The United States has always taken pride in being a model of democracy. However, presidential systems are more closely associated with dictatorship and single-party rule in other parts of the world like Latin America and Africa. Indeed, democratic practices more often flourish in parliamentary systems, and the United States remains the only advanced, industrialized democracy with a presidential system instead of a parliamentary organization.

Each of the 21 chapters in "Importing Democracy: Ideas from Around the World to Reform and Revitalize American Politics and Government" highlights...

"Manufacturing Green Prosperity: The Power to Rebuild the American Middle Class" connects two critical issues: the importance of manufacturing to the growth and fair distribution of national wealth and the need to create an environmentally sustainable society. In so doing, the book offers groundbreaking arguments demonstrating the centrality of manufacturing and shows ways in which creating a green economy will rebuild U.S. manufacturing and expand the middle class.

Drawing from the fields of political science, economics, ecology, history, engineering, and philosophy, the author...

"Solving the Climate Crisis through Social Change: Public Investment in Social Prosperity to Cool a Fevered Planet" offers a new approach to battling the climate crisis, arguing that the massive waste that caused the current environmental crisis resulted not only from fundamental structural flaws in markets but also from social inequality, lack of democracy, and a deeply flawed foreign policy. Rather than providing the typical doomsday perspective, it offers realistic optimism about the expanding climate crisis, highlighting the convergence between the necessary steps to save the planet...

Despite a decade of political technology's celebrated triumphs--such as online fundraising of the presidential campaigns of McCain in 2000, Dean in 2003, and Obama in 2008; or the web-enabled, socially networked campaign of Obama 2008--the field of e-politics is still at an unsolidified stage.

"Margin of Victory: How Technologists Help Politicians Win Elections" offers an unprecedented insiders' view of the fast-changing role of political technology that explains how innovations in the use of new media, software tools, data, and analytics hold yet untapped potential. Contributions from...

"The Middle Class Fights Back: How Progressive Movements Can Restore Democracy in America" presents an unapologetic and coherent analysis of American state capitalism. Is there a way to stop politicians, corporate CEOs, and predatory investors from plunging the entire world further into a new economic dark age? According to author, teacher, and political scientist Brian D'Agostino, PhD, the answer is "yes."

His book identifies the policies undermining middle class prosperity, demolishes their protective ideologies, and offers a visionary but pragmatic agenda of policy and institutional...