Zombie Ideas In U.S. Intellectual History: An Etymological And Epistemological Study

I first ran across the phrase "zombie ideas" in Paul Krugman's writings, either here or here---probably the latter. In the first post from November 2007, Krugman refers to this document from the Health Policy Institute, titled "Lies, Damned Lies, and Health Care Zombies: Discredited Ideas That Will Not Die." That study introduces the following phrase in its text: "These false ideas (or “zombies”) carry with them implicit policy recommendations bearing on some aspect of health care financing" (p. 6). The HPI piece was written in 1998.

Although I have found several other instances, beyond HPI and Krugman, where the phrase appears, the year 1998 seems to mark the first public appearance of the phrase "zombie ideas" in thoughtful public discourse. So much for etymology. Perhaps one of our readers---a historian with a penchant for lexicography and a fetish for the undead (hah!)---can add to this story?

But what does the phrase mean? And what is its epistemology? Addressing the former question, Krugman called them "false stories that refuse to die, and just keep coming back." The 1998 HPI study correspondingly says they are ideas with a "tendency to re-emerge." It then indirectly expands the definition of the phrase in several ways:

Yet in the United States the idea that consumer co-payments make good economic (and perhaps moral) sense steadfastly resists permanent burial. Why? The interest in user charges bears the familiar hallmarks of a zombie. First, in spite of its popularity, it is intellectually dead, and second, its overwhelming appeal is a product both of its public resonance, and of the efforts of powerful interest groups to keep it on the agenda (p. 24).

Teasing my concerns from the context of the HPI excerpt, it appears that zombie ideas are (in order of importance):

(1) intellectually dead, or are between death and life currently (hence they arise from the grave);
(2) bad (or evil);
(3) scary (people tremble at the emotional encounter);
(4) kept alive by interest groups (political or otherwise); and
(5) primarily political (or at least zombie ideas recur in this context the most).

I do not mean this list to be exhaustive; consider it a beginning. BTW: In a more humorous vein, it seems the HPI study is THE starting point for understanding zombiology in the realm of ideas.

As for epistemology, what of the science or study of this phenomenon (zombiosis, if you prefer) in the world of ideas? How does this process happen? Perhaps only the specialized historical study of interest groups will reveal changes over time: the peculiar phases, duration, and, most importantly, how zombie ideas are killed once and for all (or are they!)? It seems clear that politicians would benefit from an exhaustive study of these ideas.

I am most curious, speaking somewhat more seriously, of what ideas the historians of U.S. intellectual life feel are zombies? What ideas have recurred the most, or are the most relevant, in the history of the United States? Of course an answer to this question might indict the historians themselves. For the question could be phrased: What ideas have historians resurrected over and over to explain change in U.S. history, particular with regard to its intellectual life? So this could digress into an ad hominem thread that beats up on particular historians. That's not my goal. Besides, a comparable taxonomy has already been constructed once before by David Hackett Fisher.

What say you? What are the most important, most cited, or most over-used ideas in U.S. intellectual history? Or what have I missed in defining the meaning of zombie ideas? - TL

Zombie Ideas In U.S. Intellectual History: An Etymological And Epistemological Study

I first ran across the phrase "zombie ideas" in Paul Krugman's writings, either here or here---probably the latter. In the first post from November 2007, Krugman refers to this document from the Health Policy Institute, titled "Lies, Damned Lies, and Health Care Zombies: Discredited Ideas That Will Not Die." That study introduces the following phrase in its text: "These false ideas (or “zombies”) carry with them implicit policy recommendations bearing on some aspect of health care financing" (p. 6). The HPI piece was written in 1998.

Although I have found several other instances, beyond HPI and Krugman, where the phrase appears, the year 1998 seems to mark the first public appearance of the phrase "zombie ideas" in thoughtful public discourse. So much for etymology. Perhaps one of our readers---a historian with a penchant for lexicography and a fetish for the undead (hah!)---can add to this story?

But what does the phrase mean? And what is its epistemology? Addressing the former question, Krugman called them "false stories that refuse to die, and just keep coming back." The 1998 HPI study correspondingly says they are ideas with a "tendency to re-emerge." It then indirectly expands the definition of the phrase in several ways:

Yet in the United States the idea that consumer co-payments make good economic (and perhaps moral) sense steadfastly resists permanent burial. Why? The interest in user charges bears the familiar hallmarks of a zombie. First, in spite of its popularity, it is intellectually dead, and second, its overwhelming appeal is a product both of its public resonance, and of the efforts of powerful interest groups to keep it on the agenda (p. 24).

