This essay collection is a retrospective analysis of the Washington administration's importance to the understanding of the modern presidency. Contemporary presidential scholarship gives little attention to the enormous impact that Washington's actions had on establishing the presidency. Most contemporary literature starts with 1933 and, although FDR's impact on the development of the modern institution of the presidency is undeniable, Washington's actions in office also established standards for practices that continue to this day.

This analysis of the Washington presidency begins with an examination of Washington's leadership and its relevance to the modern presidency. The second group of essays looks at different aspects of presidential powers and the precedents established by the Washington administration. The third section examines Washington's press coverage, looking at the origins of Washington's image and the various myths in the press as well as the president's difficult relations with his contemporary press. A thoughtful and important corrective that will be of interest to scholars, students, and researchers involved with the American presidency and its history.

This book examines the frequency, causes and management of divided government in comparative context, identifying the similarities and differences between the various experiences of this increasingly frequent form of government. The countries studied include Denmark, Ecuador, Finland, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Mexico, Norway, Poland, and the US.

Granstaff argues that in current partisan politics Congress systematically fails to fulfil its primary constitutional function of specifying the national interest. He begins by showing why full-representative-deliberation, or deliberation in which all representatives can participate, is one of three congressional institutions necessary to the maintainance of the country's democratic integrity. He then looks at the framers' writings, the practices of the first Congresses, and democratic theory to suggest a deliberative theory for the American constitutional system. Next, he reviews, criticizes, and supplements the literature on congressional deliberation from the theoretic perspective established earlier. After detailing his methodology, Granstaff applies it to three case studies: the use of American troops in Lebanon, the Persian Gulf, and Somalia. The findings in each case study are consistent with the hypothesis that the discourses--as deliberation--are phony. He then discusses the implications within the three case studies and for the American constitutional system as a whole. Ultimately, the book shows that when true deliberation is replaced by partisan posturing, various constituencies effectively lose their legitimate voice in national affairs. As a result, special interests usually guide federal policy. Granstaff concludes with a procedural suggestion that might alleviate this problem. This work is a timely critique for researchers and students of political communication, Congress, and democratic theory.

In light of the public and scholarly debates on the challenges and problems of established democracies, such as a lack of participation, declining confidence in political elites, and the deteriorating capabilities of democratic institutions, this volume discusses the question whether democracy as such is in crisis. On the basis of the shared concept of embedded democracy, it develops a range of conceptual approaches to empirically analyzing the challenges of democracy and their potential transformation into crisis phenomena. The book is divided into three parts, the first of which highlights various aspects of political participation, such as political inequality in voting. In turn, Part II focuses on problems of political representation, while Part III assesses whether processes such as globalization, deregulation, and the withdrawal of the state from important policy areas have limited the political control and legitimacy of democratically elected governments.

This book presents up-to-date empirical research on crucial questions of political socialisation. It suggests new approaches and answers to a classic but still valid question of political socialisation research: 'Who learns what from whom under what circumstances with what effects?' (Greenstein 1965: 13). The volume maintains that political socialisation is no universal or independent phenomenon, but one significantly shaped by the surrounding parameters of the society in which it is embedded. Therefore, deficits in political socialisation research have become especially clear in light of political and societal changes over recent decades. The book contributes to two important discussions in the study of political socialisation: first, the question of the (relative) importance of socialisation agents and contexts, second - inextricably interwoven with the first - the timing of political socialisation. From a European perspective, articles in the volume shed light on old problems and topics of the field, using new methodological approaches or dealing with long-neglected perspectives such as young children's democratic learning or political socialisation. Includes quantitative approaches as well as innovative and explorative case studies.

