The two-volume Oxford Companion to American Politics is the first reference work to provide detailed, in-depth coverage of all aspects of American Politics. Top scholars of American Politics have written entries that surpass all previous reference material on the subject and provide scholars and students with ready access to sophisticated, comprehensive material. Long entries form the core of the book, covering such topics as climate change, terrorism, welfare policies, nuclear proliferation, voting behavior, and think tanks. Each of these entries include high-level scrutiny of the literature, history and future of the topic. The Companion also includes a number of entries from the 2001 Oxford Companion to Politics of the World, revised as necessary to bring coverage of such topics as foreign aid, and nuclear weapons up to date. In the current context of political gridlock, international tension, economic underperformance and social division, students of American politics need to focus on more than the inner workings of their own political institutions, important as that focus is. They also need to approach their work with as wide an understanding of our contemporary international and domestic economic, social and cultural conditions as it is possible for them quickly and easily to acquire. The Oxford Companion to American Politics has been designed precisely to meet the full range of those needs.

This book brings together in one place the liberal and conservative arguments that face the Republican and Democratic parties in the run-up to the 2008 election. In each chapter, David Coates lays out the popular conservative case and then presents a point-by-point liberal response. Each chapter challenges right-wing ways of framing the issue and pulls discussion back into the civilized center of American politics. The sources and evidence sustaining both conservative and liberal arguments are listed in endnotes and developed more fully on an associated blog site. A Liberal Tool Kit helps to redress the conservative bias in the way news and arguments are generally reported. Coates argues that conservative media outlets are currently more powerful and numerous than liberal ones, contending that conservative arguments tend to be presented more clearly than their less simplistic, more nuanced liberal alternatives. In this book, he presents the complexities of the conservative arguments while at the same time clarifying liberal positions in straightforward, everyday language, so leveling the playing field.

This title presents the conservative and liberal arguments related to the current economic issues faced by the Obama administration, including market regulation and green economy. At a time of tea parties and rallies to restore sanity, the political debate in America has become nothing more than a shouting match of various soundbites. This book offers a refreshing change by introducing both conservative arguments and liberal responses in a dispassionate and clear manner. Focusing on the issues that ail the economy under the Obama administration and their possible remedies, the book offers substantiated facts and rational arguments on each side, to promote true debate. Chapters on Obama's response to the financial crisis, regulated market, green economy, need for reform and more offer a true assessment of the problems at hand and propose a progressive alternative to each of the key issues, from foreclosures to entitlement reform. In addition, two appendices provide additional, in-depth information on the roots of the crisis and an economics primer accessible to the lay person. An engaging read, "Making the Progressive Case" will appeal to anyone interested in America's politics and economic future, and will help us move beyond the partisan quagmire to bring forth political change.

A systematic and comprehensive study of the early performance of New Labour in power. It brings together the results of a co-ordinated research initiative underway in the Department of Government at the University of Manchester, charting the developing relationship between election promise and government policy across the whole sweep of New Labour's manifesto agenda. Each chapter examines New Labour's initial comments, charts opening policy moves, and traces policy trajectories in each major department of state; so generating a comprehensive audit of New Labour's electoral fidelity and an academically-informed assessment of New Labour's likely policy trajectory though its first period of office. -- .

In Economic and Industrial Performance in Europe, a distinguished group of scholars compares the fortunes of different European nations in the period of economic restructuring, uncertainty, and generally slower economic growth that followed the oil crisis of the 1970s. Using meaningful quantitative data, the authors address the deterioration and divergence of economic performance across Europe since 1973. They look at attempts to improve domestic competitiveness, labour market deregulation, the impact of research and development on economic success, comparative analysis of state expenditure and debt, the military economy and the social consequences of industrialism and industrial restructuring. This volume seeks to show how the post-war boom has unravelled and how this process has impacted upon different European economies. Economic and Industrial Performance in Europe will be welcomed by students, researchers and policy makers seeking comprehensive, meaningful information on why some national economies have been better placed than others to shoulder the burden of the more intense, global competitive pressures that have become part of the post-1973 world economy.

This book links the emerging concepts of complexity, complex adaptive system (CAS) and resilience to forest ecology and management. It explores how these concepts can be applied in various forest biomes of the world with their different ecological, economic and social settings, and history. Individual chapters stress different elements of these concepts based on the specific setting and expertise of the authors. Regions and authors have been selected to cover a diversity of viewpoints and emphases, from silviculture and natural forests to forest restoration, and from boreal to tropical forests. The chapters show that there is no single generally applicable approach to forest management that applies to all settings. The first set of chapters provides a global overview of how complexity, CAS and resilience theory can benefit researchers who study forest ecosystems. A second set of chapters provides guidance for managers in understanding how these concepts can help them to facilitate forest ecosystem change and renewal (adapt or self-organize) in the face of global change while still delivering the goods and services desired by humans. The book takes a broad approach by covering a variety of forest biomes and the full range of management goals from timber production to forest restoration to promote the maintenance of biodiversity, quality of water, or carbon storage.

