Archie Bunker ja konservatismi sarjassa Perhe on Pahin

In 1971, the sitcom All in the Family premiered on CBS in the United States. The show soon became the most watched show in America, and held that position for an unprecedented five consecutive years. Archie Bunker, the main character of the show, almost instantly became a political icon and a representation of conservatism in the early 1970s.

This article explores the politics of the late 1960s television, from which All in the Family emerged, and then shows how Archie’s politics on the show are too ambivalent to be described as conservative. While conservative on some issues, especially social issues, he does not align with conservative ideology. Instead of a laissez-faire attitude towards economic policy, Bunker supports both labor unions and government welfare in the form of Social Security. The efforts of Richard Nixon to deemphasize economic policy in creating a conservative majority, instead, explain the understanding of Archie as the embodiment of a new conservative majority.