New Books in Public Policy
Episodes
Jonathan Swarts, “Constructing Neoliberalism: Economic Transformation in Anglo-American Democracies” (University of Toronto Press, 2013)
22 Sep 2014
Contributed by Lukas
The new book, Constructing Neoliberalism: Economic Transformation in Anglo-American Democracies (University of Toronto Press, 2013) shows how polit...
Shaazka Beyerle, “Curtailing Corruption: People Power for Accountability and Justice” (Lynne Rienner, 2014)
15 Sep 2014
Contributed by Lukas
Shaazka Beyerle is the author of the new book, Curtailing Corruption: People Power for Accountability and Justice (Lynne Rienner 2014). Beyerle is sen...
Leslie Grant, “West Meets East: Best Practices from Expert Teachers in the United States and China” (ASCD, 2014)
14 Sep 2014
Contributed by Lukas
Teachers have recently become a target in the educational reform debate. Most would agree that great teachers are crucial for education. However, ther...
Richard Starr, “Equal As Citizens: The Tumultuous and Troubled History of a Great Canadian Idea” (Formac, 2014)
11 Sep 2014
Contributed by Lukas
“We are not half a dozen provinces. We are one great Dominion,” Canada’s first Prime Minister, John A. Macdonald proudly declared. More than a c...
Michael S. Roth, “Beyond the University: Why Liberal Education Matters” (Yale University Press, 2014)
07 Sep 2014
Contributed by Lukas
With a new focus on vocational and work ready education, the notion of a liberal education is becoming less valued in American society. Though, there ...
Staci Zavattaro, “Cities for Sale: Municipalities as Public Relations and Marketing Firms” (SUNY Press, 2013)
01 Sep 2014
Contributed by Lukas
Staci Zavattaro is the author of the new book Cities for Sale: Municipalities as Public Relations and Marketing Firms (SUNY Press, 2013). Zavattaro is...
Matt Grossmann, “Artists of the Possible: Governing Networks and American Policy Change Since 1945” (Oxford University Press, 2014)
25 Aug 2014
Contributed by Lukas
Matt Grossmann is back on the podcast with his newest book, Artists of the Possible: Governing Networks and American Policy Change Since 1945 (Oxford ...
William Deresiewicz, “Excellent Sheep: The Miseducation of the American Elite and the Way to a Meaningful Life” (Free Press, 2014)
19 Aug 2014
Contributed by Lukas
“Don’t Send Your Kid to the Ivy League.” This was the headline of a recent New Republic article that reverberated across the internet recently...
Marianne Constable, “Our Word is Our Bond: How Legal Speech Acts” (Stanford UP, 2014)
16 Aug 2014
Contributed by Lukas
Our Word is Our Bond: How Legal Speech Acts (Stanford UP, 2014), by UC Berkeley Professor of Rhetoric Marianne Constable, impels its readers to reasse...
John L. Campbell and Ove K. Pedersen, The National Origins of Policy Ideas: ” (Princeton UP 2014)
04 Aug 2014
Contributed by Lukas
John L. Campbell and Ove K. Pedersen are the authors of The National Origins of Policy Ideas: Knowledge Regimes in the United States, France, Germany,...
Josh Lerner, “Making Democracy Fun: How Game Design Can Empower Citizens and Transform Politics” (MIT Press, 2014)
28 Jul 2014
Contributed by Lukas
Josh Lerner is the author of Making Democracy Fun: How Game Design Can Empower Citizens and Transform Politics (MIT Press, 2014). Lerner earned his Ph...
Judith Kelley, “Monitoring Democracy: When International Election Observation Works, and Why It Often Fails” (Princeton UP, 2012)
21 Jul 2014
Contributed by Lukas
Judith Kelley is the author of Monitoring Democracy: When International Election Observation Works, and Why It Often Fails (Princeton University Pre...
Thomas A. Bryer, “Higher Education Beyond Job Creation: Universities, Citizenship, and Community” (Lexington Books 2014)
17 Jul 2014
Contributed by Lukas
Thomas A. Bryer joins the podcast to discuss his book Higher Education Beyond Job Creation: Universities, Citizenship, and Community (Lexington Books ...
Darren Halpin, “The Organization of Political Interest Groups: Designing Advocacy” (Routledge, 2014)
14 Jul 2014
Contributed by Lukas
Darren Halpin is the author of The Organization of Political Interest Groups: Designing Advocacy (Routledge 2014). Halpin is associate professor and r...
