[RdR] 1-4 : Ouvrages collectifs >> Macedo (2005)

Ouvrages collectifs

 

      MACEDO Stephen (eds) (2005), Democracy at Risk. How Political Choices Undermine Citizen Participation, and What We Can Do About It, Washington, Brookings Institution Press.           Presentation: All is not well in American civic life. Citizen participation is too infrequent, too inconsistent, too unequal, and too ill informed. Democracy at Risk not only reveals the dangers of civic disengagement, but also diagnoses the causes and suggests that there may be cures. This important book explores the problem of Americans’ decreasing involvement in their own public affairs. It argues that we should not simply blame citizens for this sorry state. Much of the responsibility lies with our ill-designed political system, which tends to dampen involvement, sharpen participatory disparities between groups, and discourage serious attention to political campaigns and policy discussion. In Democracy at Risk, a team of leading political scientists performs three essential tasks: -They document recent trends in civic engagement. -They show how these trends have been shaped by the design of political institutions and public policies. -They provide recommendations on how to improve the quality, amount, and distribution of civic engagement.

Democracy at Risk focuses on three key factors influencing public participation: the electoral process, including political campaigns and subsequent elections; the American metropolis, including demographic changes and evolving development patterns; and the critical role of nonprofit organizations, voluntary associations, and the philanthropy that helps keep them growing.

Undertaken with the support of the American Political Science Association, the book tests the proposition that scholarship can provide useful insights on the state of our democratic life. It charts a course for reinvigorating civic participation in the world’s most powerful democracy.

  The authors: Stephen Macedo (Princeton University), Yvette Alex-Assensoh (Indiana University), Jeffrey M. Berry (Tufts), Michael Brintnall (American Political Science Association), David E. Campbell (Notre Dame), Luis Ricardo Fraga (Stanford), Archon Fung (Harvard), William A. Galston (University of Maryland), Christopher F. Karpowitz (Princeton), Margaret Levi (University of Washington), Meira Levinson (Radcliffe Institute), Keena Lipsitz (California—Berkeley), Richard G. Niemi (University of Rochester), Robert D. Putnam (Harvard), Wendy M. Rahn (University of Minnesota), Rob Reich (Stanford), Robert R. Rodgers (Princeton), Todd Swanstrom (Saint Louis University), and Katherine Cramer Walsh (University of Wisconsin).         Preface   1) Toward a Political Science of Citizenship (1-19) What Is Civic Engagement? What Dimensions of Civic Engagement Should We Care About? Can Civic Engagement Be Bad? Our Report and the American Political Science Association Roadmap to What Follows Conclusion   2) National Electoral Processes (21-65) Basic Trends Diagnosing Our Civic Malaise Personal Factors Structural Factors Cultural Factors What Is to Be Done? Conclusion   3) The American Metropolis (67-115) The Promise and Perils of Local Politics Changing Patterns of Metropolitan Life Place, Context, and Civic Activity Engagement with Electoral Politics Political Engagement between Elections Community Engagement through Nongovernmental Institutions and Groups What Is to Be Done? Conclusion   4) Associational Life and the Nonprofit and Philanthropic Sector (117-153) Associations and Civic Engagement Two Positive Trends: Volunteering and Growth of the Nonprofit Sector How Policy Creates and Regulates Nonprofits Reshaping the Civic Context for Associations What Is to Be Done? Conclusion   5) Conclusion: Assessing Our Political Science of Citizenship (155-177) America's Democratic Deficit Our Agenda for Reform Pitfalls of our Political Science of Citizenship Conclusion