Modernizing Democracy brings together scholars focusing the role of associations and associating in contemporary societies. Organizations and associations have been identified as the "meso level of society" and as the "basic elements of democracy". They are important providers of welfare services and play an important role between the individual and political spheres. In recent years the environment of associations and associating has changed dramatically. Individualization, commercialization and globalization are challenging both democracy and the capability of associations to fulfill the functions attributed to them by social sciences. This change provides the central question of the volume: Is being part of an organization or association becoming an outdated model? And do associations still have the capacity of modernizing societies or are they just outdated remnants of post-democracy? The contributions to Modernizing Democracy will be organized into: Studying Association and Associating in the 21st Century, Associating in Times of Post-Democracy and Associations and the Challenge of Capitalist Development. The book will be attractive to third sector researchers as well as a broader academic community of political scientists, sociologists, economists, legal scientists and related disciplines.

This book can be seen as two different books. The first is a history of political parties in ten nations (with the sections on France and Germany limited to specific periods). The second is an inquiry into the reasons for the different party systems that are found when applying similar proportional rules. In the specific countries that are analyzed, the authors put to the forefront community ties (specifically labor unions, some religious organizations and at times language) that intervene in the apparent political affiliation of a considerable number of voters. In addition, the authors add an explanation of the rise of new parties that hinges largely on whether or not alternatives exist that have not been tainted by having been part of the government or having been closely part of failed political institutions.

In this book, a new general model of delayed transitions to democracy is proposed and used to analyze Mexico's transition to democracy. This model attempts to explain the slow, gradual dynamics of change characteristic of delayed transitions to democracy and is developed in a way that makes it generalizable to other regional contexts. Utilizing both qualitative and quantitative data based on an original data set of forty thousand individual interviews, Schatz analyzes how the historical authoritarian corporate shaping of interests and forms of political consciousness has fractured the social base of the democratic opposition and inhibited democratizing social action. Using comparative cases of delayed transitions to democracy, the author's conclusions challenge and improve upon current theories of democratization.

In elaborating a model for the delayed transition to democracy, the author argues that the emphasis on transformative industrialism in both political modernization and class-analytic theories of social bases of democratization is modeled too closely on the western European process of democratization to allow a full explanation of the case of Mexico's transition to democracy. In addition, she argues that a delayed transitions model provides a more adequate explanation of gradual transitions to democracy because such a model builds on a the insights of structural theories regarding the social bases of anti-authoritarian mobilization. To support the delayed transitions model, Schatz compares Mexico with Taiwan and Tanzania, countries also characterized by delayed transitions to democracy in the late twentieth century. This important book fills a considerable gap in the literature on democratization at the end of the century.

Set against the backdrop of tensions in East Asia, this book analyzes how East Asia's "new middle powers" and emerging powers employ public diplomacy as a key element of their foreign policy strategy and in so doing influence regional power dynamics. The volume brings together contributions from an international and influential group of scholars, who are leading debates on public diplomacy within East Asia. Where the study of public diplomacy has so far focused primarily on the West, the essays in this book highlight the distinct strategies of East Asian powers and demonstrate that understanding public diplomacy requires studying its strategies and practices outside as much as within the Western world. A focus on public diplomacy likewise gives us a more varied picture of state-to-state relations in East Asia.

This book explores the paradox of the worldwide spread of democracy and capitalism in an era of Western decline. The rest is overtaking the West as Samuel Huntington predicted, but because it is adopting Western institutions. The emerging global order offers unprecedented opportunities for the expansion of peace, prosperity, and freedom. Yet this is not the 'end of history', but the beginning of a post-Western future for the democratic project. The major conflicts of the future will occur between the established democracies of the West and emerging democracies in the developing world as they seek the benefits and recognition associated with membership of the democratic community. This 'clash of democratizations' will define world politics.

This book explores how the United States institutions of democracy have affected a citizen's ability to participate in politics. The 2000 election and the ensuing decade of research demonstrated that that the institutions of elections vitally affect participation. This book examines turnout and vote choice, as well as elections as an institution, administration of elections and the intermediaries that affect a citizen's ability to cast a vote as intended. Kropf traces the institutions of franchise from the Constitutional Convention through the 2012 election and the general themes of how institutions have changed increasing, democratization and production federal growth over time in the United States.

