American Grace: How Religion Divides and Unites Us
David Campbell, with Robert Putnam
Associate Professor
Unique among nations, America is deeply religious, religiously diverse, and remarkably tolerant. But in recent decades, the nation’s religious landscape has been reshaped, resulting in a growing polarization. At the same time, personal interfaith ties are strengthening—interfaith marriage has increased while religious identities have become more fluid. Putnam and Campbell show how this denser web of personal ties brings surprising interfaith tolerance, notwithstanding the so-called “culture wars.” Using two of the most comprehensive surveys ever conducted on religion and public life in America, Campbell and Putnam use in-depth profiles of diverse congregations across the country to show how the trends they describe affect the lives of real Americans.
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The New York Times Sunday Book Review
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Skeletons in the Closet: Transitional Justice in Post-Communist Europe
Monika Nalepa
Assistant Professor
In this book, Nalepa tackles three puzzles of “pacted” transitions to democracy. She argues that infiltration of the opposition with collaborators of the authoritarian regime can serve as insurance against transitional justice, making their commitments to amnesty credible. This explanation also accounts for the timing of transitional justice across East Central Europe. Nalepa supports her theory using a combination of elite interviews, archival evidence, and statistical analysis of survey experiments in Poland, Hungary, and the Czech Republic.
—Cambridge University Press, 2010
Unchopping a Tree: Reconciliation in the Aftermath of Political Violence
Ernesto Verdeja
Assistant Professor
A common feature of political mass murder has been the attempt to destroy any memory of victims, with the aim of erasing them from history. Perpetrators seek not only to eliminate a perceived threat but also to eradicate any possibility of alternate, competing social and national histories. In this book, Verdeja explores the balance between punishment and forgiveness and what the stakes are in reconciling. Developing a normative theory of reconciliation that differs from prevailing approaches, he outlines a concept that emphasizes the importance of shared notions of moral respect and tolerance among adversaries in transitional societies. Drawing from reconciliation efforts around the world, Verdeja debates how best to envision reconciliation while taking into account the very significant practical obstacles that confront such efforts.
—Temple University Press, 2009
God and the Founders: Madison, Washington, and Jefferson
Vincent Phillip Muñoz
Tocqueville Associate Professor of Religion and Public Life
Did the founding fathers intend to build a “wall of separation” between church and state? Are public Ten Commandments displays or the phrase “under God” in the Pledge of Allegiance consistent with the founders’ understandings of religious freedom? Muñoz answers these questions by providing comprehensive analyses and interpretations of James Madison’s, George Washington’s, and Thomas Jefferson’s public documents, private writings, and political actions—and explains the founders’ competing church-state political philosophies. He explores how the founders agreed and disagreed by showing how their different principles of religious freedom would decide the Supreme Court’s most important First Amendment religion cases.
—Cambridge University Press, 2009
Global Activism Reader
Luc Reydams
Associate Professional Specialist
The Global Activism Reader is a collection of essays on the various causes, actors, and strategies in transnational social mobilization and counter-mobilization. Weaving theory with case studies, the work discusses labor, the environment, human rights, women’s rights, arms control and disarmament, and social justice and democracy. The book addresses undergraduate students in political science and international relations, particularly those taking courses on transnational activism, social movements, globalization, NGOs, and global governance. It will allow undergraduate students not only to learn about various contemporary movements, but also to develop a theoretical perspective to understand them.