The literature on the character, determinants and relative performance of the leading industrial economies has developed rapidly of late. However many of the most important pieces of writing are now slipping from view because they were originally published in different, often inaccessible and highly specialised academic journals. These three volumes bring together those key articles and provide a new introductory commentary on the literature. This authoritative collection provides the reader with easy access to the full range of arguments now being developed to explain why some forms of economic organisation prospered best in the immediate past, and why some models now seem more effective than others in responding to the new global conditions of intensified international competition and rapid capital mobility. These volumes will be an indispensable reference source for students and researchers specialising in modern capitalism.

This practical and easy-to-use book enables teachers to challenge able children to develop their potential and to extend their thinking in primary science. It links theory to practice to develop understanding of what it means to be an able scientist; and empowers teachers to build on their existing good practice to build an inclusive science curriculum for able children.

Special features include: photocopiable resources that are linked to the National Curriculum and the QCA schemes of work; teacher guidance on the use of these resources and how they can be incorporated into normal primary science lessons; and suggestions for assessment.

This practical and easy-to-use book enables teachers to challenge able children to develop their potential and to extend their thinking in primary science. It links theory to practice to develop understanding of what it means to be an able scientist; and empowers teachers to build on their existing good practice to build an inclusive science curriculum for able children. Special features include: photocopiable resources that are linked to the National Curriculum and the QCA schemes of work; teacher guidance on the use of these resources and how they can be incorporated into normal primary science lessons; and suggestions for assessment.

This book links the emerging concepts of complexity, complex adaptive systems (CAS) and resilience to forest ecology and management. It explores how these concepts can be applied in various forest biomes of the world with their different ecological, economic and social settings, and histories. Individual chapters stress different elements of these concepts based on the specific setting and expertise of the authors. Regions and authors have been selected to cover a diversity of viewpoints and emphases, from silviculture and natural forests to forest restoration, and from boreal to tropical forests.

The chapters show that there is no single generally applicable approach to forest management that applies to all settings. The first set of chapters provides a global overview of how complexity, CAS and resilience theory can benefit researchers who study forest ecosystems. A second set of chapters provides guidance for managers in understanding how these concepts can help them to facilitate forest ecosystem change and renewal (adapt or self-organize) in the face of global change while still delivering the goods and services desired by humans. The book takes a broad approach by covering a variety of forest biomes and the full range of management goals from timber production to forest restoration to promoting the maintenance of biodiversity, quality of water and carbon storage.

Drawing on over four decades of research and writing on the political economy of the UK and United States, David Coates offers a masterly account of the Anglo-American condition and the social and economic crisis besetting both countries. Charting the rise and fall of the social settlements that have shaped and defined the postwar years, Coates traces the history of the two economies through first their New Deal and then their Reaganite periods - ones labelled differently in the UK, but similarly marked by the development first of a Keynesian welfare state and then a Thatcherite neoliberal one. Coates exposes the failings and shortcomings of the Reagan/Thatcher years, showing how the underlying fragility of a settlement based on the weakening of organized labour and the extensive deregulation of business culminated in the financial crisis of 2008. The legacies of that crisis haunt us still - a squeezed middle class, further embedded poverty, deepened racial divisions, an adverse work-life balance for two-income families, and a growing crisis of housing and employment for the young. Flawed Capitalism deals with each in turn, and makes the case for the creation of a new transatlantic social settlement - a less flawed capitalism - one based on greater degrees of income equality and social justice. As members of the millennial generation come to their maturity on each side of the Atlantic, Flawed Capitalism offers the critical intellectual tools that they will need if they are ever to break decisively with the failed public policies of the past.

"The intellectual lodestone for the international Left since 1964."
"--Mike Davis"

"Compulsory reading."
"--Daniel Singer"

Socialist Register 2001 examines the concept and the reality of class as it affects workers at the beginning of the twenty-first century. Theoretical contributions explore today's old and new working classes, workers "north" and "south," peasants and workers, gender and the working class, as well as migrant and knowledge workers. Other essays examine critically important regional experiences in East Asia, India, South Africa, Brazil, Iran, Russia, Europe and North America.

Contributions include: Giovanni Arrighi, Beverly Silver, Henry Bernstein, Peter Kwong, Eric Mann, Ursula Huws, Andree Levesque, Pat & Hugh Armstrong, Rosemary, Brigitte Young, Rohini Banaji, Gerard Greenfield, Barbara Harriss-White & Nandini Gooptu, Patrick Bond, Darlene Miller, Greg Ruiter, Huw Beynon & Jose Ramalho, Justin Paulson, Haideh Moghissi, Saeed Rahnema, David Mandel, Michael Goldfield, and Steve Jeffreys.

