Few countries serve as a more useful case study for understanding the global tension between liberal and illiberal conceptions of democracy than Poland. Under the populist Law and Justice (PiS) -led government, a large part of the Polish electorate welcomed the party's "Good Change"-as it described its program-despite accusations of democratic backsliding. PiS offered voters neglected by previous governments a combination of economic redistributionism and cultural traditionalism, supplemented with narratives of bolstering Poland's national prestige and sovereignty. Yet after eight years of success, it was defeated in the October 2023 elections by a "pro-democratic" coalition. The history of PiS shows both the strengths and weaknesses of democratic illiberalism as a challenge to liberal democracy.

Bill and Stanley analyze the course and causes of the party's successes and failures. The authors deftly outline PiS's assault on democratic institutions, its paradigm-changing redistributive programs, cultural backlash agenda, politics of history, and the reasons for its fall from power. Poland's democracy has proven resilient to the specter of autocratization, but its future development under a new government raises fresh questions. This essential book considers what the rise and fall of Poland's illiberal government reveals about the future of liberal democracy and its ongoing transformations in the twenty-first century.

How Black youth in Detroit made claims for political equality over and against the new order of community policing
The criminalization of Black youth was central to policing in urban America during the civil rights era and continued in Detroit even after the rise of Black political control in the 1970s. Wildcat of the Streets documents how the "community policing" approach of Mayor Coleman Young (1974-1993)-including neighborhood police stations, affirmative action hiring policies, and public participation in law enforcement initiatives-transformed Detroit, long considered the nation's symbol of racial inequality and urban crisis, into a crucial site of experimentation in policing while continuing to subject many Black Detroiters to police brutality and repression.
In response, young people in the 1970s and 1980s drew on the city's storied history of labor radicalism as well as contemporary shopfloor struggles to wage a "wildcat of the streets," consisting of street disturbances, decentralized gang activity, and complex organizations of the informal economy. In this revelatory new history of the social life of cities, Michael Stauch mines a series of evocative interviews conducted with the participants to trace how Black youth made claims for political equality over and against the new order of community policing.
Centering the perspective of criminalized and crime-committing young people, Wildcat of the Streets is an original interpretation of police reform, the long struggle for Black liberation, and the politics of cities in the age of community policing.

The term dogwhistle, meaning a political message with a hidden or coded meaning, only entered mainstream usage in the mid-1990s, but today it seems to be everywhere. Accusations of dogwhistling fly in every political direction, and the meaning of the term has broadened to encompass an ever-expanding range of words, images, actions and objects.

This book investigates the rise of the dogwhistle as a key cultural and political reference point, arguing that it's a sign of our political times. It's related both to the polarized nature of politics in the era of populism, culture wars and online echo chambers, and to the preoccupation of radical activists on both sides of the traditional left/right divide with controlling language as a way of remaking culture. Their political aims are different, but their tactics are more similar than they might appear.

As well as examining how these tactics have recently been used, and looking at the arguments they now regularly prompt in public settings from social media to courts of law, this book by linguist Deborah Cameron considers some of the theoretical questions they raise about the way communication works and the effects it is capable of producing. It asks why contemporary radical movements put so much emphasis on words and symbols, and whether their faith in the power of language is justified.

Leniency might sometimes be the ethical response to atrocity. However, the more extraordinary an act of violence is, the greater the compulsion to severely punish the offender. The rationale is that the threat of harsh punishment will be more effective at preventing crime. At the same time, the notion that the criminal justice system is corrupt and ineffective has become commonplace. At the center of these conflicting trends is a puzzle that this book sets out to solve: what if punishment should not only be judged by its effectiveness, but also by its morality?

Mexico's War on Drugs has unleashed an endless cycle of violence in the country. The resulting human toll is catastrophic. Atrocity Without Punishment advances ethically compelling reasons to impose lenient sentences on offenders involved in drug trafficking, including many who commit serious offenses. Juan Espindola argues that this is in fact a morally permissible, even obligatory, way to hold perpetrators accountable.

From this vantage point, Espindola problematizes the relationship between punishment and core political values such as legitimacy and justice. By challenging the criminal justice system in this way, he charts a path toward a more just criminal legal system that can muster the support of those who reject abolitionism.

