With essays on U.S. history ranging from the American Revolution to
the dawn of the twenty-first century, Contested Democracy
illuminates struggles waged over freedom and citizenship throughout
the American past. Guided by a commitment to democratic citizenship
and responsible scholarship, the contributors to this volume insist
that rigorous engagement with history is essential to a vital
democracy, particularly amid the current erosion of human rights and
civil liberties within the United States and abroad. Emphasizing the
contradictory ways in which freedom has developed within the United
States and in the exercise of American power abroad, these essays
probe challenges to American democracy through conflicts shaped by
race, slavery, gender, citizenship, political economy, immigration,
law, empire, and the idea of the nation state.
In this volume,
writers demonstrate how opposition to the expansion of democracy has
shaped the American tradition as much as movements for social and
political change. By foregrounding those who have been marginalized
in U.S society as well as the powerful, these historians and scholars
argue for an alternative vision of American freedom that confronts
the limitations, failings, and contradictions of U.S. power. Their
work provides crucial insight into the role of the United States in
this latest age of American empire and the importance of different
and oppositional visions of American democracy and freedom.
At a time of intense
disillusionment with U.S. politics and of increasing awareness of the
costs of empire, these contributors argue that responsible historical
scholarship can challenge the blatant manipulation of discourses on
freedom. They call for careful and conscientious scholarship not only
to illuminate contemporary problems but also to act as a bulwark
against mythmaking in the service of cynical political ends.