What is the future for progressive politics in advanced capitalism? With its political fortunes so low, how might the Left move forward? These essays from leading left intellectuals - Dean Baker, Fred Block, David Coates, Hilary Wainwright, Colin Crouch, Wolfgang Streeck, Leo Panitch, Sam Gindin and Matthew Watson - reflect on the scale and nature of the task that the Left now faces and consider the following questions: * What in modern capitalism has brought the Left to this impasse?* What role has the Left played in its own failings?* What lessons can be learnt for progressive politics going forward?* What are the immediate options and how can they best be pursued? The views and opinions expressed vary, but all offer searching insights into the task the Left now faces. All point to the intellectual and practical experience on which the Left now needs to draw as it deals with its contemporary challenges. These essays represent a major statement on the future for centre-left politics and offer a frank appraisal of the Left's current capacity to keep conservatism at bay and to strengthen radical politics again.

The global economy is dominated by a powerful set of established and emerging capitalisms, from the long-standing capitalist economies of the West to the rising economies of the BRIC (Brazil, Russia, India and China) countries. An understanding of capitalism is therefore fundamental to understanding the modern world. Capitalism: The Basics is an accessible introduction to a variety of capitalisms and explores key topics such as: the history of major capitalist economies; the central role played by both states and markets in the global economy; the impact of capitalism on wages, workers and welfare; approaches to the analysis of capitalism, and choices for capitalism's future. Examining capitalism from both above and below, featuring a range of case studies from around the globe, and including a comprehensive glossary, this book is the ideal introduction for students studying capitalism.

Mainstream social democrats have struggled to hold this own since the global financial crisis. Some established parties have been swept off the political stage while others have seen catastrophic falls in their vote shares. Writing from a distinctively British perspective, David Coats looks to pinpoint the reasons for this decline and offer an optimistic outlook, arguing that social democracy still represents the best hope for affluent societies to secure the values of the Enlightenment. He also makes the case that the Labour party is most successful when it is open pluralist and disengaged from arid internal wrangling. Rather than offering a comprehensive policy agenda, the author calls for a discussion engaging all legitimate strains in the social democratic tradition, outlining a series of questions that Labour must answer if it is to secure a general election victory.

Getting Immigration Right focuses on what is arguably the most important aspect of the current immigration debate: how best to understand and resolve illegal immigration from Mexico. The scale and character of illegal immigration is only one facet of the “immigration problem” currently before Congress and the president, but it is its most contentious and visible face. It is also the one part of the contemporary immigration story that attracts the most intense opposition, the most widely disseminated mythologies, and the most powerfully advocated solutions. What to do about illegal immigration from Mexico is a major political question of our time. The book’s wide-ranging and timely discussion includes legal and non-Mexican immigration. It sets the context of immigration before exploring the job experiences of illegal immigrants and their quest for the American dream. The contributors then focus on the causes and consequences—economic and social—of immigration, both legal and otherwise, and vividly describe the Latino experiences of illegality, including crossing the border and living in fear of deportation. In addition, the reform of immigration law is discussed from three distinct viewpoints: one conservative, one liberal, and one libertarian. The volume closes with its editors’ own proposals for comprehensive immigration reform. With a foreword by Alejandro Portes, a professor of sociology at Princeton University and author of Immigrant America: A Portrait.

In the seventies the British political system was in deep and growing crisis. The leading political parties appeared unable to offer effective solutions to the major problems which confronted the electorate and the electorate was consequently increasingly alienated from politicians who promised so much and delivered so little. The gap between promise and performance had been a persistent feature of Labour Party politics in particular and with the revival of radicalism within the Labour Party during the 1970s it was the opportune time to re-examine the record of the party and its potential. David Coates offers an important analysis of the Labour Party during this time and its history. He examines the roots of the Party and its development up to 1945 and analyses the performance of the 1945 51 Attlee Governments in depth. He traces developments within the Party in the 1950s and offers one of the first detailed accounts of the performance in office between 1964 and 1970.

Getting Immigration Right focuses on what is arguably the most important aspect of the current immigration debate: how best to understand and resolve illegal immigration from Mexico. The scale and character of illegal immigration is only one facet of the “immigration problem” currently before Congress and the president, but it is its most contentious and visible face. It is also the one part of the contemporary immigration story that attracts the most intense opposition, the most widely disseminated mythologies, and the most powerfully advocated solutions. What to do about illegal immigration from Mexico is a major political question of our time. The book’s wide-ranging and timely discussion includes legal and non-Mexican immigration. It sets the context of immigration before exploring the job experiences of illegal immigrants and their quest for the American dream. The contributors then focus on the causes and consequences—economic and social—of immigration, both legal and otherwise, and vividly describe the Latino experiences of illegality, including crossing the border and living in fear of deportation. In addition, the reform of immigration law is discussed from three distinct viewpoints: one conservative, one liberal, and one libertarian. The volume closes with its editors’ own proposals for comprehensive immigration reform. With a foreword by Alejandro Portes, a professor of sociology at Princeton University and author of Immigrant America: A Portrait.

