Approaching Democracy
Democracy cannot be taken for granted, whether at home or internationally, and eternal vigilance (along with civic intelligence) is required to protect it. Approaching Democracy provides students with a framework to analyze the structure, process, and action of US government, institutions, and social movements. It also invites comparison with other countries. This globalizing perspective gives students an understanding of issues of governance and challenges to democracy here and elsewhere. At a moment of political hyper-partisanship, economic tensions, media misinformation, hyper-partisanship, and anxieties about the future of civil rights, this is the ideal time to introduce Approaching Democracy--a textbook based on Vaclav Havel’s powerful metaphor of democracy as an ideal and the American experiment as the closest approach to it--to a new generation of political science undergraduate students.
NEW TO THE TENTH EDITION
- Updated to reflect the results of the 2022 midterm elections and explore the implications of Congressional redistricting, voting suppression, and voting rights legislation
- Covers the first two years of the Biden administration and provides a thorough retrospective on the Trump presidency—including updates on the January 6 Commission findings and the Justice department’s investigation into Trump’s alleged misappropriation of classified government documents
- Presents the developments on the Supreme Court including the appointment of its two newest justices and major recent decisions including controversial rulings on reproductive health, the separation of church and state, and the environment
- Explores the revival of NATO and other international alliances in the context of the Russian invasion of Ukraine
- New and updated material has also been provided regarding gun control, healthcare, labor rights, immigration, economic policy, COVID-19’s lingering impacts, and the ongoing struggle for social and racial justice in America
Larry Berman is Professor Emeritus at the University of California, Davis, and former Founding Dean of the Honors College at Georgia State University.
Bruce Allen Murphy is the Fred Morgan Kirby Professor of Civil Rights in the Department of Government and Law at Lafayette College.
Nadia E. Brown is a Professor of Government, director of the Women’s and Gender Studies Program and affiliate in the African American Studies program at Georgetown University.
Sarah Allen Gershon is Associate Professor of Political Science and holds the Ray and John Uttenhove WomenLead professorship at Georgia State University.