Suzanne Mettler, “Degrees of Inequality: How the Politics of Higher Education Sabotaged the American Dream” (Basic Books, 2014)
09 Jul 2014
Contributed by Lukas
From 1945 to the mid-1970s, the rate at which Americans went to and graduate from college rose steadily. Then, however, the rate of college going and ...
Nick Smith, “Justice through Apologies: Remorse, Reform, and Punishment” (Cambridge UP, 2014)
02 Jul 2014
Contributed by Lukas
Most people say “I’m sorry” a lot. After all, we make a lot of mistakes, most of them minor, so we don’t mind apologizing and expect our apolo...
Patrick Burkart, “Pirate Politics: The New Information Policy Contests” (MIT Press, 2014)
26 Jun 2014
Contributed by Lukas
The mid-’00s saw the rise of a political movement in Europe concerned with technocratic impositions on the ideals of free culture, privacy, governme...
David C. Berliner, Gene V. Glass et al., “50 Myths and Lies That Threaten America’s Public Schools” (Teachers College Press, 2014)
18 Jun 2014
Contributed by Lukas
David C. Berliner, Gene V. Glass, and associates are the authors of 50 Myths and Lies That Threaten America’s Public Schools: The Real Crisis in Edu...
Austin Sarat, “Gruesome Spectacles: Botched Executions and America’s Death Penalty” (Stanford UP, 2014)
18 Jun 2014
Contributed by Lukas
When we discuss the death penalty we usually ask two questions: 1) should the state be in the business of killing criminals?; and 2) if so, how should...
Douglas M. Thompson, “The Quest for the Golden Trout: Environmental Loss and America’s Iconic Fish” (University Press of New England, 2013)
17 Jun 2014
Contributed by Lukas
Earlier this spring, I drove to a small beaver pond near my home in Colorado, snapped together my fishing rod, and cast a silver lure into the pond’...
Olivier Zunz, “Philanthropy in America: A History” (Princeton UP, 2014)
16 Jun 2014
Contributed by Lukas
Olivier Zunz is the author of Philanthropy in America: A History (Princeton University Press 2014). The paperback addition of the book has recently be...
Jane Maienschein, “Embryos Under the Microscope: The Diverging Meanings of Life” (Harvard UP, 2014)
12 Jun 2014
Contributed by Lukas
Why do we study the history of science? Historians of science don’t just teach us about the past: along with philosophers of science, they also hel...
Morris B. Hoffman, “The Punisher’s Brain: The Evolution of Judge and Jury” (Cambridge UP, 2014)
11 Jun 2014
Contributed by Lukas
Why do we feel guilty–and sometimes hurt ourselves–when we harm someone? Why do we become angry–and sometimes violent–when we see other people...
Emery Roe, “Making the Most of Mess” (Duke UP 2014)
09 Jun 2014
Contributed by Lukas
Emery Roe is the author of Making the Most of Mess: Reliability and Policy in Today’s Management Challenges (Duke UP 2014). Roe is senior associate ...
Marci A. Hamilton, “God vs. the Gavel: Religion and the Rule of Law” (Cambridge UP, 2014)
07 Jun 2014
Contributed by Lukas
The constitution guarantees Americans freedom of religious practice and freedom from government interference in the same same. But what does religious...
Amy Stambach, “Confucius and Crisis in American Universities” (Routledge, 2014)
06 Jun 2014
Contributed by Lukas
Dr. Amy Stambach is the author of Confucius and Crisis in American Universities: Culture, Capital, and Diplomacy in U.S. Public Higher Education (Rout...
Kevin J. Dougherty and Vikash Reddy, “Performance Funding for Higher Education” (Jossey-Bass, 2013)
24 May 2014
Contributed by Lukas
Kevin Dougherty and Vikash Reddy are the authors of Performance Funding for Higher Education: What Are the Mechanisms What Are the Impacts (Jossey-Ba...
Cornelia H. Dayton and Sharon V. Salinger, “Robert Love’s Warnings” (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2014)
21 May 2014
Contributed by Lukas
In early America, the practice of “warning out” was unique to New England, a way for the community to regulate those who might fall into pover...