Democracy is joint government of peoples. This book justifies principles of government for liberal democratic peoples who are willing to enhance the transnational rights of their citizens and accept institutional constraints in the pursuit of common goals. Unlike individualistic accounts of cosmopolitan democracy, this book constructs the design of a free political community of democracies from the perspective of the liberal democratic peoples. If liberal peoples want to govern by common institutions without forgoing their sovereignty--many have good reasons to do so--they should consider the conceptual and normative guidance offered in this book.

This book explores the crisis of the British state. Though it has been particularly apparent since the outcome of both the 2014 Scottish independence and 2016 'Brexit' referendums, it stems from deep historical roots. The book traces the origins of the state to the original Act of Union of 1707 and demonstrates how different notions of British destiny - Protestant, imperial, social democratic - have held the state together at different times. The present crisis, it is argued, is due to the exhaustion of these senses of destiny. Moran shows how the United Kingdom is now held together as a militarised state prone to disastrous adventures like the invasion of Iraq, and concludes by examining some alternative futures for the state. This book will appeal to students, scholars and the general reader interested in British politics and political history.

Even after its decisive Cold War victory and resounding anti-terrorism military campaigns, why is the United States unable to tackle soft security border threats? Five authors who examine illegal US immigration (Schiavon), Mexico's similar predicament (Gonzalez-Murphy), the conjunction of both (Hussain), a failed 43-year anti-drug war (Dominguez and Velazquez), and the threat expanding to Canada (Hussain), fault policy unilateralism and explore collective action. Utilizing multilateral security governance theory (Kirchner/Sperling, 2007), they propose a post-Westphalian outlet to better help (a) policy-makers control problems, (b) the academic community to solve puzzles, and (c) the public to feel secure.

What role does the concept of political knowledge have in democratic theory? What according to democratic theorists should the ordinary citizen know about politics? What do empirical studies about political knowledge teach us? And why should we care what people know about politics in the first place?
By asking these important questions, this book offers the reader a quick yet comprehensive overview of the steps that have been taken toward understanding the concept of citizen knowledge in democratic theory over the past several decades. The book summarizes and explains the essentials of a vast body of literature while the empirical studies offer data on a number of Western democracies. Furthermore, the reader is taken through the theoretical foundations of political knowledge from Ancient Greece to modern representative democracy. Clear and concise, the book offers a cutting edge insight into our current understanding of citizen knowledge in democratic theory.

This book explores the long history of oppression and resistance in adult and higher education, situated in Mississippi. The state serves as a unique site in which intersecting narratives around race, ethnicity, social class, opportunity, democracy, and equity have played out over the past several decades. In this book, the authors highlight the experiences of students and adults in Mississippi who provide both covert, subtle resistance to the dominant, oppressive educational narrative in the state, as well as those who provide active, visible resistance. Using critical pedagogy and critical theory to drive their analysis, the authors highlight the systematic and continuous nature of oppression, and theorize ways forward toward liberation in Mississippi, the South, and the nation.

For more than forty years, Western policymakers defined communism as the central threat to international peace and stability. They responded by confronting it with a counterbalancing threat of force, and pursuing a strategy of containment. With the collapse of communism, the challenge to peace and stability in the Euro-Atlantic community has changed. Soviet expansionism has been supplanted by powerful, internal forces arising out of the clash of competing ethnic nationalisms. This challenge, argues Steven L. Burg, cannot be met by force alone, or neutralized through a strategy of containment. It requires Western states to act decisively to influence the internal political development of the post- communist states themselves.

Burg surveys the challenges that the ethnic diversity in Eastern Europe present to domestic stability, international peace, and American interests, and suggests policies and practices by which the United States and its allies might contribute to the consolidation of peace in the region. He provides a concise explanation and analysis of the issues, evaluates the usefulness of scholarly approaches to the resolution of ethnic conflicts, and offers a strategy of what he calls preventive engagement by which policymakers may prevent conflicts such as the one that destroyed the former Yugoslavia.

War or Peace? offers clear and direct recommendations to guide both interested citizens and national policymakers as they attempt to grapple with the complexities of ethnic and nationalist politics in Europe.