American policy toward Iran has remained remarkably consistent since the earliest years of the Reagan administration. US-Iran hostility has endured for longer than the Cold War. Momentous geopolitical shifts, changing leaderships, and evolving domestic priorities have not fundamentally altered this antagonistic relationship. Standard explanations pin the blame for this enduring hostility on Iran and its leaders' revolutionary ideology and policies at odds with the United States and the West. While Iran bears significant blame for a deeply adversarial relationship-the country often engages in dangerous and repressive activities-this book demonstrates that "it's them, not us" accounts cannot alone explain America's posture toward this complicated but critically important country. Drawing on original interviews with former government officials, oral histories, memoirs, congressional hearings, archival material, and the author's own participation in dozens of Iran-related track two meetings, Dalia Dassa Kaye deftly explores how America's Iran policy is made, the people who make it, and the underlying ideas and perceptions that inform it. Dassa Kaye looks back at US policy toward Iran over the past four decades to help us look ahead, offering wider lessons for understanding American foreign policymaking.

Since the 1920s, the roll call voting record has influenced American politics. Using recorded votes, candidates attack electoral opponents, interest groups attempt to drum up financial or electoral support for their preferred candidates, scholars test theories of legislative behavior, and the media characterizes the ideological leanings of Congress. Despite this, there has not been a systematic attempt to document the changing usage of the roll call record. Michael S. Lynch and Anthony J. Madonna have undertaken a massive, multiyear data collection effort that culminated in four new datasets covering from 1905 to the contemporary period. Using data on approximately 120,000 amendments, 60,000 roll call votes, 2,000 important enactments, and 8,000 special rules from 1905 to 2015, the authors demonstrate how the roll call recording system has evolved.

Consistent with the Founders' skepticism of the impact of recorded voting in Congress, Broken Record shows that the contemporary roll call voting record includes far more meaningless position-taking and procedural roll call votes than it did during earlier congresses. The book argues that the removal of practical barriers to roll calls, internal changes to legislative procedures, and increased electoral competitiveness have led to more roll call votes on proposals sponsored by more extreme members. In addition to policy making being more difficult, increased roll call voting has played a substantial role in artificially increasing observed levels of polarization. This book argues that solving polarization requires a more nuanced set of solutions than simply replacing legislators; it will require increased public education about how Congress operates and specific procedural reforms.

A revealing look at differing threat perceptions in six key NATO countries

When Russia began its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, analysts and policymakers highlighted the unifying shock that NATO members experienced. However even before the return of US president Donald Trump, beneath this seeming cohesion lay deep-seated differences in how member states perceive and prioritize security threats.

NATO after Russia's Invasion of Ukraine analyzes the six most influential members of the alliance: the United States, the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Poland, and Italy. Through extensive interviews with current and former policymakers and a detailed examination of public statements and policies, Jason W. Davidson delivers a unique assessment of how divergent threat perceptions influence the NATO allies' major defense decisions, such as defense spending, and whether the alliance addresses each ally's most important threat and its view of NATO's most important challenges. With the rise in tumultuous geopolitical challenges posed by Russia, China, terrorism, mass refugee flows, and nationalism, this book provides the crucial context needed to navigate NATO's evolving role in international security.

Davidson provides vital insights for anyone seeking to understand the complex dynamics shaping the future of NATO and transatlantic security. Policy professionals will find actionable intelligence, while scholars and students of international relations and political science will appreciate its rigorous analysis and extensive primary research.

The contemporary movement to fight "modern slavery" has increasingly turned its attention to issues of forced labor, child labor and labor trafficking in a wide variety of industries and supply chains. At the same time, businesses have become more involved with the movement and their leadership has been touted as a better alternative to the assumed inferiority of civil society responses. How has business influence been playing out in the "anti-slavery" movement and what are the implications for international nongovernmental organizations (INGOs) fighting these forms of labor exploitation? Based on interviews, online texts, documents, and media content from a variety of INGOs and other organizations in Europe and the United States fighting these problems, Advocacy, Inc. provides a cautionary case study. "Anti-slavery" advocacy has become a new market in which INGOs are pressed to become increasingly like for-profit businesses and the strategies they pursue do not adequately address the driving forces that have created conditions for continued labor exploitation in the global economy. Moreover, some businesses benefit from this scenario, having to do very little to claim 'hero' status in advocacy efforts, while practices that perpetuate labor exploitation continue unabated.

