The study of politics seems endlessly beset by debates about method. At the core of these debates is a single unifying concern: should political scientists view themselves primarily as scientists, developing ever more sophisticated tools and studying only those phenomena to which such tools may fruitfully be applied? Or should they instead try to illuminate the large, complicated, untidy problems thrown up in the world, even if the chance to offer definitive explanations is low? Is there necessarily a tension between these two endeavours? Are some domains of political inquiry more amenable to the building up of reliable, scientific knowledge than others, and if so, how should we deploy our efforts? In this book, some of the world's most prominent students of politics offer original discussions of these pressing questions, eschewing narrow methodological diatribes to explore what political science is and how political scientists should aspire to do their work.

Updated to include the 2007 decision Gonzales v. Carhart, this volume provides all of the major Supreme Court decisions on abortion--as well as many majority, dissenting, and plurality opinions--carefully edited for use in undergraduate and graduate courses in a variety of disciplines. In his introductory essay, Shapiro sets these cases in political, historical, and philosophical context, and gives the reader a sense of what the main issues in the constitutional law of abortion are likely to be in the future.

Why are democracies so unequal? Despite the widespread expectation that democracy, via expansion of the franchise, would lead to redistribution in favor of the masses, in reality majorities regularly lose out in democracies. Taking a broad view of inequality as encompassing the distribution of wealth, risk, status, and well-being, this volume explores how institutions, individuals, and coalitions contribute to the often surprising twists and turns of distributive politics.

The contributors hail from a range of disciplines and employ an array of methodologies to illuminate the central questions of democratic distributive politics: What explains the variety of welfare state systems, and what are their prospects for survival and change? How do religious beliefs influence peopleas demand for redistribution? When does redistributive politics reflect public opinion? How can different and seemingly opposed groups successfully coalesce to push through policy changes that produce new winners and losers?

The authors identify a variety of psychological and institutional factors that influence distributive outcomes. Taken together, the chapters highlight a common theme: politics matters. In seeking to understand the often puzzling contours of distribution and redistribution, we cannot ignore the processes of competition, bargaining, building, and destroying the political alliances that serve as bridges between individual preferences, institutions, and policy outcomes.

Democracy's flexibility, its commitment to equality of representation, and its recognition of the legitimacy of opposition are all positive features of political institutions. But democracy fits uneasily with many other political values and is in many respects less than equal to the demands it confronts. In these two free-standing volumes some of the world's most prominent political theorists and social scientists present original discussions of these urgent issues. Democracy's Value deals with the nature and value of democracy, particularly the tensions between it and such goods as justice, equality, efficiency, and freedom. Democracy's Edges analyzes one of democracy's most enduring problems: how to establish the boundaries of democratic polities democratically.

Democracy has been a flawed hegemony since the fall of communism. Its flexibility, its commitment to equality of representation, and its recognition of the legitimacy of opposition politics, are all positive features for political institutions. But democracy has many deficiencies: it is all too easily held hostage by powerful interests; it often fails to advance social justice; and it does not cope well with a number of features of the political landscape, such as political identities, boundary disputes, and environmental crises. Although democracy is valuable it fits uneasily with many other political values and is in many respects less than equal to the demands it confronts. In this volume (and its companion, Democracy's Value) some of the world's most prominent political theorists and social scientists present original discussions of these urgently vexing subjects. Democracy's Edges analyses an enduring problem: how to establish the boundaries of democratic polities democratically.

"Deep, informed, and reeks of common sense." -Norman Ornstein "It is now beyond debate that rising inequality is not only leaving millions of Americans living on a sharp edge but also is threatening our democracy...For activists and scholars alike who are struggling to create a more equitable society, this is an essential read." -David Gergen We are in an age of crisis. That much we can agree on. But a crisis of what, exactly? And how do we get out of it? In a follow up to their influential and much debated Death by a Thousand Cuts, Michael Graetz and Ian Shapiro focus on what really worries people: not what the rich are making or the government is taking from them but their own insecurity. Americans are worried about losing their jobs, their status, and the safety of their communities. They fear the wolf at the door. The solution is not protectionism or class warfare but better jobs, higher wages, greater protection for families suffering from unemployment, better health insurance, and higher quality childcare. And it turns out those goals are more achievable than you might think. The Wolf at the Door is one of those rare books that doesn't just diagnose our problems, it shows how to address them. "This is a terrific book, original, erudite, and superbly well-informed, and full of new wisdom about what might and what might not help the majority of Americans who have not shared in our growing prosperity, but are left facing the wolf at the door...Everyone interested in public policy should read this book." -Angus Deaton, Princeton University "Graetz and Shapiro wrestle with a fundamental question of our day: How do we address a system that makes too many Americans anxious that economic security is slipping out of reach? Their cogent call for sensible and achievable policies...should be read by progressives and conservatives alike." -Jacob J. Lew, former Secretary of the Treasury

