Promotions - Choice's Outstanding Academic Titles 2018 -

When a prominent figure of the Chicano movement like Gutierrez (Professor Emeritus, Univ. of Texa--Arlington) writes about an important champion of Chicano politics, we know we are in for an impressive tale. Albert A. Pena Jr.: Dean of Chicano Politics brings to light south Texas's political and cultural history through the titular hero's story. It is one of intrigue, struggle, and triumph. The text, however, is not hagiography; instead, Gutierrez treats Pena like the genuine person he was. While Pena's influential roles in desegregation, electoral politics, and organizational efforts are the focus, we see he was not self-contained nor self-involved. This does not mean Pena did not have conflicts with enemies and more commonly with allies, as we are privy to his political positions as county commissioner and later as municipal judge. Indeed, Pena was a politician, both in his primary occupation and in the deprecating meaning of the term. Pena's story is Chicano biography in a place where Chicano biographies remain rare. It is political biography, where Chicanos often remain excluded. It is an essential story, and it is finally now part of our story.Summing Up: Essential. General readers; upper-division undergraduates through faculty.

In 1951 William Faulker wrote, "The past is never dead." Nothing is more prophetic than Mulloy's excellent Enemies of the State, an account of the radical Right in the US. Mulloy (Wilfried Laurier Univ.) takes readers on a journey through the twisted world of right-wing politics. Although many Americans are justifiably worried about the ascendancy of Donald Trump, his rise, according to Mulloy, can be traced to the growth of extremist movements emerging after the election of Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1933. With the extension of the federal government came the birth of the Liberty Lobby and an assortment of organizations opposed to economic and social change. In the 1950s, this opposition was especially evident when it came to challenging the racial status quo, particularly following the 1954 Brown v. Board of Education decision. Mulloy links those fears, especially the fear of communism demonstrated by the John Birch Society, to the South's massive resistance to civil rights, a resistance that continues today. Mulloy's candid account of right-wing radicalism demonstrates that Trumpism is not a new phenomenon, but is in fact directly linked to earlier, less-successful rightist movements. Malloy's study is a must for anyone seeking to understand the fracturing of the American political order today.Summing Up: Essential. Lower- and upper-division undergraduates, researchers, faculty, professionals, general readers.

Mullins (Marquette) argues in his book on Jonathan Mayhew that Mayhew's religious and political treatises are fundamental to understanding the philosophy of the American Revolution. Mullins has pened the first complete and thorough exploration into Mayhew's work. Mayhew's sermons are basic to works of many of the important "sons of liberty," including John Adams and Robert Paine. Mayhew's works set the stage for the disobedience campaign later performed by his fellow revolutionaries. Mullins also provides a well-reasoned historiography of the people whose own philosophies benefited from Mayhew's work, from the 18th century to the present. Mullins's book indicates the importance of Mayhew's works in understanding the American Revolution not just at that time but since then. Even though Mayhew died before the revolution, he is rightfully seen as one its fathers. This fundamental work on the philosophy of how American democracy was created and documented will be useful to any person seeking to understand the philosophical origins of American democracy and the revolution that was sparked by such ideas.Summing Up: Essential. All readership levels.

How do political party agendas change? How do groups get a political party to represent their concerns? In the 1930s-40s, neither party was interested in identifying itself with blacks and their concerns. In the 1970s, neither party was interested in identifying itself with conservative Christians and their concerns. That changed, because groups took the initiative to organize and align themselves with a party. They made their resources and votes important to candidates seeking nomination. Party leaders were often reluctant to respond to and be identified with these groups. Eventually, however, groups became influential, and candidates were in turn beholden to these groups and advocated for their agenda. This book provides a careful and accessible review of how these changes occurred. For anyone seeking to understand the dynamics of political party change as they relate to some of the major issues of recent decades--race and religion--this is an invaluable book. The author tracks the actions of group leaders over time and their impact. Change does not just occur; it is driven by group activity.Summing Up: Essential. Lower-division undergraduates through professionals.

