Results by title

162 books match the query 'Comparative Politics' and 6 start with w

cover of Walking the Gendered Tightrope: Theresa May and Nancy Pelosi as Legislative Leaders

Walking the Gendered Tightrope

Theresa May and Nancy Pelosi as Legislative Leaders

Melissa Haussman and Karen M. Kedrowski

University of Michigan Press, 2023

Walking the Gendered Tightrope analyzes the gendered expectations for women in high offices through the examples of British Prime Minister Theresa May and U.S. Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi. Even at their highest positions, and while completing their greatest achievements, both May and Pelosi faced gendered critiques and intraparty challenges to their leadership. While other books have analyzed the barriers to higher office that women face, this book reveals how women in positions of power are still forced to balance feminine stereotypes with the perception of power as masculine in order to prove their legitimacy. By examining intraparty dynamics, this book offers a unique comparison between a majoritarian presidential and Westminster parliamentary system. While their parties promoted Pelosi and May to highlight their progressive values, both women faced continually gendered critiques about their abilities to lead their caucuses on difficult policy issues, such as the Affordable Care Act and two Trump impeachment votes for Nancy Pelosi, or finishing Brexit for Theresa May. Grounded in the legislative literature from the United States and Britain, as well as historical accounts and personal interviews, Walking the Gendered Tightrope contributes to the fields of gender and politics, legislative studies, American politics, and British politics. 
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cover of What Holds Europe Together?

What Holds Europe Together?

Krzysztof Michalski

Central European University Press, 2006

The book addresses contemporary developments in European identity politics as part of a larger historical trajectory of a common European identity based on the idea of 'solidarity.' The authors explain the special sense in which Europeans perceive their obligations to their less fortunate compatriots, to the new East European members, and to the world at large. An understanding of this notion of 'solidarity' is critical to understanding the specific European commitment to social justice and equality. The specificity of this term helps to distinguish between what the Germans call "social state" from the Anglo-Saxon, and particularly American, political and social system focused on capitalism and economic liberalism. This collection is the result of the work of an extremely distinguished group of scholars and politicians, invited by the previous President of the European Union, Romano Prodi, to reflect on some of the most important subjects affecting the future of Europe.
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cover of What Is Africa’s Problem

What Is Africa’s Problem

Yoweri K. Museveni

University of Minnesota Press, 2000

The president of Uganda addresses key questions about Africa’s future.

Recent seismic shifts in Congo and Rwanda have exposed the continued volatility of the state of affairs in central Africa. As African states have shaken off their postcolonial despots, new leaders with sweeping ideas about a pan-African alliance have emerged-and yet the internecine struggles go on. What is Africa’s problem? As one of the leaders expressing a broad and forceful vision for Africa’s future, Uganda’s Yoweri K. Museveni is perhaps better placed than anyone in the world to address the very question his book poses.

In 1986, after more than a decade of armed struggle, a rebellion led by Museveni toppled the dictatorship of Idi Amin, and Museveni, at 42, became president of Uganda, a country at that time in near total disarray. Since then, Uganda has made remarkable strides in political, civic, and economic arenas, and Museveni has assumed the role of "the éminence grise of the new leadership in central Africa" (Philip Gourevitch, New Yorker). As such, he has proven a powerful force for change, not just in Uganda but across the turbulent span of African states.This collection of Museveni’s writings and speeches lays out the possibilities for social change in Africa. Working with a broad historical understanding and an intimate knowledge of the problems at hand, Museveni describes how movements can be formed to foster democracy, how class consciousness can transcend tribal differences in the development of democratic institutions, and how the politics of identity operate in postcolonial Africa. Museveni’s own contributions to the overthrow of Zaire’s Mobutu Sese Seko and to the political transformation of Uganda suggest the kind of change that may sweep Africa in decades to come. What Is Africa’s Problem? gives a firsthand look at what those changes might be, how they might come about, and what they might mean.
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cover of What Makes or Breaks a Democracy: Lessons from Hungary

What Makes or Breaks a Democracy

Lessons from Hungary

Andras Schweitzer

Central European University Press, 2026

Democracy has been in global decline for two decades. Why? Is it because of the emergence of populist leaders? Rising inequalities? The spread of illiberalism? Social media? Identity politics? This book investigates the potential causes while focusing on a peculiar case.
Hungary is unique in that it democratized quickly and thoroughly in 1989–1990, then, after two decades, it turned into an electoral autocracy. A new democratic era could be in the making after the April 2026 election. This book evaluates potential factors involved in these turnarounds by analyzing the post-1989 Hungarian trajectory and comparing it to other countries of the region.
If the dramatic backsliding is connected to social cultural aspects, how could democracy take root after 1989? If constitutional arrangements helped the subsequent autocratization, how was the Hungarian setup different from that in neighboring countries? Did Budapest mismanage the economy? Is Viktor Orbán unique? The findings in this book lead to universal lessons on how to build and protect democracy.
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cover of What Women Want: Gender and Voting in Britain, Japan and the United States

What Women Want

Gender and Voting in Britain, Japan and the United States

Gill Steel

University of Michigan Press, 2022

What Women Want analyzes decades of voting preferences, values, and policy preferences to debunk some of the media and academic myths about gender gaps in voting and policy preferences. Findings show that no single theory explains when differences in women’s and men’s voting preferences emerge, when they do not, or when changes—or the lack thereof—occur over time. Steel extends existing theories to create a broader framework for thinking about gender and voting behavior to provide more analytical purchase in understanding gender and its varying effects on individual voters’ preferences. She incorporates the long-term effects of party identification and class politics on political decision-making, particularly in how they influence preferences on social provision and on expectations of the state. She also points to the importance of symbolic politics

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cover of World Crisis Effects on Social Security in Latin America and the Caribbean: Lessons and Policies

World Crisis Effects on Social Security in Latin America and the Caribbean

Lessons and Policies

Carmelo Mesa-Lago

University of London Press, 2010

Written by a top scholar on social security in Latin America and the Caribbean, this book assesses the effects of the world economic crisis on social security and welfare in the region. Drawing on the impact of and lessons from previous crises, Carmelo Mesa-Lago identifies the strengths and weakness of Latin American social security before the current global crisis. He evaluates the event's actual and potential effects on pensions, health care, and social assistance programs, based on a taxonomy of three groups of countries. The book ends with a summary of policies adopted by some countries and the author's own recommendations on social policies to lessen the adverse outcomes of the financial crisis. Latin America's pioneering social-welfare reforms make this book important for other regions of the world, both developed and developing.
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