Promotions - Choice's Outstanding Academic Titles 2015 - Social & Behavioral Sciences — Political Science — U.S. Politics

This is an important addition to the literature on American social and legal history.  Edwards (history, Duke Univ.) shows how the Civil War forever changed the conception of the Constitution, federalism, and individual rights.  In an eminently readable account, she traces the evolution of legal thought and practice in the North brought about by the Civil War.  Wartime mobilization concentrated immense power in the national government and raised expectations about what a strong national government could do.  This power and these expectations did not wither away after the war.  The Confederacy was based on legal contradictions; established to protect states rights, it created a strong government that was more centralized than the Union under Lincoln.  Ostensibly fought to preserve the Union, the Civil War and its aftermath established a regime of rights that empowered African Americans and then was extended to a host of other groups even as it left African Americans in the lurch.  What the war brought about, Reconstruction institutionalized, so the Civil War can rightfully be called the countrys most important constitutional amendment.  This well-researched, well-written book is accessible and useful for scholars ranging from ambitious high school students to established senior scholars.  It is superb.Summing Up: Essential. All readership levels.

This book makes an important contribution to the study of race in American politics, arguing persuasively that anger plays a key role in activating symbolic racism.  Building on groundbreaking works such as Tali MendelbergsThe Race Card(CH, Dec'01, 39-2467), Donald Kinder and Cindy KamsUs Against Them (CH, Aug'10, 47-7142), and the work of David O. Sears and colleagues, Banks (Univ. of Maryland, College Park) finds that policies or campaigns in which anger is a prominent feature leads those scoring high in symbolic racism to place a much greater emphasis on what they perceive to be racial cues.  Importantly, the anger does not have to be tied to explicitly racial concerns; simply triggering anger is enough to make the racial connection.  An interesting albeit unsurprising finding is that those low in symbolic racism can also be motivated by anger (e.g., to support the Affordable Care Act more strongly) but only in some cases, and the effect is not as strong as it is on those high in symbolic racism.  The debate over symbolic racism continues to rage, but Banks offers strong evidence for those who find that race continues to be a powerful influence in American politics.Summing Up: Highly recommended. Upper-division undergraduate, graduate, and research collections.

This theoretically and empirically rich book, part of the "Studies in Postwar American Political Development" series, essentially asks, where does policy change come from?  Relying on a content analysis of 231 books and 37 articles on the history of domestic national government policy making in 14 different issue areas over 60 years, Grossmann (Michigan State Univ.) reaches a number of conclusions.  Elections, the media, and public opinion are not major drivers of policy change.  Usually, policy change in any given policy area is primarily the result of negotiation, compromise, and cooperation among elites, especially long-serving legislators, the president, and interest group lobbyists.  While offering an explanation of why there has been policy making in some areas but not others, the analysis raises troubling questions about the nature of American democracy and the role of the public within it.Summing Up: Highly recommended. Upper-division undergraduates and above.

Here is a case study on a topic often ignored by scholarsthe transition of power from one American president to the next.  Although Kumar links the most recent presidential transition back to the Truman-to-Eisenhower administrations, the book focuses on the comparatively smooth transition from the George W. Bush to Barack Obama administrations.  Leadership transition is important, she notes, because it is essential that any governing system have a peaceful and efficient change of power from one regime to its successor, particularly when they represent rival political parties.  She details 10 ways an effective transition benefits a president before explaining in great detail the legal parameters and historic traditions of American presidential transitions.  Kumar then pays chapter-length attention to the Bush administration's end-of-power planning followed by the Obama administration's preparation measures.  In addition, the author devotes chapters on National Security Council transition efforts and the often thorny problems surrounding presidential appointments.  Her concluding chapter details 12 "lessons" to guide future presidential transitions.  Overall, the book is loaded with anecdotes and quips from staffers and presidents about their thoughts on entering or leaving the White House, which greatly add to the readability.  This book likely will remain the primary source on this topic for a long time.Summing Up: Highly recommended. All readership levels.