Powell (Appalachian State) uses a controversial plan to build a large coal-fired power plant on Navajo land as a framework to describe Navajo efforts to address widespread poverty in the context of cultural and political realities. She argues convincingly that the politics of energy have long so dominated significant aspects of power in the Navajo nation that understanding energy on Navajo land is necessary to understand the evolving Navajo culture and Navajo relations with external forces. Powell's ethnographic and historical account is rich, personal, and often lyrical. Although Powell joined the activists who opposed the plant, she diligently avoids turning the story into one of colonialists versus noble natives. She carefully documents events and draws out implications tied to scholarly literatures. For example, she addresses difficult issues such as sovereignty and environmentalism on the reservation with great nuance. The book would have benefited from a clearer rationale for its organization and from fewer tangents that often seem pointless. Nevertheless, Powell's book is impressive and creative. Essential reading for scholars of the Navajo nation and Indian country more broadly.Summing Up: Essential. Upper-division undergraduates through professionals.

Forty years after Richard Fenno introduced political scientists to the concept of "home style" (how members of Congress act in their districts), Bernhard and Sulkin (Univ. of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign) define five stylistic approaches for how legislators go about their work in Washington. This important book identifies styles by applying clustering analysis to 16 measures of eight aspects of legislative activity for every member of the US House over two decades. Legislators' styles help explain a wide range of goals and behaviors. Chapters demonstrate how the styles legislators adopt influence their efforts at passing laws, the direction their careers in Congress take, and their electoral success. Committee chairs, party leaders, and backbenchers all tend to have distinctive styles. Members tend to stick with a single approach to their job, but new personal goals or altered circumstances can prompt a shift in style. The presentation combines rigorous statistical analyses with mini case studies that illustrate points using specific members of Congress, many of whom readers will recognize. This volume provides a new perspective from which to view the activities of legislators and will guide scholarly work for years to come.Summing Up: Essential. Upper-division undergraduates through professionals.

Hopkins (Boston College) argues that popular and scholarly treatments of polarization have become polarized. Some claim moderate voters are forced to select from extreme candidates. Others see evidence of mass-level polarization revolving around social issues. While both views offer insights, neither captures the whole picture. They do not adequately account for how the electoral system influences election outcomes. The theoretical framework offered in this volume claims that geographically based, winners-take-all constituencies combine with changes in elite and mass behavior to create nationalized parties with regional strongholds. This framework is placed in historical context to demonstrate the tradition of regional partisan variation and account for its wane and reemergence. The findings on growing regional distinctiveness of cultural attitudes and the tendency for congressional moderates to be replaced by extreme members of the opposite party are particularly compelling. Furthermore, evidence of the growing divide between urban and rural areas reinforces the conclusion that cultural attitudes are a key factor in shifting electoral results, even if they are not the primary cause of ideological divergence. By taking both sides of the polarization debate seriously, Hopkins successfully reconciles the compelling evidence presented by the competing perspectives.Summing Up: Essential. Upper-division undergraduates through faculty.

Shugart (UC Davis) and Taagepera (UC Irvine) are two of the world's leading scholars of electoral systems. In this groundbreaking work, they lay out a parsimonious model in which the product of the total number of seats in an assembly and the mean magnitude of the component electoral districts predicts both the size of the largest party and the effective number of parties. The predictions apply to both seats and votes, and indeed the ability to predict votes from seats goes against traditional assumptions. The model also applies to predicting the effective number of candidates in presidential elections. Shugart and Taagepera apply their model to complex electoral systems and test such features as upper tiers and electoral thresholds, and likewise do so for broader contextual issues such as ethnic fragmentation and, where appropriate, time since the last presidential election. All concepts are clearly explained, and illustrative country and election examples are provided throughout. The book is truly at the cutting edge of electoral system analysis. Bookending this impressive achievement is their concern with applying proper scientific analysis, including the development and goals of "quantitatively predictive logical models."Summing Up: Essential. Upper-division undergraduates through professionals.