Brazil's prison population, estimated at 90,000 in 1990, has exploded to over 650,000, the third highest in the world behind the US and China. Systematically targeting poor, Black communities, Brazil's prisons have become infamous for their overcrowding and mismanagement. And yet, this landscape of punishment is built on top of a set of progressive laws that center reform as the primary aim and concern of incarceration. Every morning, when black, windowless vans carry the newly incarcerated to their destinations, they pass through prison gates emblazoned with the words, "Resocialize to Conquer the Future."

Through long-term fieldwork within the prisons of Rio de Janeiro, David Thompson investigates the legal and moral impulse to "resocialize" as it animates the prison system of Brazil. Following incarcerated people, psychologists, attorneys, and missionaries, he draws attention to the forms of prison life and governance that reform and resocialization bring forth, from parole applications and psycho-social evaluations to prison escapes. He argues these institutions are driven by a set of unfulfilled promises: the image of a reformed, future self; the insistence that a more "humane" prison is possible; the promise of Brazilian democracy itself; and the stalled project of Black emancipation. Across these domains, Thompson charts how imprisonment forces its captives to constantly navigate between the hope of reform and the weaponization of this hope against them.

In this ambitious new work, eco-philosopher and cultural theorist Adrian Ivakhiv presents an incisive new way of thinking about images and imagination. Drawing upon an immense range of materials, Ivakhiv reassesses the place of imagination in cultural life, analyzing how people have interacted with images in the past and the ways that digital media are profoundly altering these relationships today. The book contributes powerfully to the study of visual culture and digital media, and provides provocative interpretations of a range of important artists and media movements: from the work of photographer Edward Burtynsky, the ambitious multi-screen installations of John Akomfrah, the abstract art of Swedish spiritualist Hilma af Klint, and the Afrofuturism of jazz musicians like Sun Ra and poet Alexis Pauline Gumbs, to the ever-expanding universe of animal videos on YouTube. Along the way, the book delves into animacy and religious imagery, iconophilia and iconoclasm, divination and prophecy, "truthiness" and "enchantment networks," online communities and artificial intelligence, the political and affective economies of digital media, and the role of utopian futurism in the present "climate-colonial Anthropocene" predicament. The result is a vital contribution toward a more empowering conception of the creative imagination and its possibilities in today's emerging digital ecology.

The oldest ideas are the best. This book is a defense of an ancient way of thinking about international politics: realism. Patrick Porter, a scholar of international relations, defends the realist approach to understanding the world by addressing head-on the most robust critiques of the tradition. Drawing from a wide literature, Porter restages three prominent criticisms of realism: that it is immoral, unrealistic, and provincial. In erudite, clear, and at times morbidly funny prose, Porter makes the case that realism is, in fact, everything its critics believe it is not: moral in its commitment to securing the polity and its interests in a world where there is no higher government; realistic and the best starting point for explaining how human groups tend to behave; and practical for use by everyone, everywhere, including beyond the Euro-Atlantic.

From Thucydides to Kautilya to Machiavelli, realists claim that the world is an inherently dangerous place defined by the shadow of conflict, whether we like it or not. As the 21st century grapples with multiple interlocking crises concerning economic dislocation, climate crisis, and war, we need realism now more than ever. This book is for readers who are looking for sensible guidance on how to work within that reality and survive in an increasingly hostile world.

After a period of relative calm in congressional elections prior to 2006, America has experienced a series of highly competitive, volatile national elections. Since then, at least one of the US House, US Senate, and presidency has flipped party control-often with a large House or Senate seat swing-with the exception of the 2012 election. In Waves of Discontent, Jacob F. H. Smith argues that a pervasive feeling of displeasure in the American public has caused this increase in electoral volatility.

Conducting statistical analyses of a wide array of surveys, Smith found that these feelings of displeasure translate to lower turnout among voters from the president's party and a higher percentage of independents voting for the other party. Subsequently, he conducted a content analysis of New York Times articles to look at the connection between unrest in American society and seat swings in congressional elections, even before the existence of polling. Examining the consequences of volatility in congressional elections reveals that political amateurs are more likely to win in wave years than in normal years. Based on this data, Smith presents a new theory about the policy process-the policy doom loop-in which frustration among voters at both the inability of Congress to pass policy and anger at policies that actually do pass results in even more churn in congressional elections. Waves of Discontent offers some suggestions to promote constructive policymaking efforts in Washington to reduce frustration in the electorate.