Teasing my concerns from the context of the HPI excerpt, it appears that zombie ideas are (in order of importance):

(1) intellectually dead, or are between death and life currently (hence they arise from the grave);
(2) bad (or evil);
(3) scary (people tremble at the emotional encounter);
(4) kept alive by interest groups (political or otherwise); and
(5) primarily political (or at least zombie ideas recur in this context the most).

I do not mean this list to be exhaustive; consider it a beginning. BTW: In a more humorous vein, it seems the HPI study is THE starting point for understanding zombiology in the realm of ideas.

As for epistemology, what of the science or study of this phenomenon (zombiosis, if you prefer) in the world of ideas? How does this process happen? Perhaps only the specialized historical study of interest groups will reveal changes over time: the peculiar phases, duration, and, most importantly, how zombie ideas are killed once and for all (or are they!)? It seems clear that politicians would benefit from an exhaustive study of these ideas.

I am most curious, speaking somewhat more seriously, of what ideas the historians of U.S. intellectual life feel are zombies? What ideas have recurred the most, or are the most relevant, in the history of the United States? Of course an answer to this question might indict the historians themselves. For the question could be phrased: What ideas have historians resurrected over and over to explain change in U.S. history, particular with regard to its intellectual life? So this could digress into an ad hominem thread that beats up on particular historians. That's not my goal. Besides, a comparable taxonomy has already been constructed once before by David Hackett Fisher.

What say you? What are the most important, most cited, or most over-used ideas in U.S. intellectual history? Or what have I missed in defining the meaning of zombie ideas? - TL

This Be The Verse

Twenty years ago, David Hackett Fischer published Albion's Seed: Four British Folkways in America, which attempts to explain U.S. political culture down to the present through the initial patterns of British immigration to North America. Historiographically, Fischer's project flowed from the twin streams of Annales School histoire totale, which was if anything losing influence at the time of the book's publication, and cultural history, which was very much on the rise. From the Annalistes, Fischer borrowed many of his interests (e.g. the longue durée; regionalism) and the scope of his project (this very hefty book announced itself as the first of a five-volume rewriting of the social and cultural history of the United States). But Fischer's approach stressed the importance of culture and ethnicity, both of which made this in-many-ways old-fashioned project seem more of its moment (though Fischer's conception of culture was itself rather anthropological and pre-"linguistic turn").*

Fischer's book was widely reviewed but got an almost universally mixed reception. Historians celebrated the audacity and ambition of the project, while questioning its details, logic, and conclusions. Charles Joyner, writing in the Journal of American Folklore, called it a "stunning but problematic achievement." Jack P. Greene, writing in the Journal of Social History, compared the book--in its extraordinary scope--to an encyclopedia, but worried that its individual components were not up to the historical standards one expects from encyclopedia entries. Darrett Rutman, reviewing the book for the American Historical Review, concluded that "Albion's Seed has borne at best questionable fruit." Albion's Seed stood as a kind of cautionary tale of the difficulties of writing total history. Though Fischer's career has continued to flourish, it has gone in other directions; the other four volumes of the project that Albion's Seed was supposed to inaugurate have never appeared.

But despite its rocky initial reception among historians, Albion's Seed has worked its way into the public discourse. Sara Robinson, co-author of the influential liberal blog Orcinus, devoted a two-part series to the book in 2007. And 2008 was a very good year for Albion's Seed. In trying to explain voting patterns during last year's protracted Democratic Presidential primary battle between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, many analysts turned to Albion's Seed and argued that Scots Irish culture in Appalachia made the region especially good for Clinton and bad for Obama (here's one random example of from The Seattle Times; googling "Scots Irish Fischer Obama" yields many others).

More recently, Albion's Seed has become a go-to explanation of what's going on with the Republican Party today. Indeed, at the time of this writing, the top-rated diary on DailyKos, the most influential Democratic blog, is "Yo, Pundits! Here's What's Up With the Republicans," which uses Albion's Seed to argue that each of the two major parties are based on two of Fischer's four ethno-regional groupings.**

(Lest anyone think that David Hackett Fischer has become the property of Democrats and progressives, it's worth noting that he was the 2006 recipient of the American Enterprise Institute's Irving Kristol Award for "notable intellectual or practical contributions to improved public policy and social welfare.")

