Volume 137 - Number 4 - Winter 2022-23
Negotiating Unilateralism in the Executive Branch: A Review Essay Diane J. Heith reviews By Executive Order: Bureaucratic Management and the Limits of Presidential Power by Andrew Rudalevige. She finds that Rudalevige’s exhaustive dive into newly discovered archival documents presents opportunities for revisioning executive order formation, from its traditional top-down formulation. However, she questions the time bound nature of the conclusions drawn for influencing unilateral behavior in a polarized environment.
Volume 137 - Number 1 - Spring 2022
The Conservative Bias in America’s Local Governments Raymond J. La Raja use new population-level data to examine the ideologies of municipal residents relative to those of elected officials in their communities. They find that the average ideology of local officials is markedly more conservative than that of the average resident and that local officials are especially distant from non-white constituents.
Volume 137 - Number 3 - Fall 2022
Lessons from The Politics of Ballot Design : A Review Article The Politics of Ballot Design: How States Shape American Democracy by Eric J. Engstrom and Jason M. Roberts. She argues that the scholarship might have benefitted from an examination of recent work by scholars who work in election science—a new field which examines the conduct and administration of elections—and that election scientists can also learn from scholars examining institutions such as Congress and political parties.
Volume 137 - Number 4 - Winter 2022-23
Barbara Walter’s Script for Civil War in America: A Review Essay Jack Snyder reviews Barbara Walter’s How Civil Wars Start and How to Stop Them . Walter argues that modern civil wars take the form of guerrilla warfare and organized terrorism. They are started mainly by declining ethnic groups in polarized partial democracies. Her contention that the contemporary United States is heading in this direction has a surface plausibility, but requires strong qualifications.
Volume 137 - Number 1 - Spring 2022
How Can Presidents and the Executive Branch Preserve and Protect American Democracy? A Review Essay Meena Bose reviews Phantoms of a Beleaguered Republic: The Deep State and the Unitary Executive by Stephen Skowronek, John A. Dearborn, and Desmond King. She finds that their study of the “dueling concepts,” or “phantoms,” of the “deep state” and “unitary executive” in American politics presents a trenchant assessment of the challenges of presidential governance today. She questions whether their recommendations for stronger party leadership and more collaborative decision making will address the problems that are so thoughtfully presented in this profound analysis of the American political system.
Volume 136 - Number 4 - Winter 2021-22
Ages of Organization: The Emergence of National Interest Groups in American History
Volume 137 - Number 2 - Summer 2022
Review Essay: Making America Great Again? Individualism, Community, and Enlightened Self-Interest in the United States Michael X. Delli Carpini reviews Robert Putnam’s The Upswing . He finds Putnam’s argument—that American democracy requires a balance between individualism and communitarianism—and his evidence that this balance produced positive effects through the first 60 years of the twentieth century, insightful and convincing, but raises concerns that this “data driven narrative” silos issues of race and gender, overstates the negative consequences of the political and cultural movements of the 1960s, and downplays the importance of political struggle and power in both the “upswings” and the downswings” that Putnam documents.
Volume 136 - Number 4 - Winter 2021-22
After Trump: Enemies, Partisans, and Recovery Christopher J. Fettweis discusses what political polarization in the United States has in common with the relationship between the Cold War superpowers. He argues that in both cases the “enemy image” warps perception of the other side and prevents meaningful reconciliation. Applying insight from international relations to U.S. domestic politics, he discusses the pernicious effects of the enemy image and how to overcome it.
Volume 136 - Number 2 - Summer 2021
How to Win a “Long Game”: The Voting Rights Act, the Republican Party, and the Politics of Counter-Enforcement Adrienne Jones and ANDREW POLSKY examine how the Republican Party engaged in counter-enforcement of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, notably during the Reagan and Bush 43 administrations, in an effort to maximize the voting strength of pro-Republican voting constituencies. They argue that sustained counter-enforcement efforts lead to sharp policy oscillations when parties alternate in power and that if a party pursues the long game of persistent counter-enforcement, it may find itself with the opportunity to achieve lasting results.
Volume 136 - Number 3 - Fall 2021
Contemporary Black Populism and the Development of Multiracial Electoral Coalitions: The 2018 Stacey Abrams and Andrew Gillum Gubernatorial Campaigns Sharon D. Wright Austin uses a populist theoretical framework to examine the 2018 gubernatorial campaigns of Stacey Abrams of Georgia and Andrew Gillum of Florida. She finds that although both candidates attracted the support of voters of all races, they lost because of disappointing turnout rates. She argues that this research provides evidence of the challenges black candidates encounter when seeking to win southern statewide elections through the usage of populist appeals.
