scholarly journals Book Review: Today’s Economic Issues: Democrats and Republicans; Today’s Social Issues: Democrats and Republicans

2017 ◽  
Vol 56 (3) ◽  
pp. 221 ◽  
Author(s):  
Todd J. Wiebe
Keyword(s):  
Political Parties ◽  
Social Issues ◽  
Economic Issues ◽  
Democrats And Republicans

Here I get the unique pleasure of reviewing two separate books in one shot. They are the first two volumes in ABC-CLIO’s Across the Aisle series, examining contemporary economic and social issues from the perspectives of America’s two most prominent and increasingly polarized political parties. Both volumes adhere to the same format and structure, and entries are comparable in quality and depth, the only difference being that Today’s Economic Issues contains a forward and introduction, whereas Social Issues has only a brief introduction. The former is an edited volume, whereas the latter is authored solely by Kneeland. As for the main content, the publisher is clearly going for uniformity throughout the series, so with my sincere apologies to the unique contributions of the authors and editors, I will for the most part be reviewing the two books together.

scholarly journals Book Review: Today’s Environmental Issues: Democrats and Republicans

2019 ◽  
Vol 58 (2) ◽  
pp. 129
Author(s):  
Stacey Marien
Keyword(s):  
Political Science ◽  
Common Ground ◽  
Social Issues ◽  
Environmental Issues ◽  
Assistant Professor ◽  
Associate Professor ◽  
Stevens Institute ◽  
Institute Of Technology ◽  
Democrats And Republicans

Walker is an associate professor of political science at Elmhurst College. This volume is part of a series titled “Across the Aisle.” The other titles cover Social Issues, Economic Issues and Foreign Policy Issues. The preface is written by Lindsey Cormack, an assistant professor of political science and director of the Diplomacy Lab at Stevens Institute of Technology. She goes on to state that members of Congress “do not dedicate the same amount of time and focus to each pressing environment issue.” (vii). Cormack presents some tables that contain both topics covered by party e-newsletters and keywords that are used most by each party. The preface also gives an overview of each party’s platform pertaining to environmental issues in 2016. The introduction states that this volume “examines the proposal and positions of the two parties—both the profound disagreements and the areas of common ground between the two parties.” (xviii).

scholarly journals Book Review: Today’s Foreign Policy Issues: Democrats and Republicans

2018 ◽  
Vol 57 (3) ◽  
pp. 229
Author(s):  
Anne C. Deutsch
Keyword(s):  
Foreign Policy ◽  
Political Parties ◽  
Common Ground ◽  
Green Party ◽  
Policy Issues ◽  
Party Positions ◽  
Democrats And Republicans ◽  
Monolithic Structures

Today’s Foreign Policy Issues: Democrats and Republicans, as the title suggests, examines international and “intermestic” policy issues from the perspectives of our two major political parties. According to the introduction, this book “examines the proposals and positions of the two parties—from profound disagreements to areas of common ground” (p. viii); however, this nuanced approach is difficult to achieve in a volume written for the novice researcher. Further, the structure of the articles stresses differences rather than similarities. Presenting political parties as monolithic structures is also problematic. While parties have unifying platforms that are referred to often throughout the book, they tend to obscure internal divisions. This partisan framework also seems to lend itself to deepening cleavages, both real and imagined, for readers approaching the material from entrenched perspectives. And what of independent, libertarian, and green-party positions, among others?

scholarly journals When Does Income Inequality Cause Polarization?