American campaign finance can be a tricky subject to write about.  There are parallel tracks of analysis (political history and constitutional law), and they are dense and difficult to explain, especially the perpetually swerving Supreme Court jurisprudence.  To write a very good book on either dynamic is an achievement.  To write an extraordinary book that skillfully addresses and integrates both dynamics is a triumph, and that is the case here.  This sweeping account of campaign finance reform begins in the late 19th century, a period often overlooked by scholars, who tend to start with the progressivism of Theodore Roosevelt and the 1907 Tillman Act, and continues through the practical subsequent effects of Citizens United v. FEC.  Mutch relates the political background in a readable, engrossing writing style and explains the complexities of key legal opinions in a way that even undergraduates or newcomers to the subject can follow.  Most important, the political background and legal decisions are interwoven to give readers a holistic account of how the politics and law of campaign finance evolved over time.  This is one of the best books on the subject in recent memory.Summing Up: Highly recommended. All readership levels.

Francis (Pepperdine Univ.) has penned a detailed, topical, and extraordinary book on the history of civil rights and their role in creating the modern American state.  Francis argues that citizen agency was integral to making new constitutional law in a period that has been ignored by previous researchers.  This book examines the importance of civil rights activism in building the American state through politics and constitutional approaches.  The first several chapters provide societal and historical context.  They explain in great detail how civil rights became part of the national discourse and methodically infected society.  With the structure and history in place, Francis provides detailed analysis of the NAACPs use of law, particularly with the Supreme Court, to affect race relations in the US.  She explains how the NAACP raised public awareness, including the attention of numerous US presidents, and worked to secure support of Congress.  While the organization used the Supreme Court to gain traction on racial progress, Francis explains how this also affected state and local courts.  The final chapter is imperative reading.  This book is essential for anyone interested in understanding the history of race relations in the US and how numerous groups used law and politics to affect change.Summing Up: Essential. Upper-division undergraduates and above.

In decisions such asBuckley v. Valeo(1976) andCitizens United v. The Federal Elections Commission (2010), the Supreme Court agreed with First Amendment claims that equate lobbying and campaign spending with political speech and in so doing sharply circumscribed Congresss power to defend itself against corruption or advance notions of the common good informed by the spirit of democratic equality.  Teachout (law, Fordham Univ.) explores case law and controversies before the 1970s and finds that many generations of jurists and politicians had a much broader conception of political corruption and a richer sense of civic duty and viewed any sort of gift-giving from private citizens to public officials as ethically dubious and undermining of democratic legitimacy.  Though there was quite a bit of public corruption in the old days, there was also a respect for public virtue for which modern jurisprudence has little patience.  The Supreme Courts dramatic turn away from an older tradition leaves Congress unable to regulate lobbying and campaign spending wisely, should it chose to do so.  With public confidence in government low and Washington politics driven by the agendas of corporations and the wealthy, Teachouts argument is timely, compelling, and important.Summing Up: Highly recommended. All readership levels.

This account is a superb examination of the most important civil rights issue of the early-21st century.  It begins with the campaign to defeat Proposition 8 in California.  This is political and legal journalism on the issue of marriage equality at its best.  Becker was able to gain incredible access to the plaintiffs' team of lawyers.  Readers see the legal strategies develop, the politics of the same-sex marriage issue play out, and the human sides of the story on vivid display.  The book reads like a thriller, unfolding page by page with an examination of the trial seeking to overturn Proposition 8 that brought together the legal odd couple of Ted Olson and David Boies.  Becker examines the key players in the Department of Justice and the White House (including the evolution of President Obama on the issue) and the initial reluctance of the gay community to pursue victory through the judicial process following the passage of Proposition 8.  Although Becker was not given access to the internal workings of the defense team, lead defense lawyer Chuck Cooper later spent many hours with the author explaining the defense's thinking and strategy.Summing Up: Highly recommended. General readers and undergraduate students at all levels.

Palley (Adelphi Univ.) and Shdaimah (Univ. of Maryland) have produced an excellent mixed methods study on the state of child-care policy in the US.  The authors start with the puzzle of why child-care policy has stagnated since the Nixon era given that women have made strides politically and large groups of people recognize the need for excellent child care.  They then discuss problems with the current system.  The strength of the book is its conception of the problems surrounding child care.  Even though womens policy and childrens policy are linked, it is hard for groups and political actors to focus on child care given competition for scarce resources.  Another clear obstacle is that the issue is usually framed as a poverty issue, which stigmatizes any potential reforms.  Conclusions and potential reforms are informed by empirical literature and interviews with policy actors and advocates.  This excellent book will help readers understand a difficult problem and serve as a call to arms for change.Summing Up: Highly recommended. Upper-division undergraduates and above.

