In 1976, the US Supreme Court ruled in Gregg v. Georgia that the death penalty was constitutional if it complied with certain specific provisions designed to ensure that it was reserved for the 'worst of the worst.' The same court had rejected the death penalty just four years before in the Furman decision because it found that the penalty had been applied in a capricious and arbitrary manner. The 1976 decision ushered in the 'modern' period of the US death penalty, setting the country on a course to execute over 1,400 inmates in the ensuing years, with over 8,000 individuals currently sentenced to die. Now, forty years after the decision, the eminent political scientist Frank Baumgartner along with a team of younger scholars (Marty Davidson, Kaneesha Johnson, Arvind Krishnamurthy, and Colin Wilson) have collaborated to assess the empirical record and provide a definitive account of how the death penalty has been implemented. Each chapter addresses a precise empirical question and provides evidence, not opinion, about whether how the modern death penalty has functioned. They decided to write the book after Justice Breyer issued a dissent in a 2015 death penalty case in which he asked for a full briefing on the constitutionality of the death penalty. In particular, they assess the extent to which the modern death penalty has met the aspirations of Gregg or continues to suffer from the flaws that caused its rejection in Furman. To answer this question, they provide the most comprehensive statistical account yet of the workings of the capital punishment system. Authoritative and pithy, the book is intended for both students in a wide variety of fields, researchers studying the topic, and-not least-the Supreme Court itself.

Blasphemy

"Anyone, left or right, who admires the foundations of American democracy will enjoy this spirited reminder of the Founding Fathers' true genius."
--Steven Pinker, Johnstone Professor, Harvard University, and author of The Language Instinct, The Blank Slate, and The Stuff of Thought

"The wall of separation between church and state is one of the great barriers to religious tyranny. Among the wall's most articulate defenders is Dershowitz, who shows in this readable book why the authors of our Declaration feared theocracy and favored democracy."
--Nadine Strossen, Professor of Law, New York Law School, and President of the American Civil Liberties Union

"Dershowitz proves that Jefferson and his compatriots purposely built a wall between Church and State that the Religious Right is now attempting to destroy. If conservative Christians are successful at shoving God down our throats, the end of democracy as we know it will soon follow."
--U.S. Congressman Pete Stark (D-Calif.)

The Religious Right is engaged in a crusade to convert the United States into a Christian theocracy based on the Bible and transform the Declaration of Independence into America's baptismal certificate. Now the acclaimed civil libertarian and legal educator Alan Dershowitz fights back. In this compelling and provocative book, he decisively counters arguments that the Declaration was founded on biblical law, proving conclusively that there is absolutely no relation between the "Creator" and "Nature's God" referenced in the Declaration and the Judeo-Christian God of the Old and New Testaments.

Dershowitz is both passionate and persuasive as he rescues the Declaration from theclutches of the Religious Right's dangerous historical revisionism. In Blasphemy, he restores Thomas Jefferson's document to its rightful place in American history--and its proper role in shaping the future of the country.

Exclusion by Elections develops a theory about the circumstances under which 'class identities' as opposed to 'ethnic identities' become salient in democratic politics, and links this theory to issues of inequality and the propensity of governments to address it. The book argues that in societies with even modest levels of ethnic diversity, inequality invites ethnic politics, and ethnic politics results in less redistribution than class politics. Thus, contrary to existing workhorse models in social science, where democracies are expected to respond to inequality by increasing redistribution, the argument here is that inequality interacts with ethnic diversity to discourage redistribution. As a result, inequality often becomes reinforced by inequality itself. The author explores the argument empirically by examining cross-national patterns of voting behaviour, redistribution and democratic transitions, and he discusses the argument's implications for identifying strategies that can be used to address rising inequality in the world today.

Democracy is struggling in America--by now this statement is almost cliche. But what if the country is no longer a democracy at all? In Democracy Incorporated, Sheldon Wolin considers the unthinkable: has America unwittingly morphed into a new and strange kind of political hybrid, one where economic and state powers are conjoined and virtually unbridled? Can the nation check its descent into what the author terms "inverted totalitarianism"? Wolin portrays a country where citizens are politically uninterested and submissive--and where elites are eager to keep them that way. At best the nation has become a "managed democracy" where the public is shepherded, not sovereign. At worst it is a place where corporate power no longer answers to state controls. Wolin makes clear that today's America is in no way morally or politically comparable to totalitarian states like Nazi Germany, yet he warns that unchecked economic power risks verging on total power and has its own unnerving pathologies. Wolin examines the myths and mythmaking that justify today's politics, the quest for an ever-expanding economy, and the perverse attractions of an endless war on terror. He argues passionately that democracy's best hope lies in citizens themselves learning anew to exercise power at the local level. Democracy Incorporated is one of the most worrying diagnoses of America's political ills to emerge in decades. It is sure to be a lightning rod for political debate for years to come. Now with a new introduction by Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Chris Hedges, Democracy Incorporated remains an essential work for understanding the state of democracy in America.