A state-of-the-art meditation on relations, theoretical and practical, among a familiar triad of themes: comunitarianism, liberalism, and democracy.
--"American Political Science Review"

A collection of distinguished contributors, from a wide range of disciplines, examine the implications of the resurgence of interest in community. The chapters in Democratic Community consider the fundamental issues that divide liberals and communitarians, as well as the structure of communities, the roles of freedom and democratic institutions in sustaining one another, the place of a democratic civil society in a democratic polity, and the contributions of feminist thinking.

This thirty-fifth volume in the American Society of Political and Legal Philosophy series is devoted, as is each volume in the series, to a single topic-- in this case, the implications for human nature and democratic theory of the resurgence of interest in community. Democratic Community deals not only with fundamental issues that divide liberals and communitarians, but is also concerned with the structure of communities, the roles of freedom and democratic institutions in sustaining one another, the place of a democratic civil society in a democratic polity, and the contributions of feminist thinking to the great debate. The collection of distinguished contributors, from a wide range of disciplines, includes: Richard J. Arneson (University of California, San Diego), Jean Baechler (University of Paris, Sorbonne), Christopher J. Berry (University of Glasgow), Robert A. Dahl (Yale University), Martin P. Golding (Duke University), Carol C. Gould (Stevens Institute of Technology), Amy Gutmann (Princeton University), Jane Mansbridge (Northwestern University), Kenneth Minogue (London School of Economics), Robert C. Post (University of California, Berkeley), David A. J. Richards (New York University), Gerald N. Rosenberg (University of Chicago), Bruce K. Rutherford (Yale University), Alan Ryan (Princeton University), and Carmen Sirianni (Brandeis University).

History is replete with instances of what might, or might not, have been. By calling something contingent, at a minimum we are saying that it did not have to be as it is. Things could have been otherwise, and they would have been otherwise if something had happened differently. This collection of original essays examines the significance of contingency in the study of politics. That is, how to study unexpected, accidental, or unknowable political phenomena in a systematic fashion. Yitzhak Rabin is assassinated. Saddam Hussein invades Kuwait. Hurricane Katrina hits New Orleans. How might history be different had these events not happened? How should social scientists interpret the significance of these events and can such unexpected outcomes be accounted for in a systematic way or by theoretical models? Can these unpredictable events be predicted for? Political Contingency addresses these and other related questions, providing theoretical and historical perspectives on the topic, empirical case studies, and the methodological challenges that the fact of contingency poses for the study of politics.

Contributors: Sonu Bedi, Traci Burch, Jennifer L. Hochschild, Gregory A. Huber, Courtney Jung, David R. Mayhew, Philip Pettit, Andreas Schedler, Mark R. Shulman, Robert G. Shulman, Ian Shapiro, Susan Stokes, Elisabeth Jean Wood, and David Wootton

View the Table of Contents. Read the Introduction.

Institutions shape every dimension of politics. This volume collects original essays on how such institutions are formed, operated, and changed, both in theory and in practice. Ranging across formal institutions of government such as legislatures, courts, and bureaucracies and intermediary institutions such as labor unions and party systems, the contributors show how these instruments of control give shape to the state, articulate its relationships, and express its legitimacy. Rethinking Political Institutions captures the state of the art in the study of the art of the state.

Drawing on some of the leading scholars in the field, this volume includes essays on issues of social power, public policy and programs, judicial review, and cross-national institutions. Rethinking Political Institutions is an essential addition to the debate on the significance of political institutions, in light of democracy, social change and power.

Contributors: Elisabeth S. Clemens, Jon Elster, John Ferejohn, Terry M. Moe, Claus Offe, Paul Pierson, Ulrich K. Preuss, Rogers M. Smith, Kathleen Thelen, Mark Tushnet, R. Kent Weaver, Margaret Weir, Keith E. Whittington

There might appear to be little that binds the study of order and the study of violence and conflict. Bloodshed in its multiple forms is often seen as something separate from and unrelated to the domains of 'normal' politics that constitute what we think of as order. But violence is used to create order, to maintain it, and to uphold it in the face of challenges. This 2008 volume demonstrates the myriad ways in which order and violence are inextricably intertwined. The chapters embrace such varied disciplines as political science, economics, history, sociology, philosophy, and law; employ different methodologies, from game theory to statistical modeling to in-depth historical narrative to anthropological ethnography; and focus on different units of analysis and levels of aggregation, from the state to the individual to the world system. All are essential reading for anyone who seeks to understand current trends in global conflict.

