Labor unions, partisan coalitions and market reforms in Latin America

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Gino G. Raymond

"Chronicles foretelling the death of the French Communist Party have been a staple part of the literature on the Left in France since the 1980s, when the party began to lose control over the dissident voices in its own ranks and had to face the evidence of its failure at the ballot box. The collapse of the Berlin Wall and the demise of the Soviet Union reinforced the belief that the party had lost its raison d'etre and therefore any enduring hope of survival. Nonetheless, the party emerged from the elections of 2004 in France on a much more even keel than those parties to its left which had been tipped to overtake it. Instead of viewing the party in isolation, Raymond treats it as part of the host society whose evolution invariably impacts on its fortunes and suggests that the obituaries for communism in France may be premature."--Jacket.

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Lyman Tower Sargent

An innovative departure from traditional approaches to political thought, Lyman Tower Sargent's groundbreaking anthology includes minority ideologies and positions where they occurred historically. By interweaving minority voices with majority documents rather than grouping them separately, Political Thought in the United States presents us with a uniquely organic portrait of American political life. Beginning with the time of the explorers and early settlers, the volume presents the political beliefs and ideologies of religious minorities, women, North American Indians, and African Americans as fundamental components of American thought. Emphasizing that such minority perspectives never melted together into the mainstream, Sargent subscribes to a "tossed salad" approach which emphasizes the distinctness of minority opinions. Sargent's introductory comments, which preface the selections, serve as connecting narratives and help the reader follow ideological disputes as they occurred, revealing a historical continuum and enriching our understanding of contemporary politics.

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Nicholas Atkin and Frank Tallett

"This revised and updated work shows how the resurgence of the French Far Right has a long pedigree and has entered into all areas of political, social, cultural and religious life, flourishing on concepts of race and nationhood. While the French Right, like most political movements and sets of ideas, may not have a coherent, consistent and dogmatic structure with a single ideology, there are powerful connecting links throughout modern French history. These stretch from Legitimatist support for the Bourbon monarchy, a nostalgia for imperialism, the occasional craving for a 'man of order', to the kind of rabid anti-semitism that produced the Dreyfus affair, and support for Petain's pro Nazi Vichy regime or the right-wing zealotry over Algeria which challenged de Gaulle. Le Pen's Front National is just the latest incarnation of a familiar demon. The Right in France is vital reading for anyone concerned with its re-emergence."--BOOK JACKET.

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Junko Kato

Through a detailed account of the political battles over Japanese tax reform during the last two decades, Junko Kato draws an unconventional portrait of bureaucratic motivation, showing how fiscal bureaucrats exploit their unique technical knowledge to influence policymaking. Rejecting the notion that the monopolization of policy expertise leads to bureaucratic domination, Kato contends that bureaucrats seek to increase their influence upon politicians by strategically sharing information. She also explores the reason for the relative strength of the bureaucratic organization in comparison to the governing party, whose interest in reelections and intra-party politics may pose dilemmas for individual politicians. In 1989, the Japanese Diet enacted a broad-based consumption tax after two failed attempts and in the face of widespread public disapproval. Its passage was all the more remarkable for coming just as a series of dramatic financial scandals had begun to undermine popular support for the ruling Liberal Democratic Party, foreshadowing its fall from power four years later. Kato argues that skillful maneuvering by the Ministry of Finance, determined to ensure stable long-term revenues, was decisive in persuading a majority of legislators to oppose their constituents in endorsing an unpopular program of tax reform. Her careful analysis of the Japanese case holds important implications for the study of bureaucratic power and public policy in advanced industrial democracies elsewhere in East Asia and the West.