Challenges of minority governments in Canada

Sample

Yegor Gaidar

"Yegor Gaidar, one of Russia's first post-Soviet prime ministers and principal architect of its historic transformation to a market economy, here presents his account of governing in the tumultuous early 1990s. Though still in his forties, Gaidar has already played a pivotal role in contemporary Russian political history, championing the cause of dramatic economic reform, aggressive privatization of state enterprises, and painful fiscal discipline in the face of widespread popular resistance."--BOOK JACKET. "Gaidar remains active in Russian politics, having formed his own political party, Russia's Democratic Choice. In this book, he brings his story through Yeltsin's cliffhanger re-election in 1996, and assesses the still-precarious state of the market reforms and democratic politics."--BOOK JACKET.

Sample

Washington Irving

Originally published in five volumes between 1853 and 1859, it is a treasure chest of information on Washington and the Civil War. This work is presumeably the most intimate and fascinating biography of a man who worked his way from an Army commander to the first President of the United States.

Sample

William Mervin Gumede

In this book Gumede explains how Mbeki has sought to mould the ANC into his image through tight control, and exposes the intrigues behind the battle for succession. Covering Mbeki's attempts to modernise the economy and kick-start an African Renaissance, and investigating his controversial stance on issues from AIDS to Zimbabwe, the book offers invaluable insights into the arcane machinations behind political decisions that touch the lives of millions every day.

Sample

James M. Youngdale

"Populism, according to Dr. James Youngsdale, was a pivotal force in the watershed separating nineteenth-century petty capitalism and laissez-faire liberalism from twentieth-century progressivism. It was not, Youngsdale asserts, "merely a heightened expression of middle-class disillusionment and rebelliousness," as Richard Hofstadter contends; nor was it "a glorious chapter in the struggle for human rights," as Norman Pollack idealizes it. Youngsdale's own view of populism as reflecting a shift in social and economic attitudes is in the vein of William Appleman Williams' interpretation of American history. Extending from the Civil War through the 1930s, Dr. Youngsdale's study focuses on the developments in the upper midwestern states, particularly the rise of the Minnesota Farmer Labor Party, "the most significant and successful attempt" to organize a populist third party movement in the United States. But this book is more than a forceful and thoroughgoing study of populism. It is equally an exposition of the author's theory of history as a process of "overlapping paradigms." From a synthesis of Thomas Kuhn's concept of paradigm revolutions and Alfred Adler's goal-oriented psychology, Dr. Youngdale proposes a new version of psychohistory that sees people striving for psychic homeostasis in a world of competing paradigms. Capable of a broad application, this model is offered particularly as a needed methodology for the field of American studies."--Book jacket.