What is the future for progressive politics in advanced capitalism? With its political fortunes so low, how might the Left move forward? These essays from leading left intellectuals - Dean Baker, Fred Block, David Coates, Hilary Wainwright, Colin Crouch, Wolfgang Streeck, Leo Panitch, Sam Gindin and Matthew Watson - reflect on the scale and nature of the task that the Left now faces and consider the following questions: * What in modern capitalism has brought the Left to this impasse?* What role has the Left played in its own failings?* What lessons can be learnt for progressive politics going forward?* What are the immediate options and how can they best be pursued? The views and opinions expressed vary, but all offer searching insights into the task the Left now faces. All point to the intellectual and practical experience on which the Left now needs to draw as it deals with its contemporary challenges. These essays represent a major statement on the future for centre-left politics and offer a frank appraisal of the Left's current capacity to keep conservatism at bay and to strengthen radical politics again.

The global economy is dominated by a powerful set of established and emerging capitalisms, from the long-standing capitalist economies of the West to the rising economies of the BRIC (Brazil, Russia, India and China) countries. An understanding of capitalism is therefore fundamental to understanding the modern world. Capitalism: The Basics is an accessible introduction to a variety of capitalisms and explores key topics such as: the history of major capitalist economies; the central role played by both states and markets in the global economy; the impact of capitalism on wages, workers and welfare; approaches to the analysis of capitalism, and choices for capitalism's future. Examining capitalism from both above and below, featuring a range of case studies from around the globe, and including a comprehensive glossary, this book is the ideal introduction for students studying capitalism.

This title presents the conservative and liberal arguments related to the current economic issues faced by the Obama administration, including market regulation and green economy. At a time of tea parties and rallies to restore sanity, the political debate in America has become nothing more than a shouting match of various soundbites. This book offers a refreshing change by introducing both conservative arguments and liberal responses in a dispassionate and clear manner. Focusing on the issues that ail the economy under the Obama administration and their possible remedies, the book offers substantiated facts and rational arguments on each side, to promote true debate. Chapters on Obama's response to the financial crisis, regulated market, green economy, need for reform and more offer a true assessment of the problems at hand and propose a progressive alternative to each of the key issues, from foreclosures to entitlement reform. In addition, two appendices provide additional, in-depth information on the roots of the crisis and an economics primer accessible to the lay person. An engaging read, "Making the Progressive Case" will appeal to anyone interested in America's politics and economic future, and will help us move beyond the partisan quagmire to bring forth political change.

An essential toolkit for all progressives- helping them to respond to the current sustained right-wing criticism of US domestic and foreign policy

"The game is begun," Rush Limbaugh said, the day after Barack Obama won the presidency; and he was right. The clash of views on US domestic and foreign policy is, if anything, even more intense now than it was before the change of leadership in Washington. Right-wing media figures and Republican politicians regularly regale us with conservative criticisms of the realignment of policy and politics now underway. Even more than in 2008, now is the time for liberals to "answer back," to counter those criticisms by both recognizing their content and locating their weaknesses. In the great clash of parties and philosophies that will shape the next American century, an informed citizenry will require more accurate information, ideas, and arguments than right-wing radio characteristically provides, and the market is wide open for a book that engages with both the worst and the best of the Republican case. "Answering Back "is that book.

"Answering Back "intends to lift the quality of political discourse in the United States by bringing together the best conservative and the best liberal arguments on the eight key policy issues now in contention between the parties: trickledown economics and the role of public spending, the desirability of welfare reform, the future of social security, the establishment of health care for all, the possibility of comprehensive immigration control, religious issues and the social agenda, the war in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the causes of the financial meltdown.
Each chapter begins with a brief introduction, followed by conservative views and a point-by-point progressive response. Each stage of each argument is labeled for easy memorization, and the language used is deliberately jargon free, to make the material as accessible as possible. The sources of both conservative and progressive arguments (and their supporting evidence) are cited to open the door to further research.
"Answering Back "is a completely revised and expanded version of "A Liberal "Tookit, intially published by Praeger in 2007. This new version is a handbook of arguments, data, and sources that present today's key policy debates in an even-handed and accessible manner. This will be an essential tool for anyone interested in policy reform, party politics, and American politics. It is written in a manner that is, at one and the same time, scholarly, useful, accessible, and fun