Road Work

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John Anthony Maltese

"Determined not to let the press shape the public's view of his presidency, Richard Nixon established the White House Office of Communications soon after his inauguration in 1969. The media's grim portrayals of Vietnam, coupled with Nixon's own personal grievances against the press, led him to charge the new office with the task of controlling the information flow from the executive branch. Although the composition and jurisdiction of this sophisticated public relations agency have fluctuated with each administration, every president since Nixon--Democratic and Republican--has used the Office of Communications to put a favorable "spin" on presidential news. In Spin Control, John Maltese chronicles the development of this powerful White House office and its pivotal role in molding our perception of the modern presidency. The Office of Communications manages the news, ensuring consistency from the executive branch by determining a "line-of-the-day" to be followed by members of the administration, clearing the appearance of public officials on talk shows, and staging presidential appearances to create "photo opportunities" and "sound-bites." Using up-to-the-minute polling data, the office also targets messages to particular constituencies. For instance, it provides local television stations with satellite interviews of administration officials and distributes op-ed columns, press releases, and camera-ready graphics to specialized media markets. In so doing, the office has become an effective vehicle for building presidential power. Maltese concludes that the history of the Office of Communications illustrates how the public side of the presidency has become increasingly stage-managed. Presidents can now subtly orchestrate the symbolic spectacle of politics, set the terms of political debate, and more rapidly adjust their policies to changes in public sentiment. Drawing upon thousands of revealing archival documents and candid interviews with a wide range of White House officials including Gerald Ford, Dick Cheney, Larry Speakes, Ron Ziegler, and Charles Colson, Maltese exposes a distinctly modern form of presidential control."--Jacket.

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David Grimsted

"American Mobbing, 1828-1861: Toward Civil War is a comprehensive history of mob violence related to sectional issues in antebellum America. David Grimsted argues that, though the issue of slavery provoked riots in both the North and the South, the riots produced two different reactions from authorities. In the South, riots against suspected abolitionists and slave insurrectionists were widely tolerated as a means of quelling anti-slavery sentiment. In the North, both pro-slavery riots attacking abolitionists and anti-slavery riots in support of fugitive slaves provoked reluctant but often effective riot suppression. Hundreds died in riots in both regions, but in the North, most deaths were caused by authorities, while in the South more than 90 percent of deaths were caused by the mobs themselves.". "These two divergent systems of violence led to two distinct public responses. In the South, widespread rioting quelled public and private questioning of slavery; in the North, the milder, more controlled riots generally encouraged sympathy for the anti-slavery movement. Grimsted demonstrates that in these two distinct reactions to mob violence lay major sources of the social split that infiltrated politics and political rioting and that ultimately led to the Civil War."--BOOK JACKET.

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Ibrahim Seaga Shaw

Drawing on case studies of the reporting of distant humanitarian interventions, especially in Eastern Europe and Africa by the mainstream Western media, €Ibrahim Shaw illuminates how journalists can create a more informed and empowered public sphere. He argues that journalists do not only hold the power to inform the public, but have the moral responsibility as duty bearers to educate and increase awareness of their rights and monitor, investigate and report all human rights violations. It is the first book to exclusively and critically explore the role of the media in the promotion and protection of human rights. Drawing on Kant's cosmopolitan principle of global justice, Shaw puts forward the case for human rights journalism as a more proactive approach in prioritising the deconstruction of indirect structural and cultural violence, and as the best way of preventing or minimising direct political violence.

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Edmund J. Hull

Since its inception, al Qaeda has aspired to create a safe haven in Yemen,where it has operated against U.S. and Yemeni interests. From 2001 to 2004, when Edmund J. Hull was the American ambassador to Yemen, U.S. and Yemeni counterterrorism efforts successfully seized the initiative against al Qaeda, severely degrading its capabilities. During this period, al Qaeda mounted no successful operations against U.S. interests in Yemen and suffered the loss of its top leadership and cadres. High-Value Target tells the inside story of how al Qaeda's Yemeni safe haven was disrupted during Hull's tenure. A top counterterrorism official in both the Clinton and Bush administrations, Hull provides a detailed account of a team effort to build a strategic basis for U.S.-Yemeni counterterrorism and to execute a broad strategy aimed at improving not only the security of Yemen but also its economic development.That strategy included launching successful strikes against al Qaeda's leadership; engaging in sustained, personal involvement in Yemen's remote tribal areas; and fostering Yemen's nascent democracy and civil society. Plagued by profound distrust, scarce resources, and constant threats, the U.S. diplomatic team encountered numerous obstacles but ultimately positioned Yemen on a path toward enhanced security and modest political progress. - Publisher.