![]() |
![]() |
Your cart is empty |
||
Books > Social sciences > Politics & government > Central government > Central government policies
Politics and the Environment has established itself as the most comprehensive textbook in this area. This new edition has been completely revised and updated whilst retaining the features and the theory to practice focus which made the first two editions so successful. This text is designed to introduce students to the key concepts and issues which surround environmental problems and their political solutions. The authors investigate the people, movements and organisations that form and implement these policies, and explore the barriers which hinder successful introduction of international environmental politics. * This new edition has been expanded to include: * The shift in focus in environmental politics from sustainable development to climate change governance * Far more material on climate change including institutional, national and global responses in the aftermath of the Kyoto protocol * An increased international focus with more case studies from the UK, Europe, Australia and North America * More discussion of global environmental social movements including the US environmental organisations, in particular the Green Party and the environmental justice groups * There is an additional co-author for this edition, David Benson from the University of East Anglia This textbook is an invaluable and accessible resource for undergraduates studying environmental politics.
To explain the fundamentals of public policy, this best-selling text focuses on the process behind the crafting of legislation. By examining the individual steps-from identifying a problem, to agenda setting, to evaluation, revision, or termination of a policy-students are able to see how different factors influence the creation of policy. Each chapter features at least one case study that illustrates how general ideas are applied to specific policy issues. This new Eighth Edition provides thoughtful updates based on the 2012 election and completely revised case studies.
The issue of land rights is an ongoing and complex topic of debate for South Africans. Rights to Land comes at a time when land redistribution by government is underway. This book seeks to understand the issues around land rights and distribution of land in South Africa and proposes that new policies and processes should be developed and adopted. It further provides an analysis of what went so wrong, and warns that a new phase of restitution may ignite conflicting ethnic claims and facilitate elite capture of land and rural resources. While there are no quick fixes, the first phase of restitution should be completed and the policy then curtailed. The book argues that land ownership and administration is important to rural democracy and that this should not be placed under the control of traditionalist intermediaries. Land restitution, initiated in 1994, was an important response to the injustices of the apartheid era. But it was intended as a limited and short-term process – initially to be completed in five years. It may continue for decades, creating uncertainty and undermining investment into agriculture.
Citizens are asked to buy, and asked to consider to buy, goods of all sizes and all prices, nearly all of the time. Appeals to political decision-making are less common. In The Consumer Citizen, Ethan Porter investigates how the techniques of everyday consumer experiences can shape political behavior. Drawing on more than a dozen original studies, he shows that the casual conflation of consumer and political decisions has profound implications for how Americans think about politics. Indeed, Porter explains that consumer habits can affect citizens' attitudes about their government, their taxes, their politicians, and even whether they purchase government-sponsored health insurance. The consumer citizen approaches government as if it were just an ordinary firm. Of course, government is not an ordinary firm--far from it--and the disjunction between what government is, and the consumer apparatus that citizens bring to bear on their evaluations of it, offers insight into several long-unanswered questions in political behavior and public opinion. How do many Americans make sense of the political world? The Consumer Citizen offers a novel answer: By relying on the habits and tools that they learn as consumers.
As late as the 1980s, breast cancer was a stigmatized disease, so much so that local reporters avoided using the word "breast" in their stories and early breast cancer organizations steered clear of it in their names. But activists with business backgrounds began to partner with corporations for sponsored runs and cause-marketing products, from which a portion of the proceeds would benefit breast cancer research. Branding breast cancer as "pink"-hopeful, positive, uncontroversial-on the products Americans see every day, these activists and corporations generated a pervasive understanding of breast cancer that is widely shared by the public and embraced by policymakers. Clearly, they have been successful: today, more Americans know that the pink ribbon is the symbol of breast cancer than know the name of the vice president. Hiding Politics in Plain Sight examines the costs of employing market mechanisms-especially cause marketing-as a strategy for change. Patricia Strach suggests that market mechanisms do more than raise awareness of issues or money to support charities: they also affect politics. She shows that market mechanisms, like corporate-sponsored walks or cause-marketing, shift issue definition away from the contentious processes in the political sphere to the market, where advertising campaigns portray complex issues along a single dimension with a simple solution: breast cancer research will find a cure and Americans can participate easily by purchasing specially-marked products. This market competition privileges even more specialized actors with connections to business. As well, cooperative market activism fundamentally alters the public sphere by importing processes, values, and biases of market-based action into politics. Market activism does not just bring social concerns into market transactions, it also brings market biases into public policymaking, which is inherently undemocratic. As a result, industry and key activists work cooperatively rather than contentiously, and they define issues as consensual rather than controversial, essentially hiding politics in plain sight.