James W. Russell, “Social Insecurity: 401(k)s and the Retirement Crisis” (Beacon Press, 2014)
20 May 2014
Contributed by Lukas
Jim Russell is a sociologist and it was his encounter with the hidden realities of his own 401(k) retirement plan that touched off his crusade to demy...
Sharon K. Farber, “Hunger for Ecstasy: Trauma, the Brain, and the Influence of the Sixties” (Aronson, 2013)
20 May 2014
Contributed by Lukas
It may seem silly to ask why we seek ecstasy. We seek it, of course, because it’s ECSTASY. We are evolved to want it. It’s our brain’s way of sa...
Denise Brennan, “Life Interrupted: Trafficking into Forced Labor in the United States” (Duke UP, 2014)
20 May 2014
Contributed by Lukas
Denise Brennan‘s second book, Life Interrupted: Trafficking into Forced Labor in the United States (Duke University Press, 2014), examines how indi...
Benjamin Radcliff, “The Political Economy of Happiness” (Cambridge UP, 2013)
01 May 2014
Contributed by Lukas
Americans are very politically divided. Democrats say we need a more powerful welfare state while Republicans say we need to maintain the free market....
Elizabeth Kolbert, “The Sixth Extinction: An Unnatural History” (Henry Holt, 2014)
19 Apr 2014
Contributed by Lukas
The paleontologist Michael Benton describes a mass extinction event as a time when “vast swaths of the tree of life are cut short, as if by crazed, ...
Miriam Kingsberg, “Moral Nation: Modern Japan and Narcotics in Global History” (University of California Press, 2013)
08 Apr 2014
Contributed by Lukas
Miriam Kingsberg‘s fascinating new book offers both a political and social history of modern Japan and a global history of narcotics in the modern w...
Adam Thierer, “Permissionless Innovation: The Continuing Case for Comprehensive Technological Freedom” (Mercatus Center, 2014)
04 Apr 2014
Contributed by Lukas
Much of the progress in technology today has come about as a result of innovators who did not seek prior approval from regulatory bodies and such. Yet...
Nicholas Carnes, “White-Collar Government: The Hidden Role of Class in Economic Policy Making” (University of Chicago Press, 2013)
31 Mar 2014
Contributed by Lukas
Nicholas Carnes is the author of White-Collar Government: The Hidden Role of Class in Economic Policy Making (University of Chicago Press, 2013). Carn...
Arica L. Coleman, “That the Blood Stay Pure” (Indiana UP, 2014)
18 Mar 2014
Contributed by Lukas
Arica Coleman did not start out to write a legal history of “the one-drop rule,” but as she began exploring the relationship between African Amer...
Odette Lienau, “Rethinking Sovereign Debt” (Harvard UP, 2014)
09 Mar 2014
Contributed by Lukas
In 1927 Russian-American legal theorist Alexander Sack introduced the doctrine of “odious debt.” Sack argued that a state’s debt is “odious”...
Carlo C. DiClemente, “Substance Abuse Treatment and the Stages of Change: Selecting and Planning Interventions” (Guilford Press, 2013)
20 Feb 2014
Contributed by Lukas
In this episode, I talk with Carlo C. DiClemente, a Presidential Research Professor in the Department of Psychology at the University of Maryland- Bal...
Constance DeVereaux and Martin Griffin, “Narrative, Identity, and the Map of Cultural Policy” (Ashgate, 2013)
14 Feb 2014
Contributed by Lukas
Narrative, Identity, and the Map of Cultural Policy: Once Upon a Time in a Globalized World (Ashgate, 2013), a new book by Constance DeVereaux (Col...
Sara Bannerman, “The Struggle for Canadian Copyright: Imperialism to Internationalism, 1842-1971”
11 Feb 2014
Contributed by Lukas
In The Struggle for Canadian Copyright: Imperialism to Internationalism, 1842-1971, Sara Bannerman narrates the complex story of Canada’s copyright ...
Karen G. Weiss, “Party School: Crime, Campus, and Community” (Northeastern UP, 2013)
08 Feb 2014
Contributed by Lukas
In this episode, I sit down with Karen G. Weiss, associate professor in the Department of Sociology and Anthropology at West Virginia University, to t...
Patrick Weil, “The Sovereign Citizen: Denaturalization and the Origins of the American Republic” (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2013)
28 Jan 2014
Contributed by Lukas
Patrick Weil is the author of The Sovereign Citizen: Denaturalization and the Origins of the American Republic (University of Pennsylvania Press, 20...