Political representation lies at the core of modern politics. Democracies, with their vast numbers of citizens, could not operate without representative institutions. Yet relations between the democratic ideal and the everyday practice of political representation have never been well defined and remain the subject of vigorous debate among historians, political theorists, lawyers, and citizens. In this volume, an eminent group of scholars move forward the debates about political representation on a number of fronts. Drawing on insights from political science, history, political theory, economics, and anthropology, the authors provide much-needed clarity to some of the most vexing questions about political representation. They also reveal new and enlightening perspectives on this fundamental political practice. Topics discussed include representation before democracy, political parties, minorities, electoral competition, and ideology. This volume is essential reading for anyone interested in the ideal and the reality of political representation.

Where do political identities come from, how do they change over time, and what is their impact on political life? This book explores these and related questions in a globalizing world where the nation state is being transformed, definitions of citizenship are evolving in unprecedented ways, and people's interests and identities are taking on new local, regional, transnational, cosmopolitan, and even imperial configurations. Pre-eminent scholars examine the changing character of identities, affiliations, and allegiances in a variety of contexts: the evolving character of the European Union and its member countries, the Balkans and other new democracies of the post-1989 world, and debates about citizenship and cultural identity in the modern West. These essays are essential reading for anyone interested in the political and intellectual ferment that surrounds debates about political membership and attachment, and will be of interest to students and scholars in the social sciences, humanities, and law.

Ian Shapiro makes a compelling case that the overriding purpose of politics should be to combat domination. Moreover, he shows how to put resistance to domination into practice at home and abroad. This is a major work of applied political theory, a profound challenge to utopian visions, and a guide to fundamental problems of justice and distribution. "Shapiro's insights are trenchant, especially with regards to the Citizens United decision, and his counsel on how the 'status-quo bias' in national political institutions favors the privileged. After more than a decade of imperial overreach, his restrained account of foreign policy should likewise find support." -Scott A. Lucas, Los Angeles Review of Books "Shapiro has a brief and compelling section on the importance of hope in his first chapter. This book enacts and encourages hope, with its analytical clarity, deep engagement of complicated political issues that resist easy theorizing, and emphasis on the politically possible." -Kathleen Tipler, Political Science Quarterly "Offers important insights for thinking about democracy's prospects." -Christopher Hobson, Perspectives on Politics

Commentaries by top scholars alongside the most important documents and speeches concerning the Bretton Woods Conference of 1944

The two world wars brought an end to a long†‘standing system of international commerce based on the gold standard. After the First World War, the weaknesses in the gold standard contributed to hyperinflation, the Great Depression, the rise of fascism, and ultimately World War II. The Bretton Woods Conference of 1944 arose out of the Allies’ desire to design a postwar international economic system that would provide a basis for prosperity, trade, and worldwide economic development.
 
Alongside important documents and speeches concerning the adoption and evolution of the Bretton Woods system, this volume includes lively, readable, original essays on such topics as why the gold standard was doomed, how Bretton Woods encouraged the adoption of Keynesian economics, how the agreements influenced late†‘twentieth†‘century ideas of international development, and why the agreements ultimately had to give way to other arrangements.

Within Western political philosophy, the rights of groups has often been neglected or addressed in only the narrowest fashion. Focusing solely on whether rights are exercised by individuals or groups misses what lies at the heart of ethnocultural conflict, leaving the crucial question unanswered: can the familiar system of common citizenship rights within liberal democracies sufficiently accommodate the legitimate interests of ethnic citizens.

Specifically, how does membership in an ethnic group differ from other groups, such as professional, lifestyle, or advocacy groups? How important is ethnicity to personal identity and self-respect, and does accommodating these interests require more than standard citizenship rights? Crucially, what forms of ethnocultural accommodations are consistent with democratic equality, individual freedom, and political stability? Invoking numerous cases studies and addressing the issue of ethnicity from a range of perspectives, Ethnicity and Group Rights seeks to answer these questions.

The collapse of the Soviet empire stands as a dramatic reminder that political institutions are human creations that can be designed more or less well. The question of what constitutes a viable political order is as old as it is profound, and is a central part of the works of such thinkers as Plato, Aristotle, Machiavelli, Hobbes, Locke, Montesquieu, and the American Founders.

