The president as statesman

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Justus D. Doenecke

When war broke out in Europe in 1914, political leaders in the United States were swayed by popular opinion to remain neutral; yet less than three years later, the nation declared war on Germany. In this book, the author examines the clash of opinions over the war during this transformative period and offers a fresh perspective on America's decision to enter World War I. He reappraises the public and private diplomacy of President Woodrow Wilson and his closest advisors and explores in great depth the response of Congress to the war. He also investigates the debates that raged in the popular media and among citizen groups that sprang up across the country as the U.S. economy was threatened by European blockades and as Americans died on ships sunk by German U-boats. The decision to engage in battle ultimately belonged to Wilson, but as the author demonstrates, Wilson's choice was not made in isolation. This work provides an examination of America's internal political climate and its changing international role during the seminal period of 1914-1917.

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Maria Raquel Freire and Roger E. Kanet

This volume explores Russia's re-emergence as a major actor in Central Asia and the Caucasus - a re-emergence which is limited by the involvement and influence of external state and non-state actors, including China, the USA and foreign energy companies.

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E.H. Kossmann

"What political theories did the Dutch develop in the seventeenth century, to describe and justify the existence of a republic that in one generation had grown conspicuously in wealth and power? In this book, the author shows the meaning of political philosophy for a new and surprisingly energetic state." "The first essay is a study of Dutch political theory in the seventeenth century and is based on an analysis of publications in law and philosophy dating from the 1660s to the 1690s. The second essay studies the Dutch concept of popular sovereignty in the early seventeenth century, whereas the third considers the Dutch seventeenth and eighteenth-century views on the nature of a republic. These three essays, previously published as independent articles, are brought together here for the first time in English. An introduction has been added in which the author places the original texts in a new perspective"--Book jacket.

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Aristophanes

The women of Athens concoct a daring scheme: to infiltrate the male-dominated Assembly disguised as men and to vote themselves into power, after which they will overturn the old laws and inaugurate a new society where all are equal and where property - sex, too! - is shared. This new translation by Robert Mayhew of one of playwright Aristophanes' last surviving plays recaptures the spirit, the bawdiness, and the brilliance of this rollicking farce which is at the same time a profound critique of contemporary Greek customs and manners. A full introduction and explanatory notes provide important background material on communistic ideas current in fifth- and fourth-century B.C.E. Greek thought as well as on historical and other details relevant to the text.