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Begin New Search Topic Book Review Journal Political Science Quarterly Publication Year within 3 Years

1. Vengeful Citizens, Violent States: A Theory of War and Revenge, Rachel Stein

Author:
Peter Liberman
Publication Date:
01-2021
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Political Science Quarterly
Institution:
Academy of Political Science
Abstract:
By showing that mass vengefulness helps democratic leaders bring their nations to war, this wonderful book significantly advances our understanding of how cultural values affect international politics. Its most important contribution is demonstrating that democracies that retain death penalty laws were significant more likely to initiate the use of force than non-death-penalty democracies in the 1945–2001 period. The finding is robust to a variety of control variables and specifications, although skeptics may wonder whether it might be inflated by ethnocentrism, beliefs about the utility of violence, or other unmeasured potential covariates. Rachel Stein attributes the belligerence of death penalty states to cross-national differences in vengeful cultures, on the grounds that citizens’ vengefulness predicts both cross-sectional support for the death penalty and cross-national differences in the penalty’s retention. Her rigorous analysis greatly strengthens the case that the unusual bellicosity of retributivists, observed by Stein and other researchers, affects actual interstate conflict.
Topic:
War, Prisons/Penal Systems, Leadership, Book Review, Elites, and Capital Punishment
Political Geography:
Europe, Middle East, and United States of America

2. Neighborhood Defenders: Participatory Politics and America’s Housing Crisis, Katherine Levine Einstein, David M. Glick and Maxwell Palmer

Author:
Mark Paul
Publication Date:
01-2021
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Political Science Quarterly
Institution:
Academy of Political Science
Abstract:
America is in the midst of a housing crisis. For millions of Americans, stable housing is simply out of reach. A full-time worker earning minimum wage cannot afford a two-bedroom apartment in any county in the United States. Twenty-one million households, nearly half of all renters, are rent-burdened, with rent claiming more than a quarter of their income. There are a number of contributing factors to the crisis, including pervasive economic inequality and the lack of rising wages over an entire generation for nonmanagerial workers, but many economists, political scientists, and housing experts point the finger at a lack of housing supply. Specifically, much ink has been spilled over the “not in my back yard” (NIMBY) phenomenon, whereby local residents support more housing in theory, just not in their own neighborhoods. But do local residents really have the power necessary to slow new and denser development in ways that curtail housing supply and contribute to rising house prices? In their timely and important book, Katherine Levine Einstein, David M. Glick, and Maxwell Palmer provide an excellent analysis of the political institutions that empower certain local residents to resist change in their neighborhoods. While the NIMBY sentiment is worthy of consideration regarding the housing crisis, without the right institutions, the movement would not have legs. Neighborhood Defenders provides an in-depth study of how institutions initially designed to democratize local zoning and development decisions have resulted in unintended consequences. Specifically, they document how participatory institutions that could, in theory, keep developers accountable to the people have instead backfired, leading to a shortage of housing supply and a precipitous rise in prices.
Topic:
Book Review, Political Science, Crisis Management, and Housing
Political Geography:
North America and United States of America

3. Dangerously Divided: How Race and Class Shape Winning and Losing in American Politics, Zoltan L. Hajnal

Author:
Natalie Masuoka
Publication Date:
01-2021
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Political Science Quarterly
Institution:
Academy of Political Science
Abstract:
Explanations for American voting behavior and attitudes have taken on a curious frame since the election of Barack Obama in 2008, such that there have been growing claims that race is no longer central to American politics. Obama’s election was labeled evidence of a new “post-racial” America. Then, when Donald Trump was elected in 2016, public narratives emphasized the role of social class by pointing to the voting bloc of white, working-class, and rural voters who had helped decide the outcome of the election. Zoltan L. Hajnal’s Dangerously Divided joins an important collection of recent academic work that directly challenges the argument about the reduced role of race in American politics. Hajnal does not sugarcoat his position: “A key aspect of this story is not just that race matters but also that it eclipses the other important dividing lines in American society” (p. 13). Race has always been a core feature of American politics, and it is present even in the constitutional Framers’ debates over the structure of government. The interpretation that recent events indicate a reduced role of race discounts the historical centrality that race has always played in American government. Hajnal offers empirical evidence and an unambiguous argument that race continues to direct most patterns in American politics.
Topic:
Politics, Race, Elections, Book Review, Political Science, and Class
Political Geography:
North America and United States of America

4. Is the Republican Party Destroying Itself? (And Why It Needs to Reclaim Its Conservative Ideals), Thomas E. Patterson

Author:
Gary Wasserman
Publication Date:
01-2021
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Political Science Quarterly
Institution:
Academy of Political Science
Abstract:
Coming to terms with Donald Trump, his causes and consequences, is a lively cottage industry. When packaged as predictions of his political demise by two distinguished scholars, the stakes are raised for the authors and, since this review was written before the electoral reckoning, for the reviewer as well. Perhaps Trump’s reckless disregard for traditional boundaries extends to everyone who touches the subject. Both Thomas E. Patterson and Andrew Hacker should be commended for writing obituaries before the body has actually stopped quivering. Given that both books were completed before the unique year of 2020 had struck with all its terrible unpredictable forces, these writers are brave indeed, especially because they are so self-assured in prophesizing a Republican Party decline (Patterson) and Trump’s immediate electoral demise, taking most of his party with him (Hacker). After all, they wrote when the incumbent president could boast of a roaring stock market and economy as well as unquestioned control of a party with a majority of national offices (presidency, Senate, Judiciary), state legislatures (29), and governors (26).
Topic:
Book Review, Political Science, Donald Trump, and Political Parties
Political Geography:
North America and United States of America