The collapse of the financial markets in 2008 and the resulting
'Great Recession' merely accelerated an already worrisome trend:
the shift away from an employer-based social welfare system in the
United States. Since the end of World War II, a substantial
percentage of the costs of social provision--most notably,
unemployment insurance and health insurance--has been borne by
employers rather than the state. The US has long been unique among
advanced economies in this regard, but in recent years, its social
contract has become so frayed that is fast becoming unrecognizable.
Despite Obama's election, the burdens of social provision are
falling increasingly upon individual families, and the situation is
worsening because of the unemployment crisis. How can we repair the
American social welfare system so that workers and families receive
adequate protection and, if necessary, provision from the ravages
of the market?
This book presents a fascinating analysis of expertise and policy formation, based on an in-depth study of the UK Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution. The Commission provided expert advice to governments from 1970 to 2011. Often portrayed as a scientific body, it was in fact an interesting hybrid, which embodied wide-ranging expertise. It delivered thirty-three reports, leaving a significant mark on British environmental policy, and having influence within Europe and beyond. Drawing upon an extensive literature and a wide range of sources, Knowledge, Policy, and Expertise provides the only full account of this important advisory body, covering a period in which the policy landscape was profoundly transformed. It offers a rich and detailed analysis of authority, autonomy, and trust; of the diverse roles that advisors can play and the networks within which they operate; and of the circumstances of influence in which expert advice comes to be accepted gratefully, used strategically, absorbed in diffuse ways, or ignored. Above all, this book demonstrates the complexity and contingency of knowledge-policy relations, contributing substantially to a theory of expertise, and drawing out important implications for the future of good advice.
What causes a government to invest-or not invest-in poor citizens, especially mass education? In The Education of Nations, Stephen Kosack focuses on three radically different developing countries whose developmental trajectories bear little resemblance to each other-Brazil, Ghana, and Taiwan-and offers an elegant and pragmatic answer to this crucially important question. Quite simply, the level of investment in mass education is the product of one of two simple conditions, one political and one economic. The first condition is the nature and success of political entrepreneurs at organizing the poor politically; the second is the flexibility of the labor market faced by employers who need skilled workers. Drawing from a half-century of evidence, he has found that irrespective of every other factor, these two conditions alone explain whether education is available to the poor or restricted to elites as well as many of the key features of education systems. An empirically rich and theoretically novel study, The Education of Nations will change how we think about the developing world's approach to education and development.
Elgar Advanced Introductions are stimulating and thoughtful introductions to major fields in the social sciences, business and law, expertly written by the world's leading scholars. Designed to be accessible yet rigorous, they offer concise and lucid surveys of the substantive and policy issues associated with discrete subject areas. In this updated second edition, internationally renowned scholar B. Guy Peters provides a succinct introduction to public policy and illustrates the design approach to policy problems. Peters demonstrates how decision-makers can make more effective choices and why a design approach to public intervention can improve policy formulation. Key features of the second edition include: Analytical identification and evaluation of the vital components of policy design Reflections on the challenges posed by Covid-19 and public policy solutions An expanded overview of evaluation and behavioral public policy analysis Critical discussions of alternatives to cost-benefit analysis. Offering a timely and concise approach to the field, this book will be crucial for high-level students who are new to public policy, as well as scholars and researchers hoping to improve and advance their understanding of the design perspective. Its analytic and theoretical grounding will also prove useful for policy practitioners, enabling sophisticated solutions to common policy problems.
Changes in the international environment, from the stagflation of the 1970s to the globalization of capital markets in the 1990s, have challenged the ability of all advanced welfare states to maintain postwar achievements of full employment, social security and social equality. Nevertheless, national responses and actual performance differed greatly. This two-volume study examines the adjustment to external economic challenges over three decades in Australia, Austria, Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Sweden, Switzerland and the United Kingdom Volume I presents comparative analyses of differences in the vulnerabilities and capabilities of these countries, in the effectiveness of their policy responses, and in the role of values and discourses in the politics of adjustment Volume II presents in-depth analyses of the experiences of the countries, including special studies on the participation of women in the labour market, early retirement, the liberalization of public services and international tax competition.
