| Abstrakt: |
The last decade has witnessed renewed interest in the concept of political generations and the role of generations in foreign and domestic politics. The purpose of this article is to discuss a number of patterns and insights concerning political generations in American politics that derive from my own research in international relations. In pursuit of this goal, I summarize a theory of political generations and explain how it was applied empirically. In the second half of the essay, I discuss what generational analysis might tell us about the study of political change and stability, the presidency, voters, social movements, parties, and bureaucracies. Finally, I briefly engage the methodological problems that can arise from the fact that political generations are in important respects socially constructed through public discourses, in the context of the work on the 'Millennial Generation' conducted by the Pew Research Center. While this article can only suggest patterns and initial ideas for further development and research, the hope is that it will help to push forward research on political generations across disciplinary sub-fields. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR] |