In eighteen original essays, Political Order presents the work of major scholars such as Robert Dahl, John Gray, Jennifer Nedelsky, Pasquale Pasquino, James Scott, Karen Orren, Steven Skowronek, Walter Dean Burnham, Morris Fiorina, and Norman Schofield who address some of the most pressing questions about political order. Under what conditions do we get political order rather than political chaos? How is political order sustained once it has been created? Do constitutions and electoral systems matter, and if so how much? Is there one best type of political order, and, if not, what is the range of viable possibilities and how should they be evaluated?

"An impressive collection of essays on a central problem of political theory. I recommend it highly."
--Jeffrey C. Isaac, Indiana University

With 16 original essays all published here for the first time, "Theory and Practice" focuses on the relationship between philosophical tradition and everyday life in the Western tradition. In this comprehensive volume, Ian Shapiro and Judith Wagner DeCew have gathered contributions from some of the most influential thinkers of our generation including Cass Sunnstein, Jean Bethke Elshtain, Martha Nussbaum, Jeremy Waldron, and Kent Greenwalt.

What are the relations between philosophical theories and everyday life? This question, as old as it is profound, is the central focus of "Theory and Practice," The contributors include some of the most influential thinkers of our generation, among them Cass Sunnstein, Jean Bethke Elshtain, Martha Nessbaum, Jeremy Waldron, and Kent Greenwalt. In sixteen chapters--all published here for the first time--the authors examine major attempts to reconcile theory with practice in the Western tradition from Herodotus, Plato, and Aristotle to Kant and Heidegger.

Considerable attention is devoted to the role of theory in judicial decision-making, debates between defenders of the value of pure theory and those who argue for the priority of practice, the political implications of theory, practical problems such as global warming, and the theoretical commitments of practitioners from Karl Marx to Vaclav Havel. One of the most expansive volumes in the NOMOS series to date, "Theory and Practice" will be of interest to philosophers, lawyers, and social scientists from a wide range of disciplines.

From the sprawling remnants of the Soviet empire to the southern tip of Africa, attempts are underway to replace arbitrary political regimes with governments constrained by the rule of law. This ideal which subordinates the wills of individuals, social movements--and even, sometimes, democratically elected majorities--to the requirements of law, is here explored by leading legal and political thinkers.

Part I of "The Rule of Law" examines the interplay of democracy and the rule of law, while Part II focusses on the centuries-old debate about the meaning of the rule of law itself. Part III takes up the constraints that rationality exercises on the rule of law. If the rule of law is desirable partly because it is rational, then departures from that rule might also be desirable in the event that they can be shown to be rational. Part IV concentrates on the limits of the rule of law, considering the tensions between liberalism and the rule of law which exist despite the fact that reasoned commitment to the rule of the law is preeminently a liberal commitment.
Contributing to the volume are: Robert A. Burt (Yale University), Steven J. Burton (University of Iowa), William N. Eskridge, Jr. (Georgetown University), John Ferejohn (Stanford University), Richard Flathman (Johns Hopkins University), Gerald F. Gaus (University of Minnesota, Duluth), Jean Hampton (University of Arizona), Russell Hardin (University of Chicago), James Johnson (University of Rochester), Jack Knight (Washington University), Stephen Macedo (Harvard University), David Schmidtz (Yale University), Lawrence B. Solum (Loyola Marymount University), Michael Walzer (Princeton University), Catherine Valcke (University ofToronto), and Michael P. Zuckert (Carleton College).

Why are democracies so unequal? Despite the widespread expectation that democracy, via expansion of the franchise, would lead to redistribution in favor of the masses, in reality majorities regularly lose out in democracies. Taking a broad view of inequality as encompassing the distribution of wealth, risk, status, and well-being, this volume explores how institutions, individuals, and coalitions contribute to the often surprising twists and turns of distributive politics. The contributors hail from a range of disciplines and employ an array of methodologies to illuminate the central questions of democratic distributive politics: What explains the variety of welfare state systems, and what are their prospects for survival and change? How do religious beliefs influence people's demand for redistribution? When does redistributive politics reflect public opinion? How can different and seemingly opposed groups successfully coalesce to push through policy changes that produce new winners and losers? The authors identify a variety of psychological and institutional factors that influence distributive outcomes. Taken together, the chapters highlight a common theme: politics matters. In seeking to understand the often puzzling contours of distribution and redistribution, we cannot ignore the processes of competition, bargaining, building, and destroying the political alliances that serve as bridges between individual preferences, institutions, and policy outcomes.