Robert Darnton, “On the Future of Libraries”
25 Jan 2014
Contributed by Lukas
Robert Darnton, author of books, articles, and Carl H. Pforzheimer University Professor and Director of the University Library at Harvard. Darnton joi...
Patrick Burkart, “Pirate Politics: The New Information Policy Conflicts” (MIT Press, 2014)
24 Jan 2014
Contributed by Lukas
Patrick Burkart‘s Pirate Politics: The New Information Policy Conflicts (MIT Press, 2014) considers the democratic potential and theoretical signifi...
James E. Fleming and Linda C. McClain, “Ordered Liberty: Rights, Responsibilities, and Virtues” (Harvard UP, 2013)
02 Dec 2013
Contributed by Lukas
Many have argued in recent years that the U.S. constitutional system exalts individual rights over responsibilities, virtues, and the common good. Ans...
Tom Sorell, “Emergencies and Politics: A Sober Hobbesian Approach” (Cambridge UP, 2013)
23 Nov 2013
Contributed by Lukas
In Emergencies and Politics: A Sober Hobbesian Approach (Cambridge UP, 2013), Tom Sorell argues that emergencies can justify types of action that wou...
Brian Allen Drake, “Loving Nature, Fearing the State” (University of Washington Press, 2013)
04 Oct 2013
Contributed by Lukas
What do Barry Goldwater, Edward Abbey, and Henry David Thoreau have in common? On the surface, they would seem to be at opposite ends of the ideologic...
Gayle Kaufman, “Superdads: How Fathers Balance Work and Family in the 21st Century” (NYU Press, 2013)
19 Sep 2013
Contributed by Lukas
Pretty much every day you can read an article–usually somewhat intemperate–about how women can or can’t “have it all.” Rarely, however, do y...
Mark A. Largent, “Vaccine: The Debate in Modern America” (Johns Hopkins UP, 2012)
06 Sep 2013
Contributed by Lukas
Children born in the 1970s and 1980s received just a handful of vaccinations: measles, rubella, and a few others. Beginning the 1990s, the numbers of ...
Virginia Gray et al., “Interest Group$ and Health Care Reform Across the United State$” (Georgetown UP, 2013)
30 Aug 2013
Contributed by Lukas
Virginia Gray, David Lowery, and Jennifer Benz are the authors of Interest Group$ and Health Care Reform Across the United State$ (Georgetown Universi...
Gregory Heller, “Ed Bacon: Planning, Politics, and the Building of Modern Philadelphia” (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2013)
12 Aug 2013
Contributed by Lukas
Gregory Heller is the author of Ed Bacon: Planning, Politics, and the Building of Modern Philadelphia (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2013). Helle...
Thom Brooks, “Punishment” (Routledge, 2012)
01 Aug 2013
Contributed by Lukas
Social stability and justice requires that we live together according to rules. And this in turn means that the rules must be enforced. Accordingly, w...
Jonathan V. Last, “What to Expect When No One’s Expecting: America’s Coming Demographic Crisis” (Encounter Books, 2013)
25 Jul 2013
Contributed by Lukas
Most people who listen to this podcast will know that places like Japan, Italy, and Germany are in the midst of a demographic crisis. The trouble is t...
John O. McGinnis, “Accelerating Democracy: Transforming Governance Through Technology” (Princeton UP, 2013)
10 Jul 2013
Contributed by Lukas
The advent of very powerful computers and the Internet have not “changed everything,” but it has created a new communications context within which...
Colin Gordon, “Growing Apart: A Political History of American Inequality” (Institute for Policy Studies, 2013)
25 Jun 2013
Contributed by Lukas
Americans seem to be more concerned about economic inequality today than they have been in living memory. The Occupy Movement (“We are the 99%”) i...
Marc Mauer, “Race to Incarcerate” (New Press, 2013)
18 Jun 2013
Contributed by Lukas
The American penitentiary model began as not merely a physical construct, but as a philosophical and religious one. Prisoners were to use their time i...
Daniel W. Webster and Jon S. Vernick, “Reducing Gun Violence in America” (Johns Hopkins UP, 2013)
15 May 2013
Contributed by Lukas
We’ve all heard the saying that when arguing we should ‘disagree without being disagreeable’ but, when it comes to guns, we often find ourselves...
