Rationality and ideology in American political culture: The 1997 enactment of the State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP)

This study explores American political culture and the factors that define it through an analysis of the events that led to the enactment of the State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) in 1997. SCHIP is a federal-state program that provides healthcare coverage to children from low socioeconomic strata. The analysis of SCHIP focuses on the actions of the two protagonists in its legislative journey, Senators Edward Kennedy (D-MA) and Orrin Hatch (R-UT). These historical figures are regarded not primarily as individual political actors, but rather as representatives of widely divergent political ideologies, with vastly different interpretations of how our society should be structured and governed. Two insights emerge from this study. First, this study shows that the political culture is structured and regulated by the political process. After close examination and analysis of the political process, political ideology and rationality are identified as the defining features that drive and give it direction. Second, this study shows that American political culture is fluid, changing according to circumstances and due to the unconscious prioritization of a set of fundamental principles by the body politic. The ordering of these principles reflects the subjective perception of the body politic to the issue at hand. Hence, the body politic defines the level of fluidity in the political culture. It is the level of fluidity that fuels the momentum of a legislative measure, bringing it to the forefront for legislative consideration.