From all outward appearances, the American policymaking process has been revolutionized in the last half century. Beginning in the 1970s, new safeguards were put in place to prevent the kind of free-wheeling and sometimes reckless policymaking environment of earlier periods. These changes-including the creation of the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office-were widely hailed as ushering in a new era of accountability in Washington and putting an end to the days when cagey political operatives could rush major legislation through Congress without any real consideration of the economic costs. But what if the supposedly new and improved policymaking process that resulted from these 'good government' reforms is every bit as prone to manipulation as the one it replaced? As Robert Saldin shows in When Bad Policy Makes Good Politics, that has unfortunately been the case. As in the past, the new politics of the policymaking process encourage savvy political actors to game the system. The very rules that were designed to thwart financially irresponsible legislation now incentivize the development of fundamentally flawed and unworkable policies. To uncover the pathologies of the American policymaking process, Saldin traces the sad tale of the Community Living Assistance Services and Supports (CLASS) Act. While few outside the beltway are aware of it, it was a major piece of legislation that played a central role in the passage of the Affordable Care Act (ACA), the most important social policy law since the 1960s. The CLASS Act targeted an intractable problem: the ever-increasing demand for costly long-term care services. For decades, both Republicans and Democrats have recognized the problem as a major one, so the question has not been whether we should tackle it. Rather, the debate centered on how we should do it-that is, how we should pay for it. The problem was always that the costs were staggering, and there was little political will to fund such a program (Medicare did not fund it). Long term care advocates realized this, and therefore focused on passing a law that effectively ignored the economic costs. They finally shuttled it into the larger Affordable Care Act, which was passed into law in 2010. Saldin traces the process, showing how an array of perverse incentives allowed such a flawed law to come into being. In fact, Kathleen Sibelius, the Secretary of Health and Human Services, announced in late 2011 that the administration would no longer try to put the law into effect because of its basic unworkability. Saldin's book is ostensibly about this one piece of legislation, but it's about much more than this: the near-impossibility of passing 'clean' laws that are not doctored by special interests adept at gaming the system. Essential reading for anyone interested in the policymaking process, the book establishes that our current policymaking environment produces outcomes that are just as perverse as the ones enacted by the old system.
Access Points develops a new theory about how democratic institutions influence policy outcomes. Access Point Theory argues that the more points of access that institutions provide to interest groups, the cheaper lobbying will be, and, thus, the more lobbying will occur. This will lead to more complex policy, as policymakers insert specific provisions to benefit special interests, and, if one side of the debate has a lobbying advantage, to more biased policy, as the advantaged side is able to better take advantage of the cheaper lobbying. This book then uses Access Point Theory to explain why some countries have more protectionist and more complex trade policies than other; why some countries have stronger environmental and banking regulations than others; and why some countries have more complicated tax codes than others. In policy area after policy area, this book finds that more access points lead to more biased and more complex policy. Access Points provides scholars with a powerful tool to explain how political institutions matter and why countries implement the policies they do.
Drawing on longitudinal interviews, government records, and
personal narratives, feminist sociologist Lisa Brush examines the
intersection of work, welfare, and battering. Brush contrasts
conventional wisdom with illuminating analyses of social change and
social structures, highlighting how race and class shape women's
experiences with poverty and abuse and how "domestic" violence
moves out of the home and follows women to work.
Today, two-thirds of the world's nations have abolished the death
penalty, either officially or in practice, due mainly to the
campaign to end state executions led by Western European nations.
Will this success spread to Asia, where over 95 percent of
executions now occur? Do Asian values and traditions support
capital punishment, or will development and democratization end
executions in the world's most rapidly developing region?
The concept of `economic planning' was a central theme of the popular economic policy debate in the 1930s. Dr Ritschel traces the many interpretations of planning, and examines the process of idealogical construction and dissemination of the new economic ideas. He finishes with an explanation of the planners' retreat, later in the decade, from the economics of planning towards the far less ambitious (but also less contentious) alternative - the `middle way' of Keynesian economics.
This is a study of government publicity activities in Britain between the wars. Mariel Grant focuses on the development of public relations bureaux and information services in Whitehall. She shows how during the inter-war period publicity came to be regarded as a legitimate and necessary task of democractic government, and that although government departments pursued propaganda activities with different motives and divergent persepectives, they adopted a similar approach to both the tool and their audience. Dr Grant explores a variety of different issues and campaigns, including the Post Office's attempts to make the public "telephone conscious", the Ministry of Health's sexual education efforts and the multi-departmental and protracted "Drink More Milk" campaign. She shows how the experiences and developments of the 1920s and 1930s contributed to the decision in 1939 to establish the propaganda ministry designed to manage wartime publicitiy and shape public opinion. The book offers valuable insights into the nature of propaganda and its management, and contributes to our understanding of the changing role of the state in modern British society.
Never has the Left held power in so many advanced economies, yet the difference this makes to economic policy proves hard to specify. This book is the first to examine in detail the successes and failures of governments across Europe and Australasia to chart distinctive courses in the face of the neoliberal backlash against state intervention, the welfare state, and guaranteed full employment.