Mutz (Univ. of Pennsylvania) offers an engagingly readable, data-rich work on mediated politics of a particular kind.  Her focus is upon television, long known to be most Americans' primary source of political information and here documented as the medium most capable of arousing positive and/or negative feelings about political phenomena.  The words in your face come with a double meaning in the context of political messaging via television.  TV carries the illusion that political actors are spatially much closer to viewers than they really are.  And jousting among political adversaries on television can reach levels of incivility that violate norms of everyday discourse in interpersonal relationships.  Drawing upon experiments and other methods she used, Mutz explains the impact of in-your-face elements upon viewer cognition and affect.  Although in your face is readily available from liberal as well as conservative television, its most typical consumer is a conservative white man.  In your face does make some contribution to democracy in attracting an audience and by informing viewers, especially about views of the opposition.  But there are very high costs in the form of polarization and loss of trust.  In-Your-Face Politics is strongly recommended for college and university libraries.Summing Up: Highly recommended. Lower-division undergraduates and above.

Since the inception of the 22nd Amendment, second-term, lame duck presidents have found themselves embroiled in constitutional crises involving the abuse of presidential power.  Ronald Reagan was not immune to this phenomenon.  In this meticulously researched work, Byrne (research director, National Security Archive) revisits the sordid scandal that cast a pall over the final years of the Reagan administration.  Using recently declassified documents, interviews, and other primary sources, Byrne carefully and clearly lays out the details of the Iran-Contra affair and the ensuing investigations.  He provides readers with a scintillating story of espionage, White House intrigue, and Cold War drama.  Two features make this work unique.  First, Byrne does not portray Reagan as a passive, disengaged president victimized by maverick policy makers.  Through the use of primary sources, the author demonstrates that Reagan was actively involved in every stage of Iran-Contra from its initiation through the cover-up.  Second, Byrne provides readers with a cautionary tale about structural issues in the American political system that perpetuate the unchecked abuse of power by the executive branch.  This work is a must read for students of the presidency and all who want to know more about this largely forgotten scandal.Summing Up: Highly recommended. All readership levels.

Alvandi (London School of Economics and Political Science) provides readers with a timely, important, and revisionist view of US foreign policies toward Iran during the Nixon and Ford administrations from 1968 to 1976.  During this period, Henry Kissinger served as national security advisor and then as secretary of state.  The book addresses three main foreign polices of this period regarding US-Iran relations.  First, the Nixon Doctrine proposed that Iran would serve as the primary defense pillar protecting the Persian Gulf in the wake of US reduction of forces as a result of the Vietnam War.  Second, the US and Iran would support the Kurds of Iraq in their wars (1972-75) with Iraqs Baathist government in order to fend off Soviet and communist inroads into Iraqs government and to prevent Iraqs government from participating in Arab wars against Israel.  Third, to achieve the above two polices, the US would allow Iran to develop a peaceful nuclear industry.  The first policy succeeded, until the 1979 Islamic Revolution in Iran, but the second and third failed.  Despite the failures, from 1988 to the beginning of 1977, the shah was the best foreign minister that Iran ever had.  This is one of the best books on US-Iran relations during the last decade. Summing Up: Highly recommended. Upper-division undergraduates and above.

Heaney (Univ. of Michigan) and Rojas (Indiana Univ., Bloomington) earn a place among the foremost scholars on political parties and social movements with their pathbreaking study of the tenuous relationship between the Democratic Party and antiwar movement post 9/11.  The ambitious project takes them inside antiwar movement events to examine incentives and disincentives for remaining on the front line.  Their findings, which are based on surveys of antiwar protestors, social justice advocates, and national convention delegates, show a complex relationship among party and movement and politicians and activists.  All have something to gain: for the party and candidates, it is winning; for the movement and activists, it is electing partisans supportive of their policy agenda.  The question is why, after helping elect partisan-friendly candidates, many activists demobilize.  The authors attribute it to the "shifting identities" or changing priorities of political actors.  These individual decisions then result in a collective action that may or may not resemble the movement's intended goal.  Nonetheless, Heaney and Rojas recognize the potential value of party-movement partnership for policy purposes and participatory democracy.  Their work sets a new standard for the study of social movements.Summing Up: Highly recommended. Upper-division undergraduates and above.

