In the Name of Democracy
In the Name of Democracy

Author: Jeremy Brecher

Publisher: Metropolitan Books

Published: 2007-04-01

Total Pages: 352

ISBN-13: 1429900180

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A riveting documentary anthology that examines a deeply disturbing question: Is the United States guilty of war crimes in Iraq? Until recently, the possibility that the United States was responsible for war crimes seemed unthinkable to most Americans. But as previously suppressed information has started to emerge—photographs from Abu Ghraib; accounts of U.S. attacks on Iraqi hospitals, mosques, and residential neighborhoods; secret government reports defending unilateral aggression—Americans have begun an agonizing reappraisal of the Iraq war and the way in which their government has conducted it. Drawing on a wide range of documents—from the protocols of the Geneva Convention to FBI e-mails about prisoners held in Guantánamo Bay to executive-branch papers justifying the circumvention of international law—In the Name of Democracy examines the legality of the Iraq war and the occupation that followed. Included in this powerful investigation are eyewitness accounts, victim testimonials, statements by soldiers turned resisters and whistle-blowers, interviews with intelligence insiders, and contributions by Mark Danner and Seymour Hersh. The result is a controversial, chilling anthology that explores the culpability of officials as well as the responsibilities of ordinary citizens, and for the first time squarely confronts the matter of American impunity.

In Our Name
In Our Name

Author: Eric Beerbohm

Publisher: Princeton University Press

Published: 2015-12-29

Total Pages: 366

ISBN-13: 0691168156

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When a government in a democracy acts in our name, are we, as citizens, responsible for those acts? What if the government commits a moral crime? The protestor's slogan--"Not in our name!"--testifies to the need to separate ourselves from the wrongs of our leaders. Yet the idea that individual citizens might bear a special responsibility for political wrongdoing is deeply puzzling for ordinary morality and leading theories of democracy. In Our Name explains how citizens may be morally exposed to the failures of their representatives and state institutions, and how complicity is the professional hazard of democratic citizenship. Confronting the ethical challenges that citizens are faced with in a self-governing democracy, Eric Beerbohm proposes institutional remedies for dealing with them. Beerbohm questions prevailing theories of democracy for failing to account for our dual position as both citizens and subjects. Showing that the obligation to participate in the democratic process is even greater when we risk serving as accomplices to wrongdoing, Beerbohm argues for a distinctive division of labor between citizens and their representatives that charges lawmakers with the responsibility of incorporating their constituents' moral principles into their reasoning about policy. Grappling with the practical issues of democratic decision making, In Our Name engages with political science, law, and psychology to envision mechanisms for citizens seeking to avoid democratic complicity.

In the Name of Democracy
In the Name of Democracy

Author: Thomas Carothers

Publisher: Univ of California Press

Published: 2023-11-10

Total Pages: 322

ISBN-13: 0520310055

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This is the first comprehensive, even-handed examination of U.S. policy in Latin America during the Reagan era. Drawing on interviews with U.S. officials and his own perspective as a former State Department lawyer, Thomas Carothers sheds new light on the much-discussed U.S. involvements in Nicaragua, El Salvador, and Panama and turns up varied and often unexpected findings in less-studied countries such as Bolivia, Costa Rica, Paraguay, and Chile. This title is part of UC Press's Voices Revived program, which commemorates University of California Press’s mission to seek out and cultivate the brightest minds and give them voice, reach, and impact. Drawing on a backlist dating to 1893, Voices Revived makes high-quality, peer-reviewed scholarship accessible once again using print-on-demand technology. This title was originally published in 1991.