While Albion's Seed has undoubtedly become something of a classic, I don't think that my fellow twentieth-century historians turn to it much to explain political cultural phenomena in our period. Rereading reviews from nearly two decades ago while putting together this post, I was tempted to agree with Fischer's critics about both its virtues and its flaws. Has it fared any better among historians of earlier periods of U.S. history? Or is this an example of a work of academic history that has become more read--or at least more significant--outside the profession than within it?

Perhaps Albion's Seed will do more to transform our political culture (or at least the ways that we talk about it) than it did to explain it.

___________________________________

* Albion's Seed was old-fashioned not only in its Annalistes qualities, but in its argument, which harkens back to the pre-Frederick Jackson Turner view of American history as best explained by the political traditions of the Germanic forebears of its founders.

** For those keeping score at home: Democrats = Puritans+Quakers while Republicans = Borderers+Cavaliers. Once again, the Scots Irish "Borderers" are the focus of the dKos diarist's attention.

This Be The Verse

Twenty years ago, David Hackett Fischer published Albion's Seed: Four British Folkways in America, which attempts to explain U.S. political culture down to the present through the initial patterns of British immigration to North America. Historiographically, Fischer's project flowed from the twin streams of Annales School histoire totale, which was if anything losing influence at the time of the book's publication, and cultural history, which was very much on the rise. From the Annalistes, Fischer borrowed many of his interests (e.g. the longue durée; regionalism) and the scope of his project (this very hefty book announced itself as the first of a five-volume rewriting of the social and cultural history of the United States). But Fischer's approach stressed the importance of culture and ethnicity, both of which made this in-many-ways old-fashioned project seem more of its moment (though Fischer's conception of culture was itself rather anthropological and pre-"linguistic turn").*

Fischer's book was widely reviewed but got an almost universally mixed reception. Historians celebrated the audacity and ambition of the project, while questioning its details, logic, and conclusions. Charles Joyner, writing in the Journal of American Folklore, called it a "stunning but problematic achievement." Jack P. Greene, writing in the Journal of Social History, compared the book--in its extraordinary scope--to an encyclopedia, but worried that its individual components were not up to the historical standards one expects from encyclopedia entries. Darrett Rutman, reviewing the book for the American Historical Review, concluded that "Albion's Seed has borne at best questionable fruit." Albion's Seed stood as a kind of cautionary tale of the difficulties of writing total history. Though Fischer's career has continued to flourish, it has gone in other directions; the other four volumes of the project that Albion's Seed was supposed to inaugurate have never appeared.

But despite its rocky initial reception among historians, Albion's Seed has worked its way into the public discourse. Sara Robinson, co-author of the influential liberal blog Orcinus, devoted a two-part series to the book in 2007. And 2008 was a very good year for Albion's Seed. In trying to explain voting patterns during last year's protracted Democratic Presidential primary battle between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, many analysts turned to Albion's Seed and argued that Scots Irish culture in Appalachia made the region especially good for Clinton and bad for Obama (here's one random example of from The Seattle Times; googling "Scots Irish Fischer Obama" yields many others).

More recently, Albion's Seed has become a go-to explanation of what's going on with the Republican Party today. Indeed, at the time of this writing, the top-rated diary on DailyKos, the most influential Democratic blog, is "Yo, Pundits! Here's What's Up With the Republicans," which uses Albion's Seed to argue that each of the two major parties are based on two of Fischer's four ethno-regional groupings.**

(Lest anyone think that David Hackett Fischer has become the property of Democrats and progressives, it's worth noting that he was the 2006 recipient of the American Enterprise Institute's Irving Kristol Award for "notable intellectual or practical contributions to improved public policy and social welfare.")

While Albion's Seed has undoubtedly become something of a classic, I don't think that my fellow twentieth-century historians turn to it much to explain political cultural phenomena in our period. Rereading reviews from nearly two decades ago while putting together this post, I was tempted to agree with Fischer's critics about both its virtues and its flaws. Has it fared any better among historians of earlier periods of U.S. history? Or is this an example of a work of academic history that has become more read--or at least more significant--outside the profession than within it?

Perhaps Albion's Seed will do more to transform our political culture (or at least the ways that we talk about it) than it did to explain it.

___________________________________

* Albion's Seed was old-fashioned not only in its Annalistes qualities, but in its argument, which harkens back to the pre-Frederick Jackson Turner view of American history as best explained by the political traditions of the Germanic forebears of its founders.

** For those keeping score at home: Democrats = Puritans+Quakers while Republicans = Borderers+Cavaliers. Once again, the Scots Irish "Borderers" are the focus of the dKos diarist's attention.