On 8 February 1971, Marxist revolutionaries attacked the gendarmerie outpost at the village of Siyahkal in Iran’s Gilan province. Barely two months later, the Iranian People’s Fada’i Guerrillas officially announced their existence and began a long, drawn-out urban guerrilla war against the Shah’s regime. In Call to Arms, Ali Rahnema provides a comprehensive history of the Fada’is, beginning by asking why so many of Iran’s best and brightest chose revolutionary Marxism in the face of absolutist rule. He traces how radicalised university students from different ideological backgrounds morphed into the Marxist Fada’is in 1971, and sheds light on their theory, practice and evolution. While the Fada’is failed to directly bring about the fall of the Shah, Rahnema shows they had a lasting impact on society and they ultimately saw their objective achieved.

As one of al-Qaeda’s most respected bomb-makers, Aimen Dean rubbed shoulders with the mastermind of the 9/11 attacks and swore allegiance to Osama bin Laden.

As a double agent at the heart of al-Qaeda’s chemical weapons programme, he foiled attacks on civilians and saved countless lives, brushing with death so often that his handlers began to call him their spy with nine lives.

This is the story of how a young Muslim, determined to defend his faith, found himself fighting on the wrong side – and his fateful decision to work undercover for his sworn enemy. From the killing fields of Bosnia to the training camps of Afghanistan, from running money and equipment in Britain to dodging barrel bombs in Syria, we discover what life is like inside the global jihad, and what it will take to stop it once and for all.

IN HIS OWN WORDS is a selection of Nelson Mandela's speeches, providing a lively, memorable profile of his lifelong commitment to freedom and reconciliation, democracy, and the flourishing of all the people of South Africa, Africa and the world. Arranged thematically, each section of speeches is introduced by a leading figure, such as Kofi Annan and Desmond Tutu. In these introductory essays, the authors pay tribute to Nelson Mandela's achievements, animating their accounts with personal memories, stories and reflections. Covering a range of topics of our times - struggle and reconciliation, freedom, religion and nation building, culture, education and health, children and development - the book also features Mandela's own tributes to South African heroes such as Steve Biko, Oliver Tambo and Walter Sisulu.

Can laughter really be used to undermine the appeal of terrorist groups? And should it be? Is there any truth in the stereotypical notions of fanaticism as humourless, and of humour as the antithesis of fanaticism? What is the deeper significance of the jihadi's status as an object of mockery in Arabic popular culture? Joking About Jihad explores this thicket of problems sprouting from one of the most basic--and supposedly most innocent--of human behaviours, and looks at how it has been applied to one of the least obviously laughable phenomena in the world today. Ramsay and Alkheder draw on original interviews and hitherto unexamined texts, combining insights from fields as diverse as politics, psychology, cultural studies, Islamic studies and humour research. Examining apparently spontaneous joking, professional comedy and even the jokes told by jihadis themselves, they show how Salafi jihad has been made laughable in the modern Arab world, and why it matters.

This book explores various domains of the Nepali public sphere in which ideas about democracy and citizenship have been debated and contested since 1990. It investigates the ways in which the public meaning of the major political and sociocultural changes that occurred in Nepal between 1990 and 2013 was constructed, conveyed and consumed. These changes took place against the backdrop of an enormous growth in literacy, the proliferation of print and broadcast media, the emergence of a public discourse on human rights, and the vigorous reassertion of linguistic, ethnic and regional identities. Scholars from a range of different disciplinary locations delve into debates on rumours, ethnicity and identity, activism and gender to provide empirically grounded histories of the nation during one of its most important political transitions.

Why is liberalism so obsessed with waste? Is there a drone above you now? Are you living in a no-fly zone? What is the role of masculinity in the 'war on terror'? And why do so many liberals profess a love of peace while finding new ways to justify slaughter in the name of 'peace and security'? In this, the first book to deal with the concepts of war power and police power together, Mark Neocleous deals with these questions and many more by radically rethinking the relationship between war power and police power.

