"America is the greatest democracy in the world...isn't it? Author Elizabeth Rusch examines some of the more problematic aspects of our government but, more importantly, offers ways for young people to fix them"--

The former Obama White House aides who launched the Pod Save America podcast deliver a guide to becoming involved and making a difference via politics without losing hope. From donating to a campaign to running for office, they suggest ways to have the most impact.

In a century warped by terrorism, financial collapse, Trumpist populism, systemic racism, and now a global pandemic, trust has been squandered, sacrificed, abused, stolen, or never properly built in the first place. More than ever before, Americans must work side by side to reckon with the monumental challenges posed by our present moment. Buttigieg explores the strong relationship between measures of prosperity and levels of social trust. He provides...

In previous books, Holocaust historian Timothy Snyder dissected the events and values that enabled the rise of Hitler and Stalin and the execution of their catastrophic policies. With Twenty Lessons, Snyder draws from the darkest hours of the twentieth century to provide hope for the twenty-first. As he writes, "Americans are no wiser than the Europeans who saw democracy yield to fascism, Nazism and communism. Our one advantage is that we might learn...

"A bold guide to how we must re-envision citizenship if American democracy is to survive The United States faces dangerous threats from Russia, China, North Korea, Iran, terrorists, climate change, and future pandemics, but the greatest peril to the country comes not from abroad but from within, from none other than ourselves. The question facing us is whether we are prepared to do what is necessary to save our democracy. The Bill of Obligations is...

Benjamin R. Barber is Whitman Professor of Political Science and Director of the Walt Whitman Center for the Culture and Politics of Democracy at Rutgers University. Among his many books are The Conquest of Politics (Princeton), which collects his philosophical essays, An Aristocracy of Everyone, and Jihad vs. McWorld. Benjamin Barber is one of America's preeminent political theorists. He has been a significant voice in the continuing debate about...

In 1831, Alexis de Tocqueville and Gustave de Beaumont spent nine months in the U.S. studying American prisons on behalf of the French government. They investigated not just the prison system but indeed every aspect of American public and private life - the political, economic, religious, cultural, and above all the social life of the young nation. From Tocqueville's copious notes came Democracy in America. This English-only edition of Democracy in...

Between 1898 and 1918, many American states introduced the initiative, referendum, and recall--known collectively as direct democracy. Most interpreters have seen the motives for these reform measures as purely political, but Thomas Goebel demonstrates that the call for direct democracy was deeply rooted in antimonopoly sentiment. Frustrated with the governmental corruption and favoritism that facilitated the rise of monopolies, advocates of direct...

An activist and a philosopher discuss how privatization harms society and how we can challenge it. Privatization has been on the right-wing agenda for years. Health care, schools, Social Security, public lands, the military, prisons-all are considered fair game. Through stories, analysis, impassioned argument-even song lyrics-Si Kahn and Elizabeth Minnich show that corporations are, by their very nature, unable to fulfill effectively what have traditionally...

Argues that real change can only come when party lines are ignored and people from both sides of the aisle band together to enact common sense policies.