a devolution to a more regional form of federalism if not a reversion to a purely state-centric model. Which brings us to the third point, which is what comes next. What is more likely under this model, a continued growth and ossification such as the Chinese? A determined reform that maintains the mechanism of the current federation in a greatly attenuated form? Or a complete collapse? And if the latter, what are the implications for government in the DisUnited States?

The last is proper material for speculative historical fiction and so there I'll leave it in hands more capable than mine. The real problem is that none of this will happen in a vacuum; that the precipitating events are unlikely to be confined to the United States, and that whatever the dictates of theory the actual practice is likely to be both messy and unpredictable.

Fun stuff if a bit depressing. Thanks for the post and the ping!