The book incorporates much of the important foundational information that today’s undergraduate political science major needs to learn. The need to study both human behavior as well as institutions requires a more focused course of study. This text is superb because it provides students with a host of applications specific to the discipline.

The authors skillfully integrate examples throughout the book that illustrate how scholars utilize methodological techniques to address substantive theoretical questions in political science. In so doing, the book systematically unpacks the foundation for understanding, evaluating, and producing scientific research. The companion workbook, Working with Political Science Research Methods, provides exercises and data sets to help students build an applied foundation for the statistical techniques they learn about in the text. The superb balance achieved between methodological theory and application makes the entire package an immensely valuable tool for both students and teachers. Read the rest of this entry »

Political theorist Fukuyama presents nothing less than a unified theory of state formation, a comparative study of how tribally organized societies in various parts of the world and various moments in history have transformed into societies with political systems and institutions and, in some cases, political accountability.

Drawing upon a diverse range of sources—sociobiology and anthropology as well as macroeconomics and legal history—and paying particular attention to political development in Asia, Fukuyama describes a somewhat evolutionary mechanism wherein political systems develop in response to certain societal conditions and become institutionalized because of, among other things, their ability to adapt. Very much a continuation of his former teacher Samuel Huntington’s interest in political decay, this wide-ranging and frequently provocative work also carries the mantel of the great nineteenth-century sociologists, who addressed many of the same questions. Read the rest of this entry »

Through a bravura tour of American political leaders and their appeals to the electorate, Drew Westen shows that Americans don’t vote with their heads but with their hearts–and that Democratic politicians had better wise up in their approach.

The Political Brain is a serious and groundbreaking investigation into the role of emotion in deciding the outcome of elections. It looks at data across several presidential elections from the 1950s through 2000, examines the evidence for the role of emotion in driving voting behavior, and provides a “clinical” view of a number of campaign ads, debate lines, and personal profiles of the candidates who have sought to win our hearts. Read the rest of this entry »

Afghanistan traces the historic struggles and the changing nature of political authority in this volatile region of the world, from the Mughal Empire in the sixteenth century to the Taliban resurgence today.

Thomas Barfield introduces readers to the bewildering diversity of tribal and ethnic groups in Afghanistan, explaining what unites them as Afghans despite the regional, cultural, and political differences that divide them. He shows how governing these peoples was relatively easy when power was concentrated in a small dynastic elite, but how this delicate political order broke down in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries when Afghanistan’s rulers mobilized rural militias to expel first the British and later the Soviets. Armed insurgency proved remarkably successful against the foreign occupiers, but it also undermined the Afghan government’s authority and rendered the country ever more difficult to govern as time passed. Read the rest of this entry »

Since its debut, Policy Paradox has been widely acclaimed as the most accessible policy text available. Unlike most texts, which treat policy analysis and policy making as different enterprises, Policy Paradox demonstrates that “you can’t take politics out of analysis”. Through a uniquely rich and comprehensive model, this revised edition continues to show how real-world policy grows out of differing ideals, even definitions, of basic societal goals like security, equality, and liberty.

The book also demonstrates how these ideals often conflict in policy implementation. In this revised edition, Stone has added a full-length case study as an appendix, taking up the issue of affirmative action. Clear, provocative, and engaging, Policy Paradox conveys the richness of public policy making and analysis. Read the rest of this entry »

Critics who dubbed Britain’s ex-prime minister “Tony Blur” for his allegedly substance-free politics swaddled in gauzy PR won’t have their minds changed by this nebulous memoir. Blair’s brief for his “ground-breaking” New Labour platform reads like a marketing plan: it’s all about middle-class “aspiration”, “focusing on the developing tastes of consumers”, and “modernization”, the glossed-over particulars being a muddle of small-bore education, health-care and law-and-order initiatives.

The Iraq War is a similar “battle between modernizers and reactionaries”, according to Blair’s high-minded justification, a battle which would have gone well but for the meddling of Al Qaeda and Iran. He writes like an ad executive–”it had to be dignified, it had to be different, and it had to be Diana”, he says of the laudably “modern” princess’s funeral–but his candor can be bracing. He paints comic scenes of excruciating audiences with dull dignitaries and the weekly torment of Prime Minister’s Questions, is nakedly spiteful toward his Labour rival and successor Gordon Brown, and never hides his preoccupation with image-crafting and media relations. Blair reveals himself to be savvy, charming, and sometimes earnest and impassioned, but never quite a statesman. Read the rest of this entry »

Designed for the East Asian history course, this text features the latest scholarship on the region’s cultural, political, economic, and intellectual history. Coverage is balanced among East Asian countries, with approximately 20 percent of the text focused on Korea, an area that has become increasingly important in world politics.

Special attention is devoted to gender and material culture, themes are reinforced through the text’s pedagogical features. Full color inserts on topics such as food, clothing, and art objects illustrate the rich artistic heritage of East Asia and bolster the coverage of material culture. Read the rest of this entry »

The New York Times bestseller, Culture of Corruption is now in paperback! Featuring a brand new introduction and completely updated throughout, this investigative tour-de-force by bestselling author Michelle Malkin delivers a powerful, damning, and comprehensive indictment of the culture of corruption that surrounds Team Obama’s brazen business-as-usual influence peddlers.

From power broker Rahm Emanuel, to pay-to-play tainted Michelle Obama and Joe Biden, to ethically challenged Tim Geithner, to crime-coddling corporate lawyer Eric Holder, Culture of Corruption proves that this is the government of the crony, by the lobbyist, and for the well-heeled. Obama lacks the will to change Washington politics, and Malkin reveals what his agenda means for his presidency—and America. Read the rest of this entry »

Since its original landmark publication in 1980, A People’s History of the United States has been chronicling American history from the bottom up, throwing out the official version of history taught in schools — with its emphasis on great men in high places — to focus on the street, the home, and the, workplace.
Known for its lively, clear prose as well as its scholarly research, A People’s History is the only volume to tell America’s story from the point of view of — and in the words of — America’s women, factory workers, African-Americans, Native Americans, the working poor, and immigrant laborers. As historian Howard Zinn shows, many of our country’s greatest battles — the fights for a fair wage, an eight-hour workday, child-labor laws, health and safety standards, universal suffrage, women’s rights, racial equality — were carried out at the grassroots level, against bloody resistance.

Covering Christopher Columbus’s arrival through President Clinton’s first term, A People’s History of the United States, which was nominated for the American Book Award in 1981, features insightful analysis of the most important events in our history. Read the rest of this entry »

Acclaimed historian Doris Kearns Goodwin illuminates Lincoln’s political genius in this highly original work, as the one-term congressman and prairie lawyer rises from obscurity to prevail over three gifted rivals of national reputation to become president.
On May 18, 1860, William H. Seward, Salmon P. Chase, Edward Bates, and Abraham Lincoln waited in their hometowns for the results from the Republican National Convention in Chicago. When Lincoln emerged as the victor, his rivals were dismayed and angry.

Throughout the turbulent 1850s, each had energetically sought the presidency as the conflict over slavery was leading inexorably to secession and civil war. That Lincoln succeeded, Goodwin demonstrates, was the result of a character that had been forged by experiences that raised him above his more privileged and accomplished rivals. He won because he possessed an extraordinary ability to put himself in the place of other men, to experience what they were feeling, to understand their motives and desires. Read the rest of this entry »