Poppies of Iraq is Brigitte Findakly s nuanced tender chronicle of her relationship with her homeland Iraq, co-written and drawn by her husband, the acclaimed cartoonist Lewis Trondheim. In spare and elegant detail, they share memories of her middle class childhood touching on cultural practices, the education system, Saddam Hussein s state control, and her family s history as Orthodox Christians in the arab world. Poppies of Iraq is intimate and wide-ranging; the story of how one can become separated from one s homeland and still feel intimately connected yet ultimately estranged. Signs of an oppressive regime permeate a seemingly normal life: magazines arrive edited by customs; the color red is banned after the execution of General Kassim; Baathist militiamen are publicly hanged and school kids are bussed past them to bear witness. As conditions in Mosul worsen over her childhood, Brigitte s father is always hopeful that life in Iraq will return to being secular and prosperous. The family eventually feels compelled to move to Paris, however, where Brigitte finds herself not quite belonging to either culture. Trondheim brings to life Findakly s memories to create a poignant family portrait that covers loss, tragedy, love, and the loneliness of exile.

Quantitative Intelligence Analysis describes the model-based method of intelligence analysis that represents the analyst's mental models of a subject, as well as the analyst's reasoning process exposing what the analyst believes about the subject, and how they arrived at those beliefs and converged on analytic judgments. It includes: *Specific methods of explicitly representing the analyst's mental models as computational models; *dynamic simulations and interactive analytic games; *the structure of an analyst's mental model and the theoretical basis for capturing and representing the tacit knowledge of these models explicitly as computational models detailed description of the use of these models in rigorous, structured analysis of difficult targets; *model illustrations and simulation descriptions; *the role of models in support of collection and operations; *case studies that illustrate a wide range of intelligence problems; *And a recommended curriculum for technical analysts.

The exploration of space raises new problems in the expression of human freedoms. While the potential to establish new extraterrestrial settlements is thrilling, it also brings along a myriad of decisions to consider when addressing how these settlements should operate in a way which maintains human liberties. In this book, many dimensions of freedom in space are discussed. Aspects of liberty beyond Earth, from the near term: freedom to claim satellite orbits, to the very long-term: freedom on interstellar worldships, are considered. Gathering a diverse set of expertise from scientists, ethicists, lawyers, philosophers and social scientists, they seek to collectively answer questions such as: How should early governance structures be assembled? What are the ideal forms of institutions, from science academies to schools and governments? What freedoms can people expect in space and how will governance beyond Earth tread the fine line between authority and liberty? A compelling analysis of liberties on Earth, the solar system, and beyond - this text is bound to inspire the interests of academics and scientists alike.

"A groundbreaking book . . . revealing the systemic, everyday problems in our courts that must be addressed if justice is truly to be served."--Doris Kearns Goodwin

Attorney and journalist Amy Bach spent eight years investigating the widespread courtroom failures that each day upend lives across America. What she found was an assembly-line approach to justice: a system that rewards mediocre advocacy, bypasses due process, and shortchanges both defendants and victims to keep the court calendar moving.

Here is the public defender who pleads most of his clients guilty with scant knowledge about their circumstances; the judge who sets outrageous bail for negligible crimes; the prosecutor who habitually declines to pursue significant cases; the court that works together to achieve a wrongful conviction. Going beyond the usual explanations of bad apples and meager funding, "Ordinary Injustice" reveals a clubby legal culture of compromise, and shows the tragic consequences that result when communities mistake the rules that lawyers play by for the rule of law. It is time, Bach argues, to institute a new method of checks and balances that will make injustice visible--the first and necessary step to reform.

Almost twenty-five years ago, Shanto Iyengar and Donald R. Kinder first documented a series of sophisticated and innovative experiments that unobtrusively altered the order and emphasis of news stories in selected television broadcasts. Their resulting book "News That Matters, "now hailed as a classic by scholars of political science and public opinion alike, is here updated for the twenty-first century, with a new preface and epilogue by the authors. Backed by careful analysis of public opinion surveys, the authors show how, despite changing American politics, those issues that receive extended coverage in the national news become more important to viewers, while those that are ignored lose credibility. Moreover, those issues that are prominent in the news stream continue to loom more heavily as criteria for evaluating the president and for choosing between political candidates.

""News That Matters" does matter, because it demonstrates conclusively that television newscasts powerfully affect opinion. . . . All that follows, whether it supports, modifies, or challenges their conclusions, will have to begin here."--"The Public Interest"

In 2019, award-winning journalist Glenn Greenwald writes in this gripping new book, "a series of events commenced that once again placed me at the heart of a sustained and explosive journalistic controversy." New reporting by Greenwald and his team of Brazilian journalists brought to light stunning information about grave corruption, deceit, and wrongdoing by the most powerful political actors in Brazil, his home since 2005. These stories, based on a massive trove of previously undisclosed telephone calls, audio, and text shared by an anonymous source, came to light only months after the January 2019 inauguration of Brazil 's far-right president, Jair Bolsonaro, an ally of President Trump. The revelations "had an explosive impact on Brazilian politics" (The Guardian) and prompted serious rancor, including direct attacks by President Bolsonaro himself, and ultimately an attempt by the government to criminally prosecute Greenwald for his reporting. "A wave of death threats--in a country where political violence is commonplace--have poured in, preventing me from ever leaving my house for any reason without armed guards and an armored vehicle," Greenwald writes. Securing Democracy takes readers on a fascinating ride through Brazilian politics as Greenwald, his husband, the left-wing Congressman David Miranda, and a powerful opposition movement courageously challenge political corruption, homophobia, and tyranny. While coming at serious personal costs for himself and his family, Greenwald writes, "I have no doubt at all that the revelations we were able to bring to the public strengthened Brazilian democracy in an enduring and fundamental way. I believe we righted wrongs, reversed injustices, and exposed grave corruption." The story, he concludes, "highlights the power of transparency and the reason why a free press remains the essential linchpin for securing democracy."

