The Adaptability Paradox

“Skowronek’s terrific new book incisively explains why the US Constitution, notable for its longevity and perceived adaptability, seems no longer equipped to serve these ends. In the process, The Adaptability Paradox powerfully upends conventional narratives about the distinctive value of the document’s institutional design. It fundamentally reframes how scholars and publics should understand the conditions that both generated change in the past and now inhibit progress. The result is an essential intervention in constitutional history as well as in today’s most significant political debates.” – Aziz Rana | author of “The Constitutional Bind: How Americans Came to Idolize a Document That Fails Them”

“In The Adaptability Paradox, Stephen Skowronek, the premiere scholar of American political development, provides an insightful analysis that raises the great political challenge of our time. Commendably, America has become more democratic over time, but only through adaptations that provided security for many unequal social, economic, and political features of American life. Today, anger at social, economic, and political elites abounds, on the right, left, and center. But is it still possible for the nation to become more fully democratic, and still hold together? A profoundly difficult question that we cannot ignore.”

Stephen Skowronek is the Pelatiah Perit Professor of Political and Social Science at Yale University and cofounder of the journal Studies in American Political Development. He is the author or coauthor of several books, including Phantoms of a Beleaguered Republic, The Policy State, and The Politics Presidents Make.