Many works discuss the plight of American Indians and delve into the complex legal and political position that tribes have within the US system.  Most lament the fact that tribes are in a vulnerable position and seek to expand their status through political activism.  While such political advances are certainly desirable and will be beneficial in the long run, the fact remains that many tribal nations are suffering today.  Zaferatos (Huxley College of the Environment, Western Washington Univ.) provides a practical work that combines the history of the many with the insight of the few.  While most works discuss how tribes got to where they are now, very few studies consider how tribes might work to improve under current conditions.  Zaferatos discusses the complex conditions under which tribal governments operate but also provides readers with tangible ways in which tribes can better develop economically by delving into the obstacles and the opportunities that tribal governments face today.  In doing so, he also advances the idea that strategic planning and development can foster even greater political gains than activism alone.  This is a must read for both students and practitioners.Summing Up: Essential. Lower-division undergraduates and above.

One malady affecting politics in the contemporary United States is the hyper-polarization of parties and politicians.  Smith (San Francisco State Univ.) and Seltzer (Howard Univ.) note that most of the research on polarization focuses on Congress.  The authors turn their attention to the presidency, arguing that presidents and presidential candidates in their ideologies, rhetoric, and policies have played a far greater role in polarizing US politics than the literature suggests.  They support this counterintuitive view with systematic and convincing research that proves their point.  FDR established the modern regime of a regulatory welfare system.  Subsequent presidents and congresses reacted to that regime.  In the 1960s, race began to redefine partisan loyalties, as efforts to promote racial equality became central to our understanding of the development of partisan and ideological polarization."  Reagan presented a conservative alternative to the FDR regime, in which the fight against racial equality found a home.  This led to greater polarization as the parties moved further apart and politics became more divided.  This excellent and judicious book helps explain why US politics has become dysfunctional.Summing Up: Highly recommended. Upper-division undergraduate, graduate, and research collections.

This book should be considered a must read by anyone interested in presidential power, secrecy, and law.  Kitrosser (Univ. of Minnesota Law School) frames her discussion and analysis of the presidency within what she calls a substantive accountability framework, which is given life through the mechanisms of macro-transparency, accountability tools, and extraordinary prerogative.  She provides a rich and thoughtful review of the conceptual origins of presidential power advocacy and the rationale for employing a substantive accountability framework.  The bulk of her work describes and analyzes how presidential supremacy manifests itself in external and internal matters.  Although Kitrosser does not explicitly address Steven Calabresi and Christopher Yoos The Unitary Executive (CH, Jan'09, 46-2937) or Eric Posner and Adrian Vermeules The Executive Unbound (CH, Dec'11, 49-2361), she does well to tackle the presidential supremacy arguments that those books contain.  Her conclusions on moving forward (e.g., engaging in public outreach, bridging partisan and ideological divides, using accountability tools, and creating new or modifying existing accountability tools) provide readers with interesting and thought-provoking ways to counter the aggressive and imperious forms of presidential supremacy in action.Summing Up: Essential. General readers, upper-division undergraduate students, and above.

President Eisenhower famously warned America about an emerging military-industrial complex that would promote unnecessary military spending and pose a threat to American democracy; however, until now, political science research had not fully confirmed his fears.  On the basis of a careful breakdown of the geographical pattern of final defense contracting, Thorpe (Univ. of Washington) shows that a core group of legislators representing districts whose economies are especially reliant on defense expenditures are much more likely to support military spending and assertive foreign policies.  Further, defense contracts have been systematically distributed to rural and suburban areas, where they play a relatively dominant role in local economies and lead to a growing number of legislators with an interest in increasing military spending.  As a result, in spite of the demise of the USSR and the absence of any major foreign threat, defense spending remains at Cold War levels, vastly greater than any other country.  The book provides an integrated analysis explaining not only US military spending but also the increasing power of the presidency and the reversal of Americas long-standing aversion to large military forces.  This is an important study that will be accessible to non-specialists.Summing Up: Highly recommended. All readership levels.

