The Logic of American Politics, 4th edition + Debating Reform + Midterm Mayhem
What's Next for Obama and the Republicans
1st Edition
Published on 15. February 2009
Book
978-1-60871-823-8 (ISBN)
Description
Logic now with a free supplement analyzing the midterm elections.Coming in December, this valuable supplement will provide an insider's guide to the 2010 midterm elections. When placing your order, be sure to use the ISBN on this page to ensure that your students receive the supplement packaged FREE with their textbook.
The Logic of American Politics, 4th Edition
The logic of American politics? Are those snickers from your students as they deride the phrase an oxymoron? By helping them see that political institutions and practices are imperfect solutions to collective action problems, distinguished scholars Samuel Kernell and Gary C. Jacobson-and new coauthor Thad Kousser-reveal a rationale to the U.S. political system and give students a window through which they can not only view American politics but also come to understand it.
Known for its engaging narrative, the book's new edition continues to weave historical context, current politics, and analytic concepts into a text that gently strengthens students' theoretical understanding while hooking them with great storytelling. In order to make the argument fully accessible to a student audience, the new edition highlights passages that apply the collective action and institutional design themes presented in the introduction.
The fourth edition has been revised and updated throughout, and will include full coverage of the 2008 elections. Two major developments in the new edition deserve special note:
* a new section in the first chapter introduces students to a "toolkit" of institutional design concepts-command, veto, agenda control, voting rules, delegation-and examples of how they work.With this toolkit, students learn the concepts for exploring America's governmental system in later chapters.
* with a fully revised final chapter, Logic looks forward to assess the implications of its argument for widely promoted reforms of policy and institutions.
Tables, figures, photographs, cartoons, bolded key terms, a glossary, annotated reading lists, review questions, and exercises help illustrate core ideas and aid in review and study. A series of thematic boxes further the book's analytic framework:
* Logic of Politics examines the design of various political institutions in light of the objectives they were intended to achieve.
* Strategy and Choice shows how officeholders and those seeking to influence them employ institutions to advance their goals.
* Politics to Policy highlights how public policies reflect the institutions that produce them and evaluate institutional capacity to solve the nation's problems.
For more information about The Logic of American Politics, 4th Edition, click here.
Debating Reform
As much as policy topics like abortion and same-sex marriage elicit spirited reactions from your students, aren't you looking for ways to get students out of their partisan corners? Ellis and Nelson have found that debating concrete proposals to reforming the political system encourages their undergraduate students to leave ideology behind and instead, to sift through competing claims and evidence.
Connecting classroom conversation directly to political institutions, students not only grapple with reform ideas but also join the discussion without the crutch of spouting opinion. With pro and con pieces written specifically for this volume, students consider and evaluate arguments from top scholars, thoughtfully exploring the ways government could work better.
For more information about Debating Reform, click here.
The Logic of American Politics, 4th Edition
The logic of American politics? Are those snickers from your students as they deride the phrase an oxymoron? By helping them see that political institutions and practices are imperfect solutions to collective action problems, distinguished scholars Samuel Kernell and Gary C. Jacobson-and new coauthor Thad Kousser-reveal a rationale to the U.S. political system and give students a window through which they can not only view American politics but also come to understand it.
Known for its engaging narrative, the book's new edition continues to weave historical context, current politics, and analytic concepts into a text that gently strengthens students' theoretical understanding while hooking them with great storytelling. In order to make the argument fully accessible to a student audience, the new edition highlights passages that apply the collective action and institutional design themes presented in the introduction.
The fourth edition has been revised and updated throughout, and will include full coverage of the 2008 elections. Two major developments in the new edition deserve special note:
* a new section in the first chapter introduces students to a "toolkit" of institutional design concepts-command, veto, agenda control, voting rules, delegation-and examples of how they work.With this toolkit, students learn the concepts for exploring America's governmental system in later chapters.
* with a fully revised final chapter, Logic looks forward to assess the implications of its argument for widely promoted reforms of policy and institutions.
Tables, figures, photographs, cartoons, bolded key terms, a glossary, annotated reading lists, review questions, and exercises help illustrate core ideas and aid in review and study. A series of thematic boxes further the book's analytic framework:
* Logic of Politics examines the design of various political institutions in light of the objectives they were intended to achieve.
* Strategy and Choice shows how officeholders and those seeking to influence them employ institutions to advance their goals.
* Politics to Policy highlights how public policies reflect the institutions that produce them and evaluate institutional capacity to solve the nation's problems.
For more information about The Logic of American Politics, 4th Edition, click here.
Debating Reform
As much as policy topics like abortion and same-sex marriage elicit spirited reactions from your students, aren't you looking for ways to get students out of their partisan corners? Ellis and Nelson have found that debating concrete proposals to reforming the political system encourages their undergraduate students to leave ideology behind and instead, to sift through competing claims and evidence.
Connecting classroom conversation directly to political institutions, students not only grapple with reform ideas but also join the discussion without the crutch of spouting opinion. With pro and con pieces written specifically for this volume, students consider and evaluate arguments from top scholars, thoughtfully exploring the ways government could work better.
For more information about Debating Reform, click here.