In the Name of the People
In the Name of the People

Author: K R Narayanan

Publisher: Penguin UK

Published: 2011-10-17

Total Pages: 435

ISBN-13: 8184755244

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K.R. Narayanan’s life graph reflects in many ways the fruition of the promise of ‘equality of status and opportunity’ that the Constitution guaranteed every citizen; from humble beginnings in a remote village to a distinguished career as an academician, diplomat, politician and, finally, India’s first Dalit President, Narayanan embodied modern India’s indomitable spirit. As President, as diplomat and as a citizen of India, Narayanan believed strongly in the ideas and principles that the nation was built upon—nationalism, democracy, economic progress, religious tolerance and social justice—and these found memorable expression in his speeches and writings over the years. In the Name of the People brings together Narayanan’s most important writings spanning five decades, from his first published article in 1954 to the Republic Day speech of 2000. In these pieces, he covers a diverse range of topics, from Indo–US ties and India–China relations to human development, Islam in India and women in politics; from the benefits of the parliamentary system and the need to build democracy from the grassroots to the role of education and technology in development and the importance of a sustainable environment. Also included are personalized accounts of Ambedkar, Gandhi and Nehru, and a good representation of Narayanan’s key presidential speeches. Informed, perceptive and well-argued, the pieces in In the Name of the People constitute one of our greatest statesmen’s reflections on independent India, and are especially striking in their continued relevance to the life of the nation.

Democracy on Trial
Democracy on Trial

Author: Jean Bethke Elshtain

Publisher: House of Anansi

Published: 1993-11-08

Total Pages: 162

ISBN-13: 0887848540

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Is democracy as we know it in danger? More and more we confront one another as aggrieved groups rather than as free citizens. Deepening cynicism, the growth of corrosive individualism, statism, and the loss of civil society are warning signs that democracy may be incapable of satisfying the yearnings it itself unleashes - yearnings for freedom, fairness, and equality. In her 1993 CBC Massey Lectures, political philosopher Jean Bethke Elshtain delves into these complex issues to evaluate democracy's chances for survival.

Democracy in America?
Democracy in America?

Author: Benjamin I. Page

Publisher: University of Chicago Press

Published: 2020-04-02

Total Pages: 400

ISBN-13: 022672493X

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America faces daunting problems—stagnant wages, high health care costs, neglected schools, deteriorating public services. How did we get here? Through decades of dysfunctional government. In Democracy in America? veteran political observers Benjamin I. Page and Martin Gilens marshal an unprecedented array of evidence to show that while other countries have responded to a rapidly changing economy by helping people who’ve been left behind, the United States has failed to do so. Instead, we have actually exacerbated inequality, enriching corporations and the wealthy while leaving ordinary citizens to fend for themselves. What’s the solution? More democracy. More opportunities for citizens to shape what their government does. To repair our democracy, Page and Gilens argue, we must change the way we choose candidates and conduct our elections, reform our governing institutions, and curb the power of money in politics. By doing so, we can reduce polarization and gridlock, address pressing challenges, and enact policies that truly reflect the interests of average Americans. Updated with new information, this book lays out a set of proposals that would boost citizen participation, curb the power of money, and democratize the House and Senate.

Democracy May Not Exist, But We'll Miss It When It's Gone
Democracy May Not Exist, But We'll Miss It When It's Gone