Christopher Tienken and Donald Orlich, “The School Reform Landscape: Fraud, Myth, and Lies” (Rowman and Littlefield, 2013)
13 May 2013
Contributed by Lukas
Christopher Tienken and Donald Orlich are authors of the provocative new book, The School Reform Landscape: Fraud, Myth, and Lies (Rowman and Littlefi...
Steven Hill, “Europe’s Promise: Why the European Way is the Best Hope in an Insecure Age” (University of California Press, 2010)
09 May 2013
Contributed by Lukas
What can the United States learn from Europe? One good answer, says Steven Hill, is social capitalism, a form of economic management that is responsiv...
Kathleen J. Frydl, “The War on Drugs in America, 1940-1973” (Cambridge UP, 2013)
09 May 2013
Contributed by Lukas
In 1971, President Richard Nixon declared a “War on Drugs.” We are still fighting that war today. According to many people, we’ve lost but don’...
Thane Rosenbaum, “Payback: The Case for Revenge” (Chicago UP, 2013)
08 May 2013
Contributed by Lukas
All humans have an emotionally-driven sense of fairness. We get treated unfairly and we get mad. It’s no wonder, then, that our laws–and those of ...
Paul Barrett, “Glock: The Rise of America’s Gun” (Broadway, 2013)
02 May 2013
Contributed by Lukas
History is in many respects the story of humanity’s quest for transcendence: to control life and death, time and space, loss and memory. When invent...
Steven J. Harper, “The Lawyer Bubble: A Profession in Crisis” (Basic Books, 2013)
01 May 2013
Contributed by Lukas
A friend of mine who had just graduated from law school said “Law school is great. The trouble is that when you are done you’re a lawyer.” Stev...
Jared Diamond, “The World Until Yesterday: What Can We Learn from Traditional Societies?” (Viking, 2012)
25 Apr 2013
Contributed by Lukas
It’s pretty common–and has long been–for people to think that the “way it used to be” is better than the way it is. This tendency to idealiz...
Andrew Koppelman, “The Tough Luck Constitution and the Assault on Health Care Reform” (Oxford UP, 2013)
24 Apr 2013
Contributed by Lukas
Every hundred years or so, the Supreme Court decides a question with truly vast economic implications. In 2012 such a decision was handed down, in a c...
Stephen T. Asma, “Against Fairness” (University of Chicago, 2013)
05 Apr 2013
Contributed by Lukas
Modern liberalism is built on the principle of equality and its corollary, the principle of fairness (treating equals equally). But have we taken the ...
Robert Skidelsky and Edward Skidelsky, “How Much is Enough: Money and the Good Life” (Other Press, 2012)
18 Mar 2013
Contributed by Lukas
Why do we work so hard, and should we? These are the questions that Robert and Edward Skidelsky explore in their thought provoking book How Much is En...
Matthew Wisnioski, “Engineers for Change: Competing Visions of Technology in 1960s America” (MIT Press, 2012)
26 Feb 2013
Contributed by Lukas
In his compelling and fascinating account of how engineers navigated new landscapes of technology and its discontents in 1960s America, Matthew Wisnio...
Richard Sander and Stuart Taylor, Jr., “Mismatch: How Affirmative Action Hurts Students It’s Intended to Help” (Basic Books, 2012)
22 Feb 2013
Contributed by Lukas
In their book Mismatch: How Affirmative Action Hurts Students It’s Intended to Help, and Why Universities Won’t Admit It (Basic Books, 2012), Ric...
John Wood, “Creating Room to Read” (Viking Press, 2013)
04 Feb 2013
Contributed by Lukas
In Creating Room to Read: A Story of Hope in the Battle for Global Literacy (Viking Press, 2013), John Wood presents this big idea: you can change th...
Scott Melzer, “Gun Crusaders: The NRA’s Culture War” (NYU Press, 2012)
13 Dec 2012
Contributed by Lukas
Scott Melzer is the author of Gun Crusaders: The NRA’s Culture War (New York University Press, 2012). Scott earned his Ph.D. from the University of ...
Amy Lonetree, “Decolonizing Museums: Representing Native America in National and Tribal Museums” (University of North Carolina, 2012)
20 Nov 2012
Contributed by Lukas
“Museums can be very painful sites for Native peoples,” writes Amy Lonetree, associate professor of history at UC-Santa Cruz and a citizen of the ...