Balogh (history, Univ. of Virginia) offers a compelling new examination of the causes of American political development.  He begins his analysis by pointing to the ways scholars have become trapped in the reigning liberal-conservative paradigm, a narrative that pits liberal defenders of big government against conservative defenders of small government.  Though some truth attaches to this dichotomy, the paradigm obscures far more than it illuminates.  For instance, it fails to explain why conservatives have sometimes supported big government programs and why liberals have at times opposed big government initiatives.  Ideology thus does not fully reveal the contours of either development or American politics more broadly.  To correct for this defect, Balogh proposes the use of what he calls the associational synthesis.  It seeks to fuse public and private action and state and voluntary-sector institutions in a way to account for how citizens seek to achieve collective goals.  It is also an approach that takes seriously the periods of time in between key elections as being ripe with interpretative richness.  Applied to various periods of American political development, the association synthesis provides fertile new ground for understanding American political life.Summing Up: Highly recommended. Upper-division undergraduates and above.

Few academics are able to write well about the US Senate, a clubby chamber with arcane rules and larger-than-life personalities.  Hanson (Univ. of Denver), a congressional scholar and former Senate aide, manages to overcome the challenge inToo Weak to Govern, a study of the appropriations process in that chamber since the 1970s.  Hanson deftly combines quantitative analysis and case studies to support his claim that the influence of the majority party in the Senateand in particular its ability to combine spending measures into omnibus bills over senators objectionsis contingent on the partys size and unity.  Contrary to David Rohde's arguments in Parties and Leaders in the Postreform House(CH, Dec'91, 29-2382) and Gary Cox and Mathew McCubbins'sSetting the Agenda (CH, Mar'06, 43-4315), Hanson argues that the majority party is more influential when it is weak, not strong.  The book proposes a new theoretical approach to a legislative chamber that is often misunderstood.  Engaging, persuasive, and very well-written, the book is appropriate for undergraduate and graduate students alike.Summing Up: Highly recommended. Upper-division undergraduate, graduate, and research collections.

Not only a solid piece of political scientific research, this book should play a central role in understanding of US party politics over the next several decades.  It is widely accepted that US demographic change broadly favors Democrats in the long term.  Noting that the vast majority of voters remain white, Abrajano and Hajnal (both, Univ. of California, San Diego) examine how those voters have reacted to this change.  Confirming their immigration backlash theory by drawing on a wide range of survey and other data, and using a variety of statistical techniques, they make several interrelated empirical claims: a growing racial partisan cleavage, in terms of party affiliation and voting, is driven to a significant extent by white attitudes toward Latino immigrants; the two underlying causal mechanisms are state-level Latino population and media framing; and this partisan shift leads to less redistributive and more punitive policies on the state level.  In the short and medium term, this could lead to severely racially polarized party politics.  However, the authors suggest several ways in which political actors, in particular Republicans and Latinos themselves, might mitigate this threat.  In passing, they also make original contributions to the Michigan school versus Downsian view partisanship debate and the study of media framing.  A must-read.Summing Up: Highly recommended. General readers, upper-division undergraduate students, and above.

Zoning and land use regulations are an American anomaly.  Although Americans are very individualistic and wary of government regulation, they also strongly support overly restrictive zoning regulations.  Explaining this paradox is the goal of this book.  Hirt (architecture and urban studies, Virginia Tech) provides a succinct overview of the history of zoning in the US.  She compares zoning in the US to five European countriesEngland, France, Sweden, Germany, and Russiato highlight its distinctiveness.  The story of American zoning reveals its origins in the early-20th century, fashioned to maintain property values and protect Americans' investments in their homes.  The book tells the story of how local, state, and federal governments have contributed to the use of zoning to preserve the single-family detached home, connecting zoning to other policies, such as transportation and home loan financing.  This is a terrific book for collections on housing, land use, zoning, and law.Summing Up: Highly recommended. All readership levels.