Though both the media and the public were bored by the Republican and Democratic conventions, these were nevertheless among the more significant conventions in our history. They gave signs of major changes now under way in the parties, a kind of slide into what, for want of a better term, we may call postmodern politics. As would be expected, the change is less obvious in the case of the Republican Party -- it is, after all, our conservative party. But it was there. In the case of the Democratic Party, the change has already achieved a visible momentum.

This change can be roughly summarized as follows: The traditional attitude of both parties toward the welfare state has now been infused with contrasting cultural agendas. The economics of the welfare state is no longer a simple matter of arguments about balancing receipts and expenditures -- though many conservatives still see it that way. The economics is now being integrated into the "culture wars" we are living through, so the issue of what kind of welfare state we shall have is now but an aspect of a profound division over what kind of country we are, and what kind of people we are, and what we mean by "the American way of life."

Unsurprisingly, the Republican Party is not only resistant to such thoughts, it positively distrusts them. Republican eyes go blank at the very mention of "culture." The party's historic intimacy with the business community has led it to respect economists but to be suspicious of "intellectuals." The party's establishment has nothing against religion so long as it doesn't interfere with golf on Sundays, and it regards those who take religion seriously, who talk earnestly about "values" and "virtues," as "outside the mainstream." Nevertheless, 20% of the delegates to the Republican convention described themselves as Christian conservatives -- that is to say, they see their religious beliefs as telling them something important about the way we should conduct our lives. They know that there is a "culture war" going on because of the frustrations -- even the constant abuse -- they experience. And they are the most dynamic force within the Republican Party.

At the 1992 Republican convention, Pat Buchanan asserted that there was a "culture war" going on in the U.S., and for this he was excoriated, his speech being denounced as "inflammatory" and "extremist." The Republican establishment quickly distanced itself from such distracting belligerency, and worked to retain the traditional conservative focus on economics and foreign policy. In 1996, this establishment was well prepared to stay on track, and the proceedings slithered along smoothly as the convention happily focused on the familiar issue of taxes.

In contrast, this last Democratic convention was in effect a "culture wars" rally, though the organizers were careful to spin out much empty rhetoric about "family values" without going into specifics. This irritated the media, which find it almost impossible to think that "family values," whatever they are, have anything to do with politics. At the same time, most of the journalists and commentators did have preconceptions as to what American politics is really about. They knew that a "newly energized labor movement," represented at the convention, signaled a revival of the old liberal, now renamed "progressive," coalition, a topic they have been writing about for years. What they preferred not to know is that only about 12% of American workers belong to unions today, and that at least half of the union delegates at the convention were white-collar workers who are employees of government (at all levels). What kind of labor movement is this? The majority of union delegates to the Democratic convention would describe themselves as "professionals."

Nor was it mentioned even in passing that 50% of the Democratic delegates were women, had to be women, by virtue of a sexist affirmative action quota. Why such a quota? No one asked, even though there seemed to be no political difference whatsoever between those women and their male counterparts. It is too bad the question was not raised, because it might have alerted an inquiring mind to the deeper meaning of this self-imposed quota. It pointed to a major transformation of the Democratic Party. Specifically, it pointed to the feminization of the party -- not only in the delegate count, which is of no great significance, but in the ethos that pervades the party, and in the policies that naturally flow from this ethos.

As Steven Stark recently wrote in The Atlantic Monthly: "Although many media accounts still give the impression that the [gender] gap [between the parties] is greatest on `women's issues' such as abortion and an Equal Rights Amendment, men and women do not differ much on these issues. Rather, the gulf today tends to be on issues involving the existence and expansion of the welfare state."

The American welfare state has had a feminine coloration from the very beginning, Mr. Stark points out. In Europe, the welfare state was created by trade unionists and socialists for the benefit of working people. In the U.S., our welfare state was shaped, in large part, by the child welfare establishment -- an establishment that provided "suitable" careers for women at a time when such careers were few, and devised appropriate policies that were women-oriented. (Various left-wing historians have made the same point, approvingly.) The result was a welfare state for dependent women and children, and for the burgeoning "helping professions" that attend them.

It is not really surprising that this welfare state should breed a politics not of "justice" or "fairness" but of "compassion," which contemporary liberalism has elevated into the most important civic virtue. Women tend to be more sentimental, more risk-averse and less competitive than men -- yes, it's Mars vs. Venus -- and therefore are less inclined to be appreciative of free-market economics, in which there are losers as well as winners. College-educated women -- the kind who attend Democratic conventions -- are also more "permissive" and less "judgmental" on such issues as homosexuality, capital punishment, even pornography.

This helps explain the amazing degree to which the Democratic convention was bathed in a pre-political pathos involving what journalists would once have called "sob stories" or "heartbreakers" -- terms that contemporary liberalism has made politically incorrect. Some political commentators, even some liberal commentators, were vexed at such made-for-TV soap opera, and wanted to know where the political agenda was. Well, they were looking at it, but didn't realize it. The message was: If terrible things happen to innocent people, government -- and only the federal government, at that -- is morally obliged to come to their rescue. Forget prayer, forget stoicism; hope is incarnated in the welfare state.

So powerful is this theme in our culture today that even the Republican convention had to make some gestures in this direction. But everyone understood that this was little more than copycat opportunism, while politicized compassion constitutes the very heart and soul of the Democratic Party.

This passion for compassion was so strong that it moved the Democratic delegates to ignore resolutely the issue of illegitimacy. The issue simply wasn't mentioned, even though illegitimacy -- especially among teenage girls -- and its sociopathic consequences are at the center of public insistence on the need for welfare reform. Both President Clinton and the convention refused to recognize this fact, even though Mr. Clinton had just signed a welfare reform bill. On welfare, the Democrats are, and will remain, in a state of denial. We should take seriously the hints from the White House to the effect that the president will "gut" the very welfare reform he just signed by manipulating the regulatory requirements. He will most certainly do it, after the election.

It goes beyond this, however. We know that married women, and especially married women with children, tend to be much more conservative than single women. So when Democrats talk about the family, they never -- but never -- say anything that might suggest a household consisting of a mother, a father and children. Assertions to the effect that "we are all one family" are a rather transparent rhetorical effort to delegitimize the traditional family as being the family, from which all other households are deviants, to a mild or radical decree.

The current breakup experienced by the American family is having a profound effect on American politics, as well as on American society. One can go further and say that the social problems we are confronting, problems either created or exacerbated by our welfare state, are making the welfare state a cultural issue as well as an economic one. The Christian right understands this, as does the secularist left. The "culture wars" are no political sideshow. Today, and in the years ahead, they will be energizing and defining all the controversies that revolve around the welfare state.

Mr. Kristol , an American Enterprise Institute fellow, coedits The Public Interest and publishes The National Interest.