Author: Astra Taylor

Publisher: Metropolitan Books

Published: 2019-05-07

Total Pages: 219

ISBN-13: 1250179858

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“A New Civil Rights Leader” explores what we mean when we speak of democracy and if democracy can truly ever exist (LA Times). There is no shortage of democracy, at least in name, and yet it is in crisis everywhere we look. From a cabal of plutocrats in the White House to gerrymandering and dark-money campaign contributions, it is clear that the principle of government by and for the people is not living up to its promise. The problems lie deeper than any one election cycle. As Astra Taylor demonstrates, real democracy—fully inclusive and completely egalitarian—has in fact never existed. In a tone that is both philosophical and anecdotal, weaving together history, theory, the stories of individuals, and interviews with such leading thinkers as Cornel West and Wendy Brown, Taylor invites us to reexamine the term. Is democracy a means or an end, a process or a set of desired outcomes? What if those outcomes, whatever they may be—peace, prosperity, equality, liberty, an engaged citizenry—can be achieved by non-democratic means? In what areas of life should democratic principles apply? If democracy means rule by the people, what does it mean to rule and who counts as the people? Democracy’s inherent paradoxes often go unnamed and unrecognized. Exploring such questions, Democracy May Not Exist offers a better understanding of what is possible, what we want, why democracy is so hard to realize, and why it is worth striving for. “Astra Taylor will change how you think about democracy. . . . She unpacks it, wrestles with it, with the question of who gets included and how, and excavates the invisible assumptions that have been bred into our idea of democracy.” —Ezra Klein, The Ezra Klein Show “An impressive contribution. . . . Taylor sets out to impart some coherence and substance to the term in order to rescue it from ignorance and obfuscation and displays considerable intellectual nimbleness.” —Randall Kennedy, The New York Times Book Review “Magnificent, paradigm-shifting . . . Taylor’s deep and wide examination of democratic movements, conversations, and grassroots institutions makes the reader feel . . . democracy as pleasure of thinking and acting.” —The Los Angeles Review of Books

Healing the Heart of Democracy
Healing the Heart of Democracy

Author: Parker J. Palmer

Publisher: John Wiley & Sons

Published: 2014-07-31

Total Pages: 320

ISBN-13: 1118970365

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Hope for American democracy in an era of deep divisions In Healing the Heart of Democracy, Parker J. Palmer quickens our instinct to seek the common good and gives us the tools to do it. This timely, courageous and practical work—intensely personal as well as political—is not about them, "those people" in Washington D.C., or in our state capitals, on whom we blame our political problems. It's about us, "We the People," and what we can do in everyday settings like families, neighborhoods, classrooms, congregations and workplaces to resist divide-and-conquer politics and restore a government "of the people, by the people, for the people." In the same compelling, inspiring prose that has made him a bestselling author, Palmer explores five "habits of the heart" that can help us restore democracy's foundations as we nurture them in ourselves and each other: An understanding that we are all in this together An appreciation of the value of "otherness" An ability to hold tension in life-giving ways A sense of personal voice and agency A capacity to create community Healing the Heart of Democracy is an eloquent and empowering call for "We the People" to reclaim our democracy. The online journal Democracy & Education called it "one of the most important books of the early 21st Century." And Publishers Weekly, in a Starred Review, said "This beautifully written book deserves a wide audience that will benefit from discussing it."

In The Name Of Democracy
In The Name Of Democracy

Author: Bipan Chandra

Publisher: Penguin UK

Published: 2017-04-17

Total Pages: 479

ISBN-13: 9351188930

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‘When Jayaprakash Narayan, the leader of the JP movement in north India, pressed for the resignation of Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, it prompted her to impose internal Emergency. In this fascinating account, Bipan Chandra traces the events that led up to this moment and makes some startling revelations. He finds that there was a real danger of the JP movement turning fascist, given the fuzzy ideology of Total Revolution, its confused leadership and dependence on the RSS for its organization. At the same time, despite the authoritarianism inherent in the Emergency, particularly with the rising power of Sanjay Gandhi and his Youth Congress brigade, Indira Gandhi did end it and call for elections. Finely argued, incisive and original, this book offers significant insight into those turbulent years and joins the ever-relevant debate on the acceptable limits of popular protest in a democracy.

Empathy and Democracy
Empathy and Democracy

Author: Michael E. Morrell

Publisher: Penn State Press

Published: 2015-09-10

Total Pages: 216

ISBN-13: 0271074353

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Democracy harbors within it fundamental tensions between the ideal of giving everyone equal consideration and the reality of having to make legitimate, binding collective decisions. Democracies have granted political rights to more groups of people, but formal rights have not always guaranteed equal consideration or democratic legitimacy. It is Michael Morrell’s argument in this book that empathy plays a crucial role in enabling democratic deliberation to function the way it should. Drawing on empirical studies of empathy, including his own, Morrell offers a “process model of empathy” that incorporates both affect and cognition. He shows how this model can help democratic theorists who emphasize the importance of deliberation answer their critics.