Rhodri Jeffreys-Jones. The American Left: Its Impact on Politics and Society since 1900.

Abstract

Abraham Maslow was right; when all you have is a hammer everything looks like a nail. The eminent psychologist's maxim or, “Law of the Instrument,” applies to any number of thinkers, writers, and single-issue politicians. Indeed, the adage most certainly pertains to orthodox interpretations of the American Left. First launched by Werner Sombart's iconic 1906 work Why Is There No Socialism in the United States?, specialists have spilled hogsheads of ink deciphering the American Left. Good social democrats (and other points left), Sombart, and his disciples assumed that an American Left must necessarily resemble its West European cousin. An eminent scholar of modern United States history, Rhodri Jeffreys-Jones has penned Sombart 2.0. In his misleadingly titled, The American Left: Its Impact on Politics and Society since 1900, the author depicts the Left's invisible influence upon American politics and life. Unfortunately, Jeffreys-Jones falls prey to the Law of the Instrument. Armed with a hammer, social democratic assumptions, he looks for a nail, the nefarious actors who undid America's social democratic future.