Combining firsthand accounts from activists with the research of scholars and reflections from artists, Policing the Planet traces the global spread of the broken-windows policing strategy, first established in New York City under Police Commissioner William Bratton. It's a doctrine that has vastly broadened police power the world over - to deadly effect.

With contributions from #BlackLivesMatter cofounder Patrisse Cullors, Ferguson activist and Law Professor Justin Hansford, Director of New York-based Communities United for Police Reform Joo-Hyun Kang, poet Martin Espada, and journalist Anjali Kamat, as well as articles from leading scholars Ruth Wilson Gilmore, Robin D. G. Kelley, Naomi Murakawa, Vijay Prashad, and more, Policing the Planet describes ongoing struggles from New York to Baltimore to Los Angeles, London, San Juan, San Salvador, and beyond.

"There is a vast literature on the illicit drugs, a large literature on nicotine, and nothing up-to-date and authoritative on the second most deadly, and arguably the most damaging, alcohol. Phil Cook, with a modesty and understatement that inspire trust, explores the options for reducing the harms, allowing the benefits, and respecting personal liberty. This is a masterly combination of analysis and evidence. It is also beautifully written."--Thomas C. Schelling, Nobel Prize-winning economist

"The war on tobacco was won: the harms were recognized and measures taken to reduce them. In this compelling book, Philip Cook shows that the war on alcohol, too, can be won if policymakers act on the overwhelming and converging evidence that simple measures can reduce the short-term and long-term harms caused by drinking. He brings order to a highly complicated set of causal issues by telling us what may be true, what is probably true, and what is indisputably true; and he shows how large gains can be made simply by taking account of the last set of facts."--Jon Elster, Columbia University

"This book contains the most thorough and penetrating analysis of alcohol-control policy to date. It is certain to become a landmark in the fields of health, economic, and public policy. It is a tour de force of virtually every aspect required to formulate sound policy in this crucial area. Bravo!"--Michael Grossman, City University of New York Graduate Center

"No previous book has brought alcohol policy issues together as comprehensively and set them in context as effectively as this one does. Perhaps most impressive is its author's ability to incorporate research from many fields and to translatethis evidence and the evidence from his original analyses into a book that is both highly readable and accessible to a wide audience--an audience ranging from policy researchers and policymakers to public health professionals, historians, economists, and general readers."--Frank J. Chaloupka, University of Illinois, Chicago, and director of ImpacTeen

""Paying the Tab" is unequivocally a major contribution to the field. Fully covering issues on both the supply and demand side of the market, with a wealth of new data, it provides the most comprehensive discussion of alcohol control that I am aware of. Economists will benefit tremendously from its presentation of the context for our current approach to the issue, and noneconomists will welcome the clear yet complete exposition of the methods used by economists to evaluate public policy."--Sara Markowitz, Rutgers University

A New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice "Everyone worried about the state of contemporary politics should read this book." -Anne-Marie Slaughter "A trenchant survey from 1989, with its democratic euphoria, to the current map of autocratic striving." -David Remnick, New Yorker The world is in turmoil. From Russia and Turkey across Europe to the United States, authoritarian populists have seized power as two core components of liberal democracy-individual rights and the popular will-are increasingly at war. As the role of money in politics has soared, a system of "rights without democracy" has taken hold. Populists who rail against this say they want to return power to the people. But in practice they create something just as bad: a system of "democracy without rights." Yascha Mounk offers a clear and trenchant analysis of what ails our democracy and what it will take to get it back on track. "Democracy is going through its worst crisis since the 1930s... But what exactly is the nature of this crisis? And what is driving it? The People vs. Democracy stands out in a crowded field for the quality of its answers to these questions." -The Economist "Brilliant... As this superb book makes clear, we need both the liberal framework and the democracy, and bringing them back together is the greatest challenge of our time." -Los Angeles Times "Extraordinary...provides a clear, concise, persuasive, and insightful account of the conditions that made liberal democracy work-and how the breakdown in those conditions is the source of the current crisis of democracy around the world." -The Guardian