This book offers a critical examination of the global diffusion and local reception of disaster risk reduction (DRR) programs through the lens of Indonesia's unique challenges and successes. This book critically examines the global diffusion and local reception of risk by implementing Indonesia's disaster risk reduction (DRR) programs. Global efforts to strengthen local disaster resilience capacities have become a staple of international development in recent decades. Yet, the successful implementation of DRR projects designed to enhance local resilience remains vague. There are pockets of success in the post-2018 Central Sulawesi Earthquake, but a gap nevertheless remains between global expectations and local realities. Through a critical realist study of global and local worldviews of risk in Indonesia, this book argues that the global advocacy of DRR remains inadequate because of a failure to prioritize person-orientated ethics in its conceptualization of disaster resilience. Much of the research and policies on DRR have used social science methods only to complement the technological improvement approach offered in reducing disaster risk, especially in the Global South. This book invites readers to revisit disaster as a social problem and as a social construct. This book emphasizes the importance of social science disciplines to answer extensive topics on DRR-from empirical, theoretical, and philosophical approaches-to provide a critical arena and generate dialogue around a people-centered approach to DRR. Vis-a-vis regional comparison, the authors provide a valuable lens to understand the underlying social structures that make resilience possible and unpack the extent to which local governments, communities, and persons interpret and modify their behavior on risk when faced with the global message on understanding a systemic situation. This book is an essential resource for researchers, professionals, and students in areas of resilience, risk management, development studies, and area studies. It provides fresh perspectives and fostering dialogue on DRR in the Global South.

Pioneering field work reveals how infrastructural systems-buildings, laws, algorithms, excavators, regulations, toxins-maintain white supremacy within the urban landscape

For decades, Detroit residents, politicians, planners, and advocacy organizations have campaigned for the elimination of empty buildings from city neighborhoods. Leveling these structures, many argue, is essential to making space for Detroit's majority-Black populace to flourish in the wake of white flight and deindustrialization. In 2013, the city set out to demolish more than twenty thousand empty buildings by the end of the decade, with administrators suggesting it would offer an innovative model for what other American cities could do to combat the effects of racist disinvestment. Drawing on extensive ethnographic research with city residents, demolition workers, and public officials, as well as analyses of administrative archives, Demolishing Detroit examines the causes, procedures, and consequences of empty-building demolitions in Detroit. Contrary to stated goals of equity, the book reveals how racism and intersecting inequities endured despite efforts to level them.

As calls to dismantle racist systems have become increasingly urgent, this book provides cautionary tales of urban transformations meant to combat white supremacy that ultimately reinforced inequality. Bridging political analyses of racial capitalism, infrastructures, and environments in cities, Nick Caverly grapples with the reality that tearing down unjust policies, ideologies, and landscapes is not enough to end racist disparities in opportunities and life chances. Doing so demands rebuilding systems in the service of reparative futures.

How can citizens make sense of the complex mixture of durability and dynamism that animates American party politics? How should Americans understand-and come to terms with-contemporary partisan polarization and the democratic backsliding afflicting politics in the United States today? In this volume, contributors argue that the historical-institutionalist approach practiced by scholars of American Political Development (APD) offers enormous potential and can shed light on the paradoxical character of American party politics in general and the present conflicts plaguing the polity in particular.
Parties, Power, and Change draws together a broad range of contributions from a new generation of historically oriented social scientists for the first time, and foregrounds political parties in the study of APD. By doing so, the volume highlights the ways in which party development has both been shaped by, and contributed to, changes in governing institutions and the democratic polity. The essays illuminate the developments that gave rise to salient features of the contemporary political landscape that occupy both academic and public discourse today, including shifts in ideology, group affiliations, and issue positions of the parties; changes in party structures; and partisan-driven democratic backsliding. Finally, this volume argues that, by viewing American politics through the lens of the historical development of party politics, readers can better understand the essential role that parties play in American history and see how parties can be mediating institutions that both sustain and undermine democracy.
Contributors: Amel Ahmed, Gwendoline M. Alphonso, Julia Azari, Rachel M. Blum, Jeffrey D. Broxmeyer, Boris Heersink, Jessica Hejny, Adam Hilton, Daniel Klinghard, Didi Kuo, Matthew J. Lacombe, Verlan Lewis, Nicole Mellow, Sam Rosenfeld, Jeffrey S. Selinger, Daniel Schlozman.