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Political machine
A political machine is a political organization in which an authoritative boss or small group commands the support of a corps of supporters and businesses (usually campaign workers), who receive rewards for their efforts. The machine's power is based on the ability of the workers to get out the vote for their candidates on election day. Although these elements are common to most political parties and organizations, they are essential to political machines, which rely on hierarchy and rewards for political In this 1899 cartoon from Puck, all of New York City politics revolves around boss power, often enforced by a strong party Richard Croker. whip structure. Machines sometimes have a political boss, often rely on patronage, the spoils system, "behind-the-scenes" control, and longstanding political ties within the structure of a representative democracy. Machines typically are organized on a permanent basis instead of for a single election or event. The term may have a pejorative sense referring to corrupt political machines.[1] The term "political machine" dates back to the 20th century in the United States, where such organizations have existed in some municipalities and states since the 18th century. Similar machines have been described in Latin America, where the system has been called clientelism or political clientelism (after the similar Clientela relationship in the Roman Republic), especially in rural areas, and also in some African states and other emerging democracies, like postcommunist Eastern European countries. Japan's Liberal Democratic Party is often cited as another political machine, maintaining power in suburban and rural areas through its control of farm bureaus and road construction agencies.[2] In Japan, the word jiban (literally "base" or "foundation") is the word used for political machine.[3][4]
Definition
The Encyclopdia Britannica defines "political machine" as, "in U.S. politics, a party organization, headed by a single boss or small autocratic group, that commands enough votes to maintain political and administrative control of a city, county, or state".[1] William Safire, in his Safire's Political Dictionary, defines "machine politics" as "the election of officials and the passage of legislation through the power of an organization created for political action".[3] Hierarchy and discipline are hallmarks of political machines. "It generally means strict organization", according to Safire.[3] Quoting Edward Flynn, a Bronx County Democratic leader who ran the borough from 1922 until his death in 1953,[5] he wrote "[...] the so-called 'independent' voter is foolish to assume that a political machine is run solely on good will, or patronage. For it is not only a machine; it is an army. And in any organization as in any army, there must be discipline."[3] Political patronage, while often associated with political machines, is not essential to the definition for either Safire or Britannica.[3] The phrase is considered derogatory "because it suggests that the interest of the organization are placed before those of the general public", according to Safire. Machines are criticized as undemocratic and inevitably encouraging corruption.[3]
Political machine
Function
A political machine is a party organization that recruits its members by the use of tangible incentivesmoney, political jobsand that is characterized by a high degree of leadership control over member activity. "Political machine" started as a grass-roots campaign to gain the patronage needed to win the modern election. Having strong patronage, these "clubs" were the main driving force in gaining and getting out the "straight party vote" in the election districts.[6]
Political machine forcibly removed in what was known as the 1946 Battle of Athens. Since the 1960s, some historians have reevaluated political machines, considering them corrupt but efficient. Machines were undemocratic but responsive. They were also able to contain the spending demands of special interests. In Mayors and Money, a comparison of municipal government in Chicago and New York, Ester R. Fuchs credited the Cook County Democratic Organization with giving Mayor Richard J. Daley the political power to deny labor union contracts that the city could not afford and to make the state government assume burdensome costs like welfare and courts. Describing New York, Fuchs wrote, "New York got reform, but it never got good government." At the same time, as Dennis R. Judd and Todd Swanstrom point out in City Politics, this view often coincided with a lack