Short Synopsis
Journalist Sam Tanenhaus expands his New Republic cover story on the death of conservatism into a book-length manifesto, arguing that the 2008 election brought movement conservatism to an end, while expressing optimism that "authentic conservatives" can still bounce back.

Full Synopsis
Sam Tanenhaus's essay "Conservatism Is Dead" prompted intense discussion and debate when it was published in the New Republic in the first days of Barack Obama's presidency. Now Tanenhaus, a leading authority on modern politics, has expanded his argument into a sweeping history of the American conservative movement. For seventy-five years, he argues, the Right has been split between two factions: consensus-driven "realists," who believe in the virtue of government and its power to adjust to changing conditions, and movement "revanchists," who distrust government and society—and often find themselves at war with America itself.

Eventually, Tanenhaus writes, the revanchists prevailed, and the result is the decadent "movement conservatism" of today, a defunct ideology that is "profoundly and defiantly unconservative—in its arguments and ideas, its tactics and strategies, above all in its vision."

But there is hope for conservatism. It resides in the examples of pragmatic leaders like Dwight Eisenhower and Ronald Reagan and thinkers like Whittaker Chambers and William F. Buckley, Jr. Each came to understand that the true role of conservatism is not to advance a narrow ideological agenda but to engage in a serious dialogue with liberalism and join with it in upholding "the politics of stability." Conservatives today need to rediscover the roots of this honorable tradition. It is their only route back to the center of American politics.

At once succinct and detailed, penetrating and nuanced, The Death of Conservatism is a must-listen for Americans of any political persuasion.

"An elegant brief history of the modern conservative movement, as unsparing in its critique of liberal hubris as of revanchist resentment." ---The New York Times

"Insightful...a welcome clarion call for the smart politics of consensus." ---The Boston Globe

"Sklar's capable and smooth reading gets the material across…he ably renders dry political battles of the past as high intellectual drama." ---Publishers Weekly Audio Review

"Sklar's capable and smooth reading gets the material across…he ably renders dry political battles of the past as high intellectual drama." ---Publishers Weekly Audio Review

"[This] impeccably well-written book insightfully summarizes the highs and lows of American conservatism over the decades." ---Publishers Weekly

New York Times Bestseller