State Capture: How Conservative Activists, Big Businesses, and Wealthy Donors Reshaped the American States -- and the Nation
by Alex Hertel-Fernandez (Author)

About the Author
Alexander Hertel-Fernandez is an Assistant Professor in Columbia University's School of International and Public Affairs. His research has appeared in the American Prospect, Democracy Journal, The New York Times, The New Yorker, and The Washington Post, as well as numerous scholarly journals. He is also the author of Politics at Work (Oxford, 2018).

About this book
Most Americans pay little attention to the massive number of elections that occur at the state level every year. Yet cumulatively, a party's success in state-level races across the country can produce major shifts in policymaking and governance. That is precisely what has happened in the US since 2010. In a wave election that year, the Republican Party began their ascendancy in state-level elections, and by 2016 had solidified their dominance. The party now fully controls 25 state legislatures and governorships-one of the largest advantages either party has had since the New Deal.
After the GOP wave, a broad swathe of states began considering and enacting a near-identical set of conservative priorities-often even using the exact same text. Where did this flood of new legislation come from? How did so many states arrive at the same proposals at precisely the same time? As Alexander Hertel-Fernandez shows in the eye-opening State Capture, the answer can be found in a trio of powerful interest groups: the Koch Brothers-run Americans for Prosperity (AFP), the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), and the State Policy Network (SPN). Drawing from an impressive evidence base, Hertel-Fernandez explains how, since the 1970s, conservative activists, wealthy donors, and big businesses constructed a right-wing "troika" of overlapping and influential lobbying groups.
But it is about more than this. It also teases out how conservative-corporate mobilization has fostered epochal shifts in the American political economy: the decline of unions, party polarization, and the skyrocketing concentration of wealth. State Capture will be essential reading for anyone interested in understanding contemporary American politics.

Brief contents
Introduction 1
PART I THE EVOLUTION OF ALEC: A CORPORATECONSERVATIVE ANCHOR ACROSS US STATES
1. “The Most Dangerously Effective Organization”: A Smart ALEC Is Born 23
2. Policy Plagiarism: A Window into ALEC’s Reach across US States 64
3. An Easy “A” with ALEC: ALEC’s Appeal for State Lawmakers 78
4. “A Great Investment”: ALEC’s Appeal for Big Business 112
PART II THE RIGHT- WING TROIKA AND ITS FOES
5. A Little Help from Their Friends: Introducing the Right- Wing Troika 143
6. Transforming the Nation One State at a Time: The Right- Wing Troika and State Policy 174
7. “Feisty Chihuahuas versus a Big Gorilla”: Why Left- Wing Efforts to Counter the Troika Have Floundered 211
Conclusion: State Capture and American Democracy 243
Appendices
    Chapter 3 Appendix 269
    Chapter 4 Appendix 274
    Chapter 6 Appendix 278
    Chapter 7 Appendix 291
Notes 295
Works Cited 319
Index 343

Pages:  384 pages
Publisher: Oxford University Press (February 4, 2019)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0190870796
ISBN-13: 978-0190870799