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Get Your Tongue out of My Mouth ‘Cause I’m Kissin’ You Goodbye: The Politics of Ideas
Author(s) -
Meier Kenneth J.
Publication year - 2004
Publication title -
policy studies journal
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.773
H-Index - 69
eISSN - 1541-0072
pISSN - 0190-292X
DOI - 10.1111/j.1541-0072.2004.00062.x
Subject(s) - politics , public policy , political science , key (lock) , work (physics) , public administration , set (abstract data type) , political economy , sociology , law and economics , law , mechanical engineering , ecology , biology , engineering , computer science , programming language
The seminal work of Derthick and Quirk (1985) argues that public policy changes when the intellectual debate of ideas establishes that policy options are legitimate and current policies are ineffective. 1 Overlooked in their otherwise exceptional analysis is the role that country music plays in the politics of ideas. 2 The thesis of this article is that country music is a crucial part of the politics of ideas, and, in fact, many policy debates are resolved in country music well before the intellectual community of policy analysts reaches a consensus. This article will recap some of the key policy debates in which country music set the agenda, 3 established the key policy alternatives, or resolved the policy debate and permitted the adoption of public policy (Anderson, 1994). 4