What makes for an ongoing, successful democracy in Latin America? The essays in this collection emphasize the inherent dynamicism needed to sustain democratic governance. Organized around analyses of political institutions, political parties, public administration and corruption, public opinion, and continuity and change in Venezuelan politics, the essays advance the proposition that Venezuelan democracy survived recent threats because of its capacity to reform institutions and absorb new actors.

The chapter authors include prominent scholars from both the United States and Venezuela, and each grapples with two related questions: What types of reforms are necessary to sustain the process of democratization? And, are actors in the Venezuelan system capable of adopting these changes? A stimulating collection for scholars and researchers dealing with Latin American politics and for those examining democratization in the developing world.

How can the culturally diverse communities of America live justly and fruitfully together? Not by assimilation into the dominant culture -- nor by fighting for the freedom to pursue our own self-interest at the cost of our repressing both the wounds and the promising potential of our own cultural roots. This book offers a theory and practice of transformation that shows, especially through literature, education, and politics, how we can create a multicultural society that liberates our being as a fulfillment of the story of democracy. Perhaps for the first time in American history we are seeing the personal, political, historical, and sacred faces of women, people of color, and all ethnic groups as they tell their stories. It is this emerging scholarship that constitutes the new multicultural and feminine face of the story of democracy.

As political leaders acknowledge the limits of their power they increasingly integrate constructive input from inside and outside government into their decision-making. A Ministry or Commission of Public Input is necessary to collect, process and communicate input more effectively and politicians need to work with the public to identify solutions.

Including contributors with diverse backgrounds and outlooks, this volume provides an unconventional and provocative look at how Japan is situated in a globally unfolding transition from representative democracy to monitoring democracy. In Japan's case, the transition is unfolding from karaoke democracy to kabuki democracy. Karaoke democracy focuses on collectively redistributing benefits with many intervening institutions whereas kabuki democracy focuses on striking an emotional chord with direct conversations between leaders and citizens. A must read for those interested in knowing where Japan is heading.

Centering its study around three explanatory variables - actors, institutions and ideas - this book argues that Russia's hybrid institutional environment reduces the competition of policy ideas, both at the stage of policy elaboration by the community of state and non-state policy experts, and also at the stage of policy adoption by parliament.

From Dictatorship to Democracy was a pamphlet, printed and distributed by Dr Gene Sharp and based on his study, over a period of forty years, on non-violent methods of demonstration. Now in its fourth edition, it was originally handed out by the Albert Einstein Institution, and although never actively promoted, to date it has been translated into thirty-one languages. This astonishing book travelled as a photocopied pamphlet from Burma to Indonesia, Serbia and most recently Egypt, Tunisia and Syria, with dissent in China also reported. Surreptitiously handed out amongst youth uprisings the world over - how the 'how-to' guide came about and its role in the recent Arab uprisings is an extraordinary tale. Once read you'll find yourself urging others to read it and indeed want to gift it.

Former slaves, with no prior experience in electoral politics and with few economic resources or little significant social standing, created a sweeping political movement that transformed the South after the Civil War. Within a few short years after emancipation, not only were black men voting but they had elected thousands of ex-slaves to political offices. Historians have long noted the role of African American slaves in the fight for their emancipation and their many efforts to secure their freedom and citizenship, yet they have given surprisingly little attention to the system of governance that freedpeople helped to fashion. Justin Behrend argues that freed-people created a new democracy in the Reconstruction era, replacing the oligarchic rule of slaveholders and Confederates with a grassroots democracy.
"Reconstructing Democracy" tells this story through the experiences of ordinary people who lived in the Natchez District, a region of the Deep South where black political mobilization was very successful. Behrend shows how freedpeople set up a political system rooted in egalitarian values wherein local communities rather than powerful individuals held power and ordinary people exercised unprecedented influence in governance. In so doing, he invites us to reconsider not only our understanding of Reconstruction but also the nature and origins of democracy more broadly.