Carlson, J. Merchants of the Right: Gun Sellers and the Crisis of American Democracy.

• Author: Knox, Allison G.S.

Carlson, J. Merchants of the Right: Gun Sellers and the Crisis of American Democracy. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2023. 288 pages. Hardcover, $29.95.

There are many interesting ways to gauge the pulse of the public as they contemplate and support policy concepts. As consumers of knowledge, Americans tend to watch the ebb and flow of policy debate as new ideas about various issues emerge, gain steam and either become new pieces of legislation in Congress, or fizzle and die out. There are a few different policy initiatives that continue to maintain the interests of the American public, particularly as Congress works to figure out policy solutions to the policy problems that exist within society. One of these policy initiatives is that of gun rights. While the conversation continues to evolve on what to do regarding gun rights and gun control, Jennifer Carlson, an associate professor of Sociology at the University of Arizona, uses the perspective of gun dealers to understand the current sentiments of gun ownership and conservativism in the United States. Her book, Merchants of the Right: Gun Sellers and the Crisis of American Democracy, and her perspective of how to understand the political dynamics of this policy issue is not only interesting but provides how to study policy dynamics in a new and interesting way.

Jennifer Carlson is a policy scholar who often focuses on concepts of conservatism and gun rights, and her book, Merchants of the Right: Gun Sellers and the Crisis of American Democracy, is a fascinating take on the rise of conservatism in the United States. Carlson's book opens with a particularly interesting viewpoint of COVID-19 and the pandemic's impact on gun sales. Instead of taking the book into an obvious angle that focuses on COVID-19 and the scare of the pandemic increased gun sales, Carlson looks at the situation from a unique angle highlighting that COVID-19 ushered in a new opportunity for conservative American citizens to build a new era of political thought. Carlson writes:

"But as I listened... I realized that these pillars of conservative thinking were more than mere ideologies, worldviews or frameworks. At this moment of uncertainty, these themes served as tools for Robert and other gun sellers I met during 2020, who used them to build conservative culture from the ground up. Armed individualism, conspiracism, and partisanship allowed Robert and others to locate a sense of control amid...