Ilya Somin, who posts on Volokh Conspiracy, has just released a scholarly take on The Tea Party, which he calls, approvingly, the first popular constitutionalist movement in many years whose main focus is the need to limit federal power. From the abstract:
The enormous size and scope of modern government undercuts meaningful democratic control over government policy because "rationally ignorant" voters cannot keep track of more than a small fraction of government activity. Strengthening democratic accountability is one of the main objectives of advocates of popular constitutionalism. The imposition of stricter limits on government power might make that goal easier to achieve. The Tea Party’s focus on limiting government also makes it less likely that we will see the emergence of a right-wing populist movement that is primarily focused on intolerance and xenophobia, of the kind that often arose during previous economic downturns.
Access the full research paper here.
