Winning back the center

Seminar paper from the year 2008 in the subject Politics - Political Systems - General and Comparisons, grade: 2,0, University of Bonn, language: English, abstract: Whatever their differences of character and the differences of the political systems are, William Clinton and Tony Blair are joined at the hip as energetic parishioners of the so-called Third way politics. Both restructured and repositioned their parties by breaking with their party's old style policies. New Labour and New Democrats both meant a clear cut from their parties political past. With a new agenda and new politics and last but not least a new and a well organized party machine rallied behind them, both succeeded in taking back the power after many years of opposition. But to what political price? In order to win back the political center Bill Clinton and Tony Blair made significant strategically policy shifts that parted with their parties old-style liberal/ socialist 1paths to more business friendly and social conservative policies. In this paper a comparison and analysis of the political 'Third way politics' in the United States of America and Great Britain shall be made. The emphasis is on how and why these politics were adopted and whether they ultimately succeeded.