Uneasy partners

"Businessmen are politicians in America," writes Kim McQuaid, "and politicians are businessmen." Today, in areas as diverse as home mortgages, high technology, and Smart Bombs, the private and public sectors are working together to perform tasks that each is unable to do alone. In Uneasy Partners McQuaid surveys the close ties that have formed between big business and government in the period from World War II to the present. Government needs business, McQuaid explains, to make and implement key economic and business-related decisions. Business needs government to gain advantages over labor and markets. The defining characteristics of this business-government relationship form the focal point for the book's chapters. McQuaid first examines the 1945-60 transition period, discussing Eisenhower's domestic policies, foreign aid, and the oil market. He then explores the rapid expansion of government under the Democratic administrations of the 1960s and discusses the Republican retrenchment and the Reagan administration's pro-business agenda in the 1980s. Finally he assesses the legacy of the Reagan policies and evaluates the current U.S. position in the world economy . As the newly elected Clinton administration pledges business-government partnerships and greater efficiency in policy areas ranging from tax and trade to antitrust and R&D, Uneasy Partners allows policymakers and interested citizens alike to view such issues in their historical context. Written in a lively and engaging style, Uneasy Partners offers a timely look at the interaction of the two most important political actors in U.S. society over the course of the past half-century.