John Lauritz Larson, “The Market Revolution: Liberty, Ambition and the Eclipse of the Common Good” (Cambridge UP, 2010)
28 Oct 2012
Contributed by Lukas
The mass industrial democracy that is the modern United States bears little resemblance to the simple agrarian republic that gave it birth. The market...
David Chura, “I Don’t Wish Nobody to Have a Life Like Mine: Tales of Kids in Adult Lockup” (Beacon Press, 2010)
25 Oct 2012
Contributed by Lukas
It is easy to dismiss juveniles in prison as “bad seeds”, as people with which we have nothing in common, and of which we want only distance. Davi...
Isaac Campos, “Home Grown: Marijuana and the Origins of Mexico’s War on Drugs” (UNC Press, 2012)
31 Jul 2012
Contributed by Lukas
Isaac Campos is the author of Home Grown: Marijuana and the Origins of Mexico’s War on Drugs (University of North Carolina Press, 2012). Campos is a...
Jesse Rhodes, “An Education in Politics: The Origin and Evolution of No Child Left Behind” (Cornell UP, 2012)
24 Jul 2012
Contributed by Lukas
Jesse Rhodes‘ book An Education in Politics: The Origin and Evolution of No Child Left Behind (Cornell University Press, 2012). The book synthesiz...
Barry Schwartz, “The Paradox of Choice: Why More is Less – How the Culture of Abundance Robs Us of Satisfaction” (Harper Perennial, 2003)
16 Jul 2012
Contributed by Lukas
Is there such a thing as too much choice? In The Paradox of Choice: Why More is Less – How the Culture of Abundance Robs Us of Satisfaction (Harper ...
David Linen, “The Compass of Pleasure: How Our Brains Make Fatty Foods, Orgasm, Exercise, Marijuana, Generosity, Vodka, Learning, and Gambling Feel So Good” (Viking, 2011)
26 Jun 2012
Contributed by Lukas
What happens in our brains when we do things that feel good, such as drinking a glass of wine, exercising, or gambling? How and why do we become addic...
Elizabeth Brake, “Minimizing Marriage: Marriage, Morality, and the Law” (Oxford UP, 2012)
01 Jun 2012
Contributed by Lukas
From the time we are children, we are encouraged to see our lives as in large measure aimed at finding a spouse. In popular media, the unmarried adult...
Sally Pipes, “The Pipes Plan: The Top Ten Ways to Dismantle and Replace Obamacare” (Regnery Publishing, 2012)
20 Apr 2012
Contributed by Lukas
In her new book, The Pipes Plan: The Top Ten Ways to Dismantle and Replace Obamacare (Regnery Publishing, 2012), Sally C. Pipes, President and Chief E...
Lynn Stout, “Cultivating Conscience: How Good Laws Make Good People” (Princeton UP, 2010)
22 Feb 2012
Contributed by Lukas
Lynn Stout‘s pathbreaking book Cultivating Conscience:How Good Laws Make Good People (Princeton University Press, 2010) represents a much-needed up...
Naomi Schaefer Riley, “The Faculty Lounges: And Other Reasons Why You Won’t Get the College Education You Paid For” (Ivan R. Dee, 2011)
18 Nov 2011
Contributed by Lukas
In her new book The Faculty Lounges: And Other Reasons Why You Won’t Get The College Education You Pay For (Ivan R. Dee, 2011), Naomi Schaefer Rile...
David Feith, “Teaching America: The Case for Civic Education” (Rowman and Littlefield Education, 2011)
01 Nov 2011
Contributed by Lukas
In his new book, Teaching America: The Case for Civic Education (Rowman & Littlefield Education, 2011), David Feith, Chairman of the Civic Education I...
David Horowitz, “A Point in Time: The Search for Redemption in this Life and the Next” (Regnery Publishing, 2011)
26 Oct 2011
Contributed by Lukas
In his new book, A Point in Time: The Search for Redemption in This Life and the Next (Regnery Publishing, 2011), David Horowitz, long ago editor of R...
Ron Christie, “Acting White: The Curious History of a Racial Slur” (Thomas Dunne Books, 2010)
26 Sep 2011
Contributed by Lukas
In his new bookActing White: The Curious History of a Racial Slur (Thomas Dunne Books, 2010), former White House aide Ron Christie recounts the histor...
