Political Science Quarterly

 

Number 4, Winter 1997-98

• The Transition to Republican Rule in the House: Implications for Theories of Congressional Politics

  John H. Aldrich and David W. Rohde examine the revisions in the rules of the House of Representatives and the Republican Party Conference imposed by the Republican majority when it took control of the House after the 1994 elections. From this analysis, they draw inferences about support for competing theories of congressional politics.

• Complexity and the Analysis of Political and Social Life

  Robert Jervis argues that in policy analysis we too often overlook the complex dynamics and interactions that characterize political and social systems. Focusing on complexity and interaction in a system leads to a greater understanding of human activities, more methodological sophistication, and better guidelines for action.

• Prospects for Elite--Driven Democracy in South Africa

  Jeffrey Herbst looks at the pact that led to South Africa's first nonracial government in 1994. He finds that much of the optimism surrounding democratic transitions in Latin America is not justified in South Africa, because South African leaders have much more difficulty managing their respective constituencies.

• Do Economic Crises Contribute to Economic Reform? Argentina and Venezuela in the 1990s

  Javier Corrales questions the claim that deep economic crises pave the wavy for successful implementation of economic reforms. By looking at Argentina and Venezuela, he argues that a better predictor of the implementation of reform is whether the president resolves political differences with the ruling party.

• Bargaining for Social Rights: Unions and the Reemergence of Welfare Capitalism, 1945-1952

  Michael K. Brown analyzes why American unions acted to put employee benefits on the bargaining table in the 1940s and why that strategy was supported by President Truman and northern Democracts in Congress. The author argues that union leaders were motivated to obtain private social benefits such as health insurance in order to ensure the security of union membership, a question that was reopened when the closed shop was outlawed by the Taft-Hartley Act. Paradoxically, this union policy helped defeat Truman's efforts to enact national health insurance.

• Opinion: Netanyahu, A Palestinian State, and Israeli Security Reassessed

  In one of our occasional opinion essays, Jerome Slater discusses the arguments for and against a Palestinian state as the solution to the Arab-Israeli conflict. He argues that an appropriately structured Palestinian state would enhance rather than threaten Israel's national security.

   

  Book Reviews

• Orfield, Gary, Susan E. Eaton, and the Harvard Project on School Desegregation, Dismantling Desegregation: The Quiet Reversal of Brown v. Board of Education
  Reviewed by Paul Teske

• Bader, John B., Taking the Initiative: Leadership Agendas in Congress and the "Contract with America"
  Reviewed by James G. Gimpel

• Domínguez, Jorge I. and Marc Lindenberg, eds., Democratic Transitions in Central America
  Reviewed by Consuelo Cruz

• Iriye, Akira, Cultural Internationalism and World Order
  Reviewed by Thomas Schoonover

• Pomper, Gerald M., et al., The Election of 1996: Reports and Interpretations
  Reviewed by Norman R. Luttbeg

• Andersen, Kristi, After Suffrage: Women in Partisan and Electoral Politics before the New Deal
  Reviewed by Jane Junn

• Klinkner, Philip A., Midterm: The Elections of 1994 in Context
  Reviewed by James E. Campbell

• Larkin, Bruce D., Nuclear Designs: Great Britain, France, and China in the Global Governance of Nuclear Arms
  Reviewed by Jim Walsh

• Agüero, Felipe, Soldiers, Civilians, and Democracy: Post-Franco Spain in Comparative Perspective
  Reviewed by W. Rand Smith

• Medrano, Juan Díez, Divided Nations: Class, Politics, and Nationalism in the Basque Country and Catalonia
  Reviewed by W. Rand Smith

• Picard, Elizabeth, Lebanon: A Shattered Country
  Reviewed by Michael C. Hudson

• Reeher, Grant, Narratives of Justice: Legislators' Beliefs about Distributive Fairness
  Reviewed by Kay Lehman Schlozman

• Richardson, Louise, When Allies Differ: Anglo-American Relations during the Suez and Falklands Crises
  Reviewed by Gene A. Sessions

• Smith, Gordon B., Reforming the Russian Legal System
  Reviewed by Peter Juviler

• Herspring, Dale R., Russian Civil-Military Relations
  Reviewed by Laura V. Swartz

• Gaiduk, Ilya V., The Soviet Union and the Vietnam War
  Reviewed by Fredrik Logevall

• Ndulu, Benno, Nicolas van de Walle et al., Agenda for Africa's Economic Renewal
  Reviewed by David Leonard

• Reischauer, Robert D., ed., Setting National Priorities: Budget Choices for the Next Century
  Reviewed by Robert C. Lowry

• Binder, Sarah A. and Steven S. Smith, Politics or Principle? Filibustering in the United States Senate
  Reviewed by J. Mark Wrighton

• Dumbrell, John, American Foreign Policy: Carter to Clinton
  Reviewed by Walter LaFeber

• Ake, Claude, Democracy and Development in Africa
  Reviewed by Frank Holmquist

• Bimber, Bruce, The Politics of Expertise in Congress: The Rise and Fall of the Office of Technology Assessment
  Reviewed by William T. Golden

• Rozell, Mark J. and Clyde Wilcox, Second Coming: The New Christian Right in Virginia Politics
  Reviewed by Corwin Smidt

• Sparer, Michael S., Medicaid and the Limits of State Health Reform
  Reviewed by James W. Fossett

• Teles, Steven M., Whose Welfare? AFDC and Elite Politics
  Reviewed by Donna Wilson Kirchheimer

• Roman, Peter, Eisenhower and the Missile Gap
  Reviewed by Christopher Preble

• Mastny, Vojtech, The Cold War and Soviet Insecurity: The Stalin Years
  Reviewed by Melvyn P. Leffler

• Clarke, Simon, et al., The Workers' Movement in Russia
  Reviewed by Walter D. Connor

• Connor, Walter D., Tattered Banners: Labor, Conflict, and Corporatism in Postcommunist Russia
  Reviewed by Leonard Benardo

• Thurston, Robert W., Life and Terror in Stalin's Russia: 1934-1941
  Reviewed by Andrea Chandler

• Kertzer, David E., Politics and Symbols: The Italian Communist Party and the Fall of Communism
  Reviewed by Alexander de Grand

• Sheehan, Michael, The Balance of Power: History and Theory
  Reviewed by Norman Rich

• Peterson, Susan, Crisis Bargaining and the State: The Domestic Politics of International Conflict
  Reviewed by Joe D. Hagan

• Bell-Fialkoff, Andrew, Ethnic Cleansing
  Reviewed by Roy Licklider

• Hauptmann, Emily, Putting Choice Before Democracy: A Critique of Rational Choice Theory
  Reviewed by Carole Pateman

• Pollack, Sheldon D., The Failure of U.S. Tax Policy: Revenue and Politics
  Reviewed by Jane Gravelle

• Rothstein, Bo, The Social Democratic State: The Swedish Model and the Bureaucratic Problem of Social Reforms
  Reviewed by Tim Tilton