A Companion to Ronald Reagan
Wiley Blackwell Companions to American History Series

A Companion to Ronald Reagan evaluates in unprecedented detail the events, policies, politics, and people of Reagan?s administration. It assesses the scope and influence of his various careers within the context of the times, providing wide-ranging coverage of his administration, and his legacy.

• Assesses Reagan and his impact on the development of the United States based on new documentary evidence and engagement with the most recent secondary literature
• Offers a mix of historiographic chapters devoted to foreign and domestic policy, with topics integrated thematically and chronologically
• Includes a section on key figures associated politically and personally with Reagan

“To Grasp and Hold a Vision”: Ronald Reagan in Historical Perspective 1
Andrew L. Johns

Part I Ronald Reagan’s Pre-Presidential Life and Career 7

1. Reagan’s Early Years: From Dixon to Hollywood 9
John Sbardellati

2. Political Ideology and Activism to 1966 22
Lori Clune

3. Reagan’s Gubernatorial Years: From Conservative Spokesperson to National Politician 40
Kurt Schuparra

4. Reagan Runs: His Campaigns for the Presidency, 1976, 1980, and 1984 54
Yanek Mieczkowski

Part II The Reagan Administration, 1981–1989 71

Domestic Policy: Politics and Economics 73

5. The Great Communicator: Rhetoric, Media, and Leadership Style 74
Reed L. Welch

6. Reagan and the Evolution of American Politics, 1981–1989 96
Andrew E. Busch

7. Ronald Reagan and the Supreme Court 117
Andrew E. Hunt

8. “Reaganomics”: The Fiscal and Monetary Policies 131
W. Elliot Brownlee

9. Reagan and the Economy: Business and Labor, Deregulation and Regulation 149
Michael R. Adamson

10. Reagan and the Military 167
Jonathan Reed Winkler

Domestic Policy: Social and Cultural Issues 184

11. Ronald Reagan, Race, Civil Rights, and Immigration 185
Lilia Fernandez

12. Reagan, Religion, and the Culture Wars of the 1980s 204
Matthew Avery Sutton

13. Reagan and AIDS 221
Jennifer Brier

14. The Crackdown in America: The Reagan Revolution and the War on Drugs 238
Jeremy Kuzmarov

15. Ronald Reagan’s Environmental Legacy 257
Jacob Darwin Hamblin

Foreign Policy: Issues 275

16. Reagan, the Soviet Union, and the Cold War, 1981–1985 276
Michael V. Paulauskas

17. Shaking the Empire, or a Negotiated Settlement: Ronald Reagan and Visions of the Cold War’s End 295
Gregory Mitrovich

18. The Iran–Contra Affair 321
James F. Siekmeier

19. The Reagan Doctrine 339
Dustin Walcher

20. Reagan and Terrorism 359
Heather S. Gregg

Foreign Policy: Regions 377

21. Reagan and Africa 378
James H. Meriwether

22. Reagan and Western Europe 393
William Glenn Gray

23. Reagan and Asia 411
Michael Schaller

24. Reagan and Central America 434
Jason M. Colby

25. Reagan and the Middle East 453
Clea Bunch

Key Figures 469

26. Mikhail Gorbachev 470
Elizabeth C. Charles

27. The Vice Presidency of George H. W. Bush 491
Michael F. Cairo

28. Ronald Reagan, Tip O’Neill, and 1980s Congressional History 510
Robert David Johnson

29. The Troika: James Baker III, Edwin Meese III, and Michael Deaver 529
Christopher Maynard

30. A Foreign Policy Divided Against Itself: George Shultz versus Caspar Weinberger 546
Andrew Preston

31. Margaret Thatcher 565
Michael F. Hopkins

Part III The Legacy of Ronald Reagan 583

32. Ronald Reagan and the Conservative Movement 585
Sandra Scanlon

33. Reagan and Globalization 608
Thomas W. Zeiler

34. Reputation and Legacies: An American Symbol 626
Chester J. Pach

Index 644

Andrew L. Johns is Associate Professor of History at Brigham Young University and the David M. Kennedy Center for International Studies. He is the author of Vietnam’s Second Front:  Domestic Politics, the Republican Party, and the War (2010), and the co-editor of The Eisenhower Administration, the Third World, and the Globalization of the Cold War (with Kathryn C. Statler, 2006) and Diplomatic Games: Sport, Statecraft, and International Relations since 1945 (with Heather L. Dichter, 2014). He is also the editor of Passport: The Society for Historians of American Foreign Relations Review.