Julian E. Zelizer: How Much Do We Learn From the First Cut of History?
[Julian E. Zelizer is a professor of history and public affairs at Princeton University. He is the author of Jimmy Carter (Times Books) and Arsenal of Democracy (Basic Books) and the editor of The Presidency of George W. Bush (Princeton University Press).]
Last year it seemed almost impossible to walk through an airport without noticing someone reading a copy of Game Change, by John Heilemann and Mark Halperin. The book captured the public's imagination through a vivid account of the personalities in the 2008 presidential campaign. For Americans who couldn't quite let go of the long campaign season, Game Change offered one last hurrah....
Yet about a year and a half later, as Game Change is released in paperback, the book reads differently. As many of Obama's supporters have become more sober about the president's ability, and his willingness, to change the way that politics works, we can read the book for the limits of the genre it represents, rather than for the saga of the candidates and the handlers.
The election narrative dates back to Theodore White's The Making of a President (1961). White's account of the 1960 election allowed readers to delve deep into the drama of the primaries and general election. Democrats offered White unparalleled access to their campaigns, and since he started covering the race early he captured John F. Kennedy from beginning of his national political emergence....
Although White himself never recreated the magic from the first book, the genre of writing that White popularized endured. When elections end, we expect an instant history to be published to help us understand what really happened. While the formula for the books has not varied greatly, there have been notable changes in the substance....
Game Change offered something fresh to this genre. The book, which sold out on its first day, was based on an enormous wealth of insider interviews where campaign operatives spilled some revelatory information about what had happened. The authors put forth an anthropological exposé of the circus of professional campaign operators who surrounded the candidates and ran the show. ... Game Change came full circle from White's examination of Kennedy. Whereas Theodore White had been fascinated by the candidates and their loyal team advisors, the genre had gradually pushed writers into the cold and impersonal professionalized world that candidates stepped into. Read from the perspective of 2010, we can look back at some of the Teddy White–like promise bestowed upon Obama upon his election with more skepticism and doubts.
Yet even with its more cynical look at the election process, Game Change suffered from some of the same limitations of the election narrative genre—rooted all the way back to Teddy White's heroic account—that exaggerate the possibility of change that elections can bring without fundamental reforms in the way that our institutions work. Election narratives are grounded on the same kind of belief about the possible impact of elections—thus their decision to focus so much attention on them above other parts of politics—that usually leaves Americans frustrated after the difficulties of governance begin....
Read entire article at The Nation
Last year it seemed almost impossible to walk through an airport without noticing someone reading a copy of Game Change, by John Heilemann and Mark Halperin. The book captured the public's imagination through a vivid account of the personalities in the 2008 presidential campaign. For Americans who couldn't quite let go of the long campaign season, Game Change offered one last hurrah....
Yet about a year and a half later, as Game Change is released in paperback, the book reads differently. As many of Obama's supporters have become more sober about the president's ability, and his willingness, to change the way that politics works, we can read the book for the limits of the genre it represents, rather than for the saga of the candidates and the handlers.
The election narrative dates back to Theodore White's The Making of a President (1961). White's account of the 1960 election allowed readers to delve deep into the drama of the primaries and general election. Democrats offered White unparalleled access to their campaigns, and since he started covering the race early he captured John F. Kennedy from beginning of his national political emergence....
Although White himself never recreated the magic from the first book, the genre of writing that White popularized endured. When elections end, we expect an instant history to be published to help us understand what really happened. While the formula for the books has not varied greatly, there have been notable changes in the substance....
Game Change offered something fresh to this genre. The book, which sold out on its first day, was based on an enormous wealth of insider interviews where campaign operatives spilled some revelatory information about what had happened. The authors put forth an anthropological exposé of the circus of professional campaign operators who surrounded the candidates and ran the show. ... Game Change came full circle from White's examination of Kennedy. Whereas Theodore White had been fascinated by the candidates and their loyal team advisors, the genre had gradually pushed writers into the cold and impersonal professionalized world that candidates stepped into. Read from the perspective of 2010, we can look back at some of the Teddy White–like promise bestowed upon Obama upon his election with more skepticism and doubts.
Yet even with its more cynical look at the election process, Game Change suffered from some of the same limitations of the election narrative genre—rooted all the way back to Teddy White's heroic account—that exaggerate the possibility of change that elections can bring without fundamental reforms in the way that our institutions work. Election narratives are grounded on the same kind of belief about the possible impact of elections—thus their decision to focus so much attention on them above other parts of politics—that usually leaves Americans frustrated after the difficulties of governance begin....