This timely Handbook considers the increasing struggles facing international development in light of the COVID-19 pandemic. It investigates the role global co-operation must play in resolving the multiple crises of the pandemic, resultant economic devastation and existing climate changes and external-debt concerns. Contributions identify the need to question current assumptions and approaches to international development in the context of how markets are constructed, states reformed and resources distributed. Split across four thematic parts, this thought-provoking Handbook explores the concept and politics of development, development and contested globalization, the politics of development agendas and global actors in the politics of development. Chapters examine the politics of: developmental regionalism, crime, law and development in historical perspective, international monetary relations, food, global health, the global gender agenda, the sustainable development goals, development in the WTO, and private foundations. Engaging and accessible, the Handbook on the Politics of International Development will be a key resource for students and scholars of international politics and relations, public policy, geopolitics and development studies.
This Handbook brings together state-of-the-art contributions and international insights outlining the key theoretical developments and empirical findings related to sustainable development and governance. Providing both an overview and deep dive into the topic, it demonstrates how the concept of sustainable development and governance has led to multiple responses in both the academic and policy world from a theoretical, conceptual and operational viewpoint. Drawing on a wide range of perspectives, leading contributors examine global research on the governance of sustainable development, spanning disciplines including politics, public policy, international relations, environmental science and human geography. Providing an in-depth examination of current ongoing challenges such as climate change, trade and poverty, the Handbook investigates both collaborative approaches for sustainable development governance and policy innovation and integration. Furthermore, chapters utilise global case studies in action, exploring governance by international and non-government organisations and illustrating their key findings. Providing an interdisciplinary perspective, this Handbook will be a critical resource for research students of sustainable development and environmental governance as well as established researchers in the field. Scholars of politics and public policy will find the case studies informative and illuminating.
Deborah Posel breaks new ground in exposing some of the crucial political processes and struggles which shaped the reciprocal development of Apartheid and capitalism in South Africa. Her analysis debunks the orthodoxy view which presents apartheid as the product of a single `grand plan', created by the State in response to the pressures of capital accumulation. Using as a case study influx control during the first phase of apartheid (1948-1961), she shows that apartheid arose from complex patterns of conflict and compromise within the State, in which white capitalists, the black working class, and popular movements exercised varying and uneven degrees of influence. Her book integrates a detailed empirical analysis of the capitalist State and its relationship to class interests.
Regulation has become a key form of state activity and an area of burgeoning academic concern, both in Public Law and Economics. This collection makes available to the reader a number of indispensable readings. The text considers the central topics of regulation and looks to theory as well as practice, enforcement as well as rule-making, and supra-national as well as domestic concerns. Particular attention is paid to the ways that regulatory developments can be explained, the choices of technique that confront regulators and the varieties of regulatory style that are encountered within and between different regimes. The introductory essay considers the maturation of regulation both as a practice and as a discipline. it examines regulation as a topic for study, reviews major developments in regulation and outlines central themes. This book is intended as a resource for upper-level undergraduate students and teachers of regulation as part of degree courses in law, economics, business, public policy and politics, but also for those involved in or subject to regulation on a daily basis.
"This book is a tour de force." --Adam Grant, New York Times bestselling author of Give and Take A revolutionary new history of humankind through the prism of work by leading anthropologist James Suzman Work defines who we are. It determines our status, and dictates how, where, and with whom we spend most of our time. It mediates our self-worth and molds our values. But are we hard-wired to work as hard as we do? Did our Stone Age ancestors also live to work and work to live? And what might a world where work plays a far less important role look like? To answer these questions, James Suzman charts a grand history of "work" from the origins of life on Earth to our ever more automated present, challenging some of our deepest assumptions about who we are. Drawing insights from anthropology, archaeology, evolutionary biology, zoology, physics, and economics, he shows that while we have evolved to find joy, meaning and purpose in work, for most of human history our ancestors worked far less and thought very differently about work than we do now. He demonstrates how our contemporary culture of work has its roots in the agricultural revolution ten thousand years ago. Our sense of what it is to be human was transformed by the transition from foraging to food production, and, later, our migration to cities. Since then, our relationships with one another and with our environments, and even our sense of the passage of time, have not been the same. Arguing that we are in the midst of a similarly transformative point in history, Suzman shows how automation might revolutionize our relationship with work and in doing so usher in a more sustainable and equitable future for our world and ourselves. |
![]() ![]() You may like...
Public Governance Paradigms - Competing…
Jacob Torfing, Lotte Bogh Andersen, …
Paperback
R975
Discovery Miles 9 750
The State of Accountability in the…
Sylvia I. Bergh, Sony Pellissery, …
Hardcover
R3,488
Discovery Miles 34 880
Handbook of Development Policy
Habib Zafarullah, Ahmed S. Huque
Hardcover
R7,440
Discovery Miles 74 400
|