of period alternatives. They go on to point out that this is a falsehood, since there are certainly examples of reform oriented, anti-machine leaders during this time. Smaller communities such as Parma, Ohio, in the postCold War Era under Prosecutor Bill Mason's "Good Old Boys" and especially communities in the Deep South, where small-town machine politics are relatively common, also feature what might be classified as political machines, although these organizations do not have the power and influence of the larger boss networks listed in this article. For example, the "Cracker Party" was a Democratic Party political machine that dominated city politics in Augusta, Georgia, for over half of the 20th century.[12][13][14][15] [16]
References
[1] "political machine" (http:/ / www. britannica. com/ EBchecked/ topic/ 467617/ political-machine). Encyclopaedia Britannica. . Retrieved December 6, 2008. [2] The American Journey, Reconstruction to the Present (Student ed.). Glencoe/McGraw-Hill. 2005. ISBN0078609801. [3] Safire, William (1978). ""Machine politics"". Safire's Political Dictionary (First ed.). Random House. pp.391392. (although the book existed in an earlier version titled "The New Language of Politics") [4] Editorial Research Reports (http:/ / books. google. com/ books?id=Bo0KAAAAIAAJ& q="roman+ republic"+ "political+ patronage"& dq="roman+ republic"+ "political+ patronage"& lr=& pgis=1), 1, Congressional Quarterly, 1973, [5] Glazer, Nathan; Monyhan, Daniel Patrick (1963). "The Irish". Beyond the Melting Pot: The Negroes, Puerto Ricans, Jews, Italians and Irish of New York. The MIT Press. p.226. "Ed Flynn ran the Bronx from 1922 until his death in 1953." [6] Wilson, James Q. (2005). American Government. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. [7] The Americans: Reconstruction to the 21st Century: California Teacher's Edition. Evanston: McDougall Littell Inc. 2006. pp.267268. [8] Blumer, Herbert (1914/1915). The American Journal of Sociology. 20. p.603. "The political machine is in fact an attempt to maintain, inside the formal administrative organization of the city, the control of a primary group." [9] Gosnell, Harold F. (September 1933). "The Political Party versus the Political Machine". Annals of American Academy of Political and Social Science 169: 2128. doi:10.1177/000271623316900104. "When the spoils element is predominant in a political organization, it is called a political machine." [10] "Urban Political Machines" (http:/ / www. digitalhistory. uh. edu/ historyonline/ us28. cfm), Digital History, [11] Political Machines (http:/ / autocww. colorado. edu/ ~toldy2/ E64ContentFiles/ PoliticsAndGovernment/ PoliticalMachines. htm), University of Colorado, Boulder, [12] "Newspapers helped end long rule of corrupt Cracker Party" (http:/ / chronicle. augusta. com/ stories/ 110799/ opi_124-1871. shtml). The Augusta Chronicle. Aug 29, 2010. . [13] "Search results for "Cracker Party"" (http:/ / search. augusta. com/ fast-elements. php?type=standard& profile=augustachronicle& querystring="cracker+ party"& Go. x=0& Go. y=0& Go=Go). The Augusta Chronicle. . Retrieved 13 November 2012. [14] , http:/ / www. augusta. com/ leaders/ slideshow_local/ slide14. html [15] Cashin, Edward J. (2007-02-19). "Cites & Counties: Augusta" (http:/ / www. georgiaencyclopedia. org/ nge/ Article. jsp?id=h-955). The New Georgia Encyclopedia. . [16] , http:/ / www. augusta. com/ leaders/ slideshow_local/ slide10. html
Political machine
Further reading
Clifford, Thomas P (1975). The Political Machine: An American Institution. Vantage Press. ISBN0-533-01374-7. Gosnell, Harold Foote (1968). Machine Politics: Chicago Model. University of Chicago Press. ISBN0-226-30492-2. Gosnell, Harold F; Merriam, Charles E (2007). Boss Platt and His New York Machine: A Study of the Political Leadership of Thomas C. Platt, Theodore Roosevelt and Others. Lightning Source Inc. ISBN1-4325-8850-8. Kurland, Gerald (1972). Political Machine: What It Is, How It Works. Story House Corp. ISBN0-686-07238-3. Mushkat, Jerome (1971). Tammany; the Evolution of a Political Machine, 1789-1865. Syracuse University Press. ISBN0-8156-0079-8. Sachs, Paul Martin (1974). The Donegal Mafia: An Irish Political Machine. University of California. ISBN0-300-02020-1. Schlesinger, Jacob M. (1999). Shadow Shoguns: The Rise and Fall of Japan's Postwar Political Machine. Stanford University Press. ISBN0-8047-3457-7. Tuckel, P.; Maisel, R. (2008). "Nativity Status and Voter Turnout in Early Twentieth-Century Urban United States". Historical Methods 41 (2): 99107.
License
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