Nolan McCarty

Howard Rosenthal

Keith T. Poole

An analysis of how the increasing polarization of American politics has been accompanied and accelerated by greater income inequality, rising immigration, and other social and economic changes.

The Dance of Ideology and Unequal Riches

Polarized America

Behind every financial crisis lurks a "political bubble"--policy biases that foster market behaviors leading to financial instability. Rather than tilting against risky behavior, political bubbles--arising from a potent combination of beliefs, institutions, and interests--aid, abet, and amplify risk. Demonstrating how political bubbles helped create the real estate-generated financial bubble and the 2008 financial crisis, this book argues that similar government oversights in the aftermath of the crisis undermined Washington's response to the "popped" financial bubble, and shows how such patterns have occurred repeatedly throughout US history. The authors show that just as financial bubbles are an unfortunate mix of mistaken beliefs, market imperfections, and greed, political bubbles are the product of rigid ideologies, unresponsive and ineffective government institutions, and special interests. Financial market innovations--including adjustable-rate mortgages, mortgage-backed securities, and credit default swaps--become subject to legislated leniency and regulatory failure, increasing hazardous practices. The authors shed important light on the politics that blinds regulators to the economic weaknesses that create the conditions for economic bubbles and recommend simple, focused rules that should help avoid such crises in the future. The first full accounting of how politics produces financial ruptures, Political Bubbles offers timely lessons that all sectors would do well to heed.

Financial Crises and the Failure of American Democracy

Political Bubbles

Updated analysis of how the increasing polarization of American politics has been accompanied and accelerated by greater income inequality. The idea of America as politically polarized—that there is an unbridgeable divide between right and left, red and blue states—has become a cliché. What commentators miss, however, is that increasing polarization has been closely accompanied by fundamental social and economic changes—most notably, a parallel rise in income inequality. In this second edition of Polarized America, Nolan McCarty, Keith Poole, and Howard Rosenthal use the latest data to examine the relationships of polarization, wealth disparity, immigration, and other forces. They find that inequality feeds directly into political polarization, and polarization in turn creates policies that further increase inequality. Paul Krugman called the first edition of Polarized America “Important.... Essential reading for anyone who wants to understand what's happening to America.” The second edition has been thoroughly brought up to date. All statistical analyses, tables, and figures have been updated with data that run through 2012 or 2014, and the text has been revised to reflect the latest evidence. The chapter on campaign finance has been completely rewritten (with Adam Bonica as coauthor); the analysis shows that with so much “soft” money coming from very wealthy ideological extremists, there is even greater campaign contribution inequality than income inequality.

Polarized America, second edition

Adam Meirowitz

Political Game Theory is a self-contained introduction to game theory and its applications to political science. The book presents choice theory, social choice theory, static and dynamic games of complete information, static and dynamic games of incomplete information, repeated games, bargaining theory, mechanism design and a mathematical appendix covering, logic, real analysis, calculus and probability theory. The methods employed have many applications in various disciplines including comparative politics, international relations and American politics. Political Game Theory is tailored to students without extensive backgrounds in mathematics, and traditional economics, however there are also many special sections that present technical material that will appeal to more advanced students. A large number of exercises are also provided to practice the skills and techniques discussed.

An Introduction

Political Game Theory

Frances E. Lee

Analyzes how rising party polarization, unequal representation, and economic inequalities affect the performance of American governing institutions.

Can America Govern Itself?

The 2016 election of Donald J. Trump invoked a time for reflection about the state of American politics and its deep ideological, cultural, racial, regional, and economic divisions. But one aspect that the contemporary discussions often miss is that these fissures have been opening over several decades and are deeply rooted in the structure of American politics and society. In Polarization: What Everyone Needs to Know® Nolan McCarty takes readers through what scholars know and don't know about the origins, development, and implications of our rising political conflicts, delving into social, economic, and geographic determinants of polarization in the United States. While the current political climate seems to suggest that extreme views are becoming more popular, McCarty also argues that, contrary to popular belief, the 2016 election was a natural outgrowth of 40 years of polarized politics, rather than a significant break with the past. He evaluates arguments over which factors that have created this state of affairs, including gerrymandered legislative districts, partisan primary nomination systems, and our private campaign finance system. He also considers the potential of major reforms such as instating proportional representation or ranked choice voting to remedy extreme polarization. A concise overview of a complex and crucial topic in US politics, this book is for anyone wanting to understand how to repair the cracks in our system.

Nolan McCarty

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