America and the Reagan Revolution, Essay Example

Ronald Reagan and the end of the Cold War has marked a turning point in American history. The winning of the Republican Party was somewhat unexpected and is often called “the Reagan Revolution”. He called for a new beginning in America; both economically and socially.  Before Reagan’s election in 1980, Jimmy Carter’s politics created an atmosphere when all conservative forces developed a strong opposition. Reagan managed to pull together all conservative forces and created a program that condemned welfare cheats, while believing in sates’ rights. He stood up for family values, which started to disappear from the U.S. society during the Carter era. According to him, the government was not the solution for social and economic problems; he believed that too much government influence was the problem. The growing stagfiation (inflation and unemployment rise) before his election called for economic ans social reforms. While spending of the state and public debt rose during his two terms, GDP grew and the misery index (inflation and unemployment) shrunk by ten percent. Reagan represented the corporastic capitalism. The political spectrum changed because a new type of conservatism appeared. The conservative shift was triggered by the Watergate scandal, the Iranian hostage crisis and the increased budget deficit. The conservative movement before Reagan’s election called for lower government spending and lower taxation. This created a public support. He could unite three conservative forces: religious conservatives, the Conservative Coalition and Neoconservatives. The political spectrum shifted to the right, and Democrats accepted the fact that government spending was too high. The Democratic Party developed a new wing: Conservative Democrats. This is the reason why they did not introduce influential reforms after 1998 to reduce the gap between poor and rich.  The new politics brought with them new ideology as well. While the Cold War was still on, he stood up against the threat and called the Soviet Union, ruled by Brezhnev, the “focus of evil in the modern world”. Military forces were lined up to prevent the cold war from turning into a real conflict. However, when Gorbachev took office in the Soviet Union, he decided to sit down with him during several summit meetings to negotiate policies related to nuclear weapons.

In the economic field, when Reagan took office, the country was in a bad shape. Competition threatened American companies from Russia, Japan, Germany and the United Kingdom. Immigration rates rose, resulting in a higher rate of unemployment. Government spending was high, and America simply could not afford the cost of running the country. Inflation and unemployment rates rose, while standards of living started to drop during the previous administrations. Reagan tackled the problem from an unusual angle, creating an alternative vision; he cut back spending, reduced taxes and introducing free trade principles supporting America’s globalization efforts. In 1982, an economic boom showed the results of the reform. Reagan thought that the U.S. government was previously too involved in the economy and believed in the free market, moving towards a liberal approach of politics and economics. He believed in America’s talent and entrepreneurial spirit and supported small businesses by tax reduction. Manufacturing rate and economic productivity rose.

One important downside of the Reagan administration, however, is commonly agreed; it resulted in the widening gap between the poor and the rich. By cutting welfare and supporting businesses, Reagan thought that wealth would be redistributed by companies receiving the tax benefits. This was not the case, and inequality in the U.S. society grew.

The international politics of America changed during the Reagan administration as well. He understood that the Vietnam War exhausted the patience of people and they did not want any further involvement in military conflict. He maneuvered carefully to manage international relations during conflicts between Israel and Lebanon and Iraq and Iran. However, he could not avoid getting involved in the war and, in order to end the conflict, he supported Iraq.

However, the ending of the conflict did not only have international relations consequences. In the beginning of the globalization process, by creating stability in the Muslim world, America managed to find new markets and build new influences in the region. Since then, U.S. politics have been focusing on maintaining balance in the Middle Eastern region to protect the economic interest of U.S. companies operating abroad. Reagan was the first to realize that ending a conflict and negotiating would create new opportunities of expansion for the United States, delivering growth. Therefore, when looking at current international agreements and debates, we should not neglect the role of Reagan in taking on the role of negotiation during the 80-s (Kemp, n.d.).

Reagan still has a large follower base among contemporary Republican leaders, and all of the members of the party look at him as somebody who changed the shape of the country and politics.

References

Kemp, G. (n.d.) The Reagan administration. The Iran Primer. Retrieved from http://iranprimer.usip.org/resource/reagan-administration