Samuel Zipp, “Manhattan Projects: The Rise and Fall of Urban Renewal in Cold War New York” (Oxford UP, 2010)
22 Sep 2011
Contributed by Lukas
If you’ve ever lived in New York City, you know exactly what a “pre-war building” is. First and foremost, it’s better than a “post-war build...
Alan Jacobs, “The Pleasures of Reading in an Age of Distraction” (Oxford UP, 2011)
12 Sep 2011
Contributed by Lukas
In his new book, The Pleasures of Reading in an Age of Distraction (Oxford University Press, 2011), Alan Jacobs, Clyde S. Kilby Chair Professor of Eng...
Mikaila Lemonik Arthur, “Student Activism and Curricular Change in Higher Education” (Ashgate, 2011)
09 Sep 2011
Contributed by Lukas
Colleges and universities have a reputation for being radical places where tenured radicals teach radical ideas. Don’t believe it. Consider this: t...
Mara Hvistendahl, “Unnatural Selection: Choosing Boys over Girls, and the Consequences of a World Full of Men” (PublicAffairs, 2011)
07 Sep 2011
Contributed by Lukas
The students in my undergraduate class on gender, sexuality, and human rights are a pretty tough bunch. They know they’re in for some unpleasant top...
Ben Shapiro, “Primetime Propaganda: The True Story of How the Left Took Over Your TV” (Broadside Books, 2011)
31 Aug 2011
Contributed by Lukas
In his new book, Primetime Propaganda: The True Hollywood Story of How the Left Took Over Your TV (Broadside Books, 2011), Ben Shapiro, who is the you...
Elaine Sciolino, “La Seduction: How the French Play the Game of Life” (Times Books, 2011)
24 Aug 2011
Contributed by Lukas
In her new book, La Seduction: How the French Play the Game of Life(Times Books, 2011), Elaine Sciolino, Paris bureau chief of The New York Times, exp...
Max Singer, “History of the Future: The Shape of the World to Come Is Visible Today” (Lexington Books, 2011)
12 Aug 2011
Contributed by Lukas
In his new book, History of the Future: The Shape of the World to Come Is Visible Today (Lexington Books, 2011), Max Singer, Senior Fellow and co-foun...
Tamara Metz, “Untying the Knot: Marriage, the State, and the Case for Their Divorce” (Princeton UP, 2010)
04 Aug 2011
Contributed by Lukas
Marriage is at the center of some of our fiercest political debates. Here are some recent developments regarding marriage in the United States. Earlie...
Kimbrew McLeod and Peter DiCola, “Creative License: The Law and Culture of Digital Sampling” (Duke University Press, 2011)
04 Aug 2011
Contributed by Lukas
One hallmark of important art, in any medium, is a thoughtful relation with artistic precursors. Every artist reckons with heroes and rivals, influenc...
Dov Zakheim, "A Vulcan's Tale: How the Bush Administration Mismanaged the Reconstruction of Afghanistan" (Brookings Institution Press, 2011)
15 Jul 2011
Contributed by Lukas
In his new book, A Vulcan's Tale: How the Bush Administration Mismanaged the Reconstruction of Afghanistan (Brookings Institution Press, 2011) Dov ...
Scott Cleland with Ira Brodsky, “Search and Destroy: Why You Can’t Trust Google” (Telescope Books, 2011)
20 Jun 2011
Contributed by Lukas
In their new book Search and Destroy: Why You Can’t Trust Google (Telescope Books, 2011), Scott Cleland, President of Precursor LLC, and Ira Brodsky...
Eric C. Schneider, “Smack: Heroin and the American City” (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2008)
15 Jun 2011
Contributed by Lukas
When I arrived at college in the early 1980s, drugs were cool, music was cool, and drug-music was especially cool. The coolest of the cool drug-music ...
William Damon, “Failing Liberty 101: How We Are Leaving Young Americans Unprepared for Citizenship in a Free Society” (Hoover Institution, 2011)
03 Jun 2011
Contributed by Lukas
In his new book, Failing Liberty 101: How We Are Leaving Young Americans Unprepared for Citizenship in a Free Society, (Hoover Institution Press, 2011...
Michael Auslin, "Pacific Cosmopolitans: A Cultural History of U.S.-Japan Relations" (Harvard UP, 2011)
05 May 2011
Contributed by Lukas
How have the United States and Japan managed to remain such strong allies, despite having fought one another in a savage war less than 70 years ago? I...