More details
Series
Language
English
Place of publication
Washington
United States
Publishing group
SAGE Publications Inc
Target group
College/higher education
ISBN-13
978-1-60871-823-8 (9781608718238)
Copyright in bibliographic data is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or its licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Persons
Samuel Kernell is professor of political science at the University of California, San Diego, where he has taught since 1977. Previously, he taught at the University of Mississippi and the University of Minnesota. Kernell's research interests focus on the presidency and American political history. His previous books include Going Public: New Strategies of Presidential Leadership, 3rd edition; an edited collection of essays, James Madison: The Theory and Practice of Republican Government; and, with Gary C. Jacobson, The Logic of American Politics, 7th edition, and Strategy and Choice in Congressional Elections, 2nd edition. Kernell's most recent book, Party Ballots, Reform and the Transformation of American Politics, (2015, with Erik Engstrom), won the APSA's David Greenstone Award for the best book in politics and history. Gary C. Jacobson is distinguished professor of political science at the University of California, San Diego, where he has taught since 1979. He previously taught at Trinity College, the University of California at Riverside, Yale University, and Stanford University. Jacobson specializes in the study of U.S. elections, parties, interest groups, and Congress. He is the author of Money in Congressional Elections: The Politics of Congressional Elections, Eighth Edition, The Electoral Origins of Dividend Government: Competition in the U.S. House Elections, 1946 - 1988, and A Divider, Not a Uniter: George W. Bush and the American People, Second Edition, and is coauthor with Samuel Kernell of Strategy and Choice in Congressional Elections, Second Edition. Jacobson is also a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Thad Kousser is professor of political science and department chair at the University of California, San Diego. He has served as a legislative aide in the California, New Mexico, and U.S. senates. He is the author of Term Limits and the Dismantling of State Legislative Professionalism, coauthor of The Power of American Governors and The Logic of American Politics, and coeditor of The New Political Geography of California. Kousser has been awarded the UCSD Academic Senate's Distinguished Teaching Award, has served as coeditor of State Politics and Policy Quarterly, and serves as coeditor for state and local politics of Legislative Studies Quarterly. Richard J. Ellis is Mark O. Hatfield Professor of Politics at Willamette University. His books include The Development of the American Presidency (2015; 2nd ed.); Debating Reform: Conflicting Perspectives on How to Fix the American Political System (with Michael Nelson, 3nd ed., 2016); Judging the Boy Scouts of America: Gay Rights, Freedom of Association, and the Dale Case (2014); Judging Executive Power: Sixteen Supreme Court Cases That Have Shaped the American Presidency (2009); and Presidential Travel: The Journey from George Washington to George W. Bush (2008). In 2008 he was named the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching Oregon Professor of the Year.
Michael Nelson is Fulmer Professor of Political Science at Rhodes College and a senior fellow at the University of Virginia's Miller Center. A former editor of the Washington Monthly, his most recent books include Trump's First Year (2018); The Elections of 2016 (2018); The Evolving Presidency: Landmark Documents (2019); The American Presidency: Origins and Development (with Sidney M. Milkis, 2011); and Governing at Home: The White House and Domestic Policymaking (with Russell B. Riley, 2011). Nelson has contributed to numerous journals, including the Journal of Policy History, Journal of Politics, and Political Science Quarterly. He also has written multiple articles on subjects as varied as baseball, Frank Sinatra, and C. S. Lewis. More than fifty of his articles have been anthologized in works of political science, history, and English composition. His 2014 book, Resilient America: Electing Nixon, Channeling Dissent, and Dividing Government, won the American Political Science Association's Richard E. Neustadt Award for best book on the presidency published that year; and his 2006 book with John Lyman Mason, How the South Joined the Gambling Nation, won the Southern Political Science Association's V.O. Key Award.
Greg Giroux was previously a senior writer with CQ-Roll Call Group, specializing in politics and elections. He has been a major contributor to the past six editions of CQ's Politics in America, the almanac that profiles all members of Congress and their constituencies. Giroux joined CQ in 1996 and served as editorial assistant and researcher at the CQ Weekly magazine prior to joining the political reporting staff in 1998. Giroux is a graduate of The College of William and Mary in Williamsburg, Va.
Michael Nelson is Fulmer Professor of Political Science at Rhodes College and a senior fellow at the University of Virginia's Miller Center. A former editor of the Washington Monthly, his most recent books include Trump's First Year (2018); The Elections of 2016 (2018); The Evolving Presidency: Landmark Documents (2019); The American Presidency: Origins and Development (with Sidney M. Milkis, 2011); and Governing at Home: The White House and Domestic Policymaking (with Russell B. Riley, 2011). Nelson has contributed to numerous journals, including the Journal of Policy History, Journal of Politics, and Political Science Quarterly. He also has written multiple articles on subjects as varied as baseball, Frank Sinatra, and C. S. Lewis. More than fifty of his articles have been anthologized in works of political science, history, and English composition. His 2014 book, Resilient America: Electing Nixon, Channeling Dissent, and Dividing Government, won the American Political Science Association's Richard E. Neustadt Award for best book on the presidency published that year; and his 2006 book with John Lyman Mason, How the South Joined the Gambling Nation, won the Southern Political Science Association's V.O. Key Award.
Greg Giroux was previously a senior writer with CQ-Roll Call Group, specializing in politics and elections. He has been a major contributor to the past six editions of CQ's Politics in America, the almanac that profiles all members of Congress and their constituencies. Giroux joined CQ in 1996 and served as editorial assistant and researcher at the CQ Weekly magazine prior to joining the political reporting staff in 1998. Giroux is a graduate of The College of William and Mary in Williamsburg, Va.