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-18
Author(s):  
Jacob R. Gunderson
Keyword(s):  
Income Inequality ◽  
Political Parties ◽  
Positive Relationship ◽  
Conventional Wisdom ◽  
National Elections ◽  
Economic Issues ◽  
Party Positions ◽  
Economic Elites ◽  
The Right ◽  
Issue Content

Scholars have long been concerned with the implications of income inequality for democracy. Conventional wisdom suggests that high income inequality is associated with political parties taking polarized positions as the left advocates for increased redistribution while the right aims to entrench the position of economic elites. This article argues that the connection between party positions and income inequality depends on how party bases are sorted by income and the issue content of national elections. It uses data from European national elections from 1996 to 2016 to show that income inequality has a positive relationship with party polarization on economic issues when partisans are sorted with respect to income and when economic issues are relatively salient in elections. When these factors are weak, however, the author finds no relationship between income inequality and polarization.

scholarly journals What Do Partisan Donors Want?

2020 ◽  
Vol 84 (1) ◽  
pp. 104-118
Author(s):  
David Broockman ◽  
Neil Malhotra
Keyword(s):  
American Politics ◽  
Social Issues ◽  
Political Influence ◽  
Significant Heterogeneity ◽  
Mass Survey ◽  
Independent Dataset ◽  
Economic Issues ◽  
Policy Domain ◽  
Original Survey

Abstract Influential theories indicate concern that campaign donors exert outsized political influence. However, little data have documented what donors actually want from government, and existing research has devoted less attention to donors’ views on individual issues. Findings from an original survey of US donors, including an oversample of the largest donors, and a concurrently fielded mass survey document significant heterogeneity by party and policy domain in how donors’ and citizens’ views diverge. We find that Republican donors are much more conservative than Republican citizens on economic issues, whereas their views are similar on social issues. By contrast, Democratic donors are much more liberal than Democratic citizens on social issues, whereas their views are more similar on economic issues. Both parties’ donors, but especially Democratic donors, are more pro-globalism than their citizen counterparts. We replicate these patterns in an independent dataset. Our findings have important implications for the study of American politics.

scholarly journals Prawo i Sprawiedliwość w polskim systemie partyjnym (przyczynek do dyskusji o systemotwórczej roli partii)

2018 ◽  
pp. 79-94
Author(s):  
Andrzej ANTSZEWSKI
Keyword(s):  
Political Parties ◽  
Party System ◽  
Political Competition ◽  
Social Issues ◽  
Moral Foundations ◽  
Governance System ◽  
Electoral Success ◽  
The Status ◽  
Law And Justice ◽  
The Government

Among the numerous functions of political parties, the role of creating the governance system is highly significant. It manifests itself in the ability of political parties to establish permanent relations with the other parties and in this way provides the essence of a party system. The purpose of the present paper is to demonstrate the role the Law and Justice party (PiS) plays in the creation of the governance system. Since 2005, PiS has been one of the two dominant political parties struggling to win the parliamentary and presidential elections. In order to determine the scope of this party’s influence on the shape of the party system, their achievements in elections, parliament and Cabinet activity need to be analyzed. Such a quantitative analysis allows us to grasp PiS’s development trends in political competition. The paper discusses the reasons for their electoral success in 2005 as well as their defeat in 2007 and the aftermath of both these elections for the party’s competition to the government. The achievements of PiS confirm that this party has won the status of a party that structures the political competition, a status that has not been lost irrespective of the five elections at different levels that the party has lost. PiS has successfully adopted the postulates of the Left in terms of the economy and social issues, whereas it has maintained the image of a right-wing party in terms of the shape of the state and its moral foundations. PiS has managed to form an electorate that differs from other parties’ electorates in terms of its social and demographic properties as well as its political attitudes, which reinforces the position of PiS in the electoral struggle. Yet PiS has failed to establish a permanent coalition government. The elimination of Self-Defence (Samoobrona) and the League of Polish Families (LPR) from the Sejm has practically deprived PiS of any coalition potential, or has at least significantly reduced this potential. This, coupled with a continuously growing negative electorate, may turn out to constitute the main obstacle to PiS regaining power.

Book Review: Economic Issues in Public Policies

1981 ◽  
Vol 25 (2) ◽  
pp. 84-85
Author(s):  
K. Michael Warner
Keyword(s):  
Public Policies ◽  
Economic Issues
Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document