Within Western political philosophy, the rights of groups has often been neglected or addressed in only the narrowest fashion. Focusing solely on whether rights are exercised by individuals or groups misses what lies at the heart of ethnocultural conflict, leaving the crucial question unanswered: can the familiar system of common citizenship rights within liberal democracies sufficiently accommodate the legitimate interests of ethnic citizens. Specifically, how does membership in an ethnic group differ from other groups, such as professional, lifestyle, or advocacy groups? How important is ethnicity to personal identity and self-respect, and does accommodating these interests require more than standard citizenship rights? Crucially, what forms of ethnocultural accommodations are consistent with democratic equality, individual freedom, and political stability? Invoking numerous cases studies and addressing the issue of ethnicity from a range of perspectives, Ethnicity and Group Rights seeks to answer these questions.

A text in the Yale University Press Series on Basic Documents in World Politics This volume contains the full text of the United Nations Charter and the Statute of the International Court of Justice, as well as related historical documents. They are accompanied by ten original essays on the Charter and its legacy by distinguished scholars and former high-level UN officials. The commentaries illuminate the early and ongoing roles of the United Nations in responding to international crises, debates about the UN's architecture and its reform, and its role in global governance, climate change, peacekeeping, and development. A concise and accessible introduction to the UN for students, this collection also offers important new scholarship that will be of interest to experts.

Updated to include the 2007 decision Gonzales v. Carhart, this volume provides all of the major Supreme Court decisions on abortion--as well as many majority, dissenting, and plurality opinions--carefully edited for use in undergraduate and graduate courses in a variety of disciplines. In his introductory essay, Shapiro sets these cases in political, historical, and philosophical context, and gives the reader a sense of what the main issues in the constitutional law of abortion are likely to be in the future.

Can individuals believe that they are acting with integrity, yet in disobedience to the dictates of their conscience? Can they retain fidelity to their conscience while ignoring a sense of what integrity requires? Integrity and conscience are often thought to be closely related, perhaps even different aspects of a single impulse. This timely book supports a different and more complicated view. Acting with integrity and obeying one's conscience might be mutually reinforcing in some settings, but in others they can live in varying degrees of mutual tension. Bringing together prominent scholars of legal theory and political philosophy, the volume addresses both classic ruminations on integrity and conscience by Plato, Hume, and Kant as well as more contemporary examinations of professional ethics and the complex relations among politics, law and personal morality.

"This book succeeds in showing that there are sound alternatives to the dominant unilateralist approach for dealing with the national security and foreign policy challenges confronted by the United States. Bravo for Professor Shapiro!"--Ernesto Zedillo, former President of Mexico, Director of the Yale Center for the Study of Globalization

"At a time and on an issue that cry out for fresh, critical, and constructive thinking, Ian Shapiro has performed a great service by laying out a bold yet pragmatic idea for dealing with the threats America faces in the post-September 11 world. He has adapted an old idea that worked--the containment of communist expansion during the Cold War--to the task of replacing a policy that has, to a spectacular and tragic degree, not worked: military preemption and the attempt to impose democracy in the name of waging 'the War on Terror.' His critique of both the Bush administration and many of its Democratic opponents is hard-hitting and well substantiated; his recommendations are compelling; and his presentation is concise and forceful. The result is a major contribution to the debate over the single most vexing and important political challenge facing the U.S. and the world."--Strobe Talbott, President of the Brookings Institution, former Deputy Secretary of State

"Ian Shapiro follows up his masterful analysis of the politics of taxation("Death by a Thousand Cuts") with a wonderfully clinical dissection of U.S. foreign policy. Shapiro recognizes that the policy of the present administration is not just a bad idea stumbled across by accident, but a bad idea that was carefully husbanded and nurtured for years by people who were deadly serious aboutpower and unafraid to use it. It is time, he believes, for Democrats who are serious about making the best use of power to stop triangulating these bad ideas, and to start trying to nurture some good ideas of their own. This crystal-clear account of the merits of a policy of containment represents an excellent place for them to begin."--David Runciman, author of "The Politics of Good Intentions"

"This is by far the best critique of the Bush administration's national-security doctrine that I have read. Its prose is lively and engaging. It focuses on the essentials and makes a clear argument that is effectively supported by his judicious reflections on the history of the Cold War and on contemporary issues including the war on terror and the conflicts in the Middle East."--Michael W. Doyle, Columbia University

"Shapiro's new book is a rich and nuanced critique of the Bush administration's doctrine of preemption and democracy promotion and its related foreign-policy agendas. He traces the rise of the administration's preoccupation with Iraq and terrorism, and the fallout in domestic and regional terms. He manages to cut to the heart of the matter without compromising the detail. His analysis also provides the all-important historical backdrop that has often been absent in other studies."--Anoush Ehteshami, Durham University