Raised Right

Jeffrey R. Dudas is Associate Professor of Political Science and Affiliate Faculty of American Studies at the University of Connecticut. He is the author of The Cultivation of Resentment: Treaty Rights and the New Right (Stanford, 2008).

"I began this book a skeptic and finished it a convert. Dudas argues that the origin of modern American conservatism can be found in the biographies of three American Conservative icons, each of whom had a dysfunctional father but found substitutes in our Founding Fathers, and a myth of rights of paternal authority. A true tour de force."—Malcolm M. Feeley, University of California at Berkeley "Raised Right offers an imaginative, incisive, and incendiary interpretation of modern political conservativism in the United States, focusing in particular on its paradoxical discourses about paternal authority and the rights of self-governing citizens. Dudas has produced a stunning analysis of enduring themes in contemporary American political culture."—Michael McCann, University of Washington "Dudas's rumination on the fathers of contemporary conservatism, real and fantastic, and how they haunt the movement's ideology is both novel and provocative. Raised Right ambitiously articulates a linkage between law and fatherly authority that underlies much of the driving force in the right's social and economic agenda. A must-read for anyone curious about the roots of conservatism or concerned about its future trajectory."—Claire Rasmussen, University of Delaware

• 1. Raised Right2. Something to Believe In: Modern American Conservatism and the Paternal Rights Discourse3. Penetrating the Inner Sanctum: William F. Buckley Jr., Paternal Desire, and the Rights of Man4. "The Greatest Nation on Earth": Ronald Reagan, Fathers, and the Rights of Americans5. All the Rage: Clarence Thomas, Daddy, and the Tragedy of Rights6. A Nightmare Walking: The Haunting of Modern American Conservatism