What according to democratic theorists should the ordinary citizen know about politics? What does several decades of empirical research about citizens' political knowledge tell us? And why should we care? This book offers a comprehensive outline of the vast literature on political knowledge and by providing an analytical framework for its studying

THE INSPIRATION BEHIND CHANNEL 4 DRAMA STARRING BENEDICT CUMBERBATCH - BREXIT: THE UNCIVIL WARMAIL ON SUNDAY BOOK OF THE YEAROBSERVER BOOK OF THE WEEK'A compelling book' Evening Standard'Essential' Sunday Times'His soldier's dispatch is easy to read and vividly illustrates a sense of rising panic and embattlement. If you wa...

Fully updated new edition of the best-selling political biography.He is a most unlikely revolutionary: a middle-aged, middle-class former grammar schoolboy who honed his radicalism on the mean streets of rural Shropshire. Last summer, this little-known outsider rode a wave of popular enthusiasm to win the Labour Party leadership by a landslide, with a greater mandate than any British political leader before him. This new edition of the critically acclaimed biography brings the Jeremy Corby...

As Europe’s Muslim communities continue to grow, so does their impact on electoral politics and the potential for inclusion dilemmas. In vote-rich enclaves, Muslim views on religion, tradition, and gender roles can deviate sharply from those of the majority electorate, generating severe trade-offs for parties seeking to broaden their coalitions. Dilemmas of Inclusion explains when and why European political parties include Muslim candidates and voters, revealing that the ways in w...

In the crucible of the 2017 general election, a small group of progressive activists set about trying to change British political life for the better. Armed with the conviction that the old politics was irretrievably broken, the progressive alliance set itself the task of breaching the walls of Britain's tribal political culture.Over the seven weeks of the campaign, even as the struggle between Theresa May and Jeremy Corbyn built up to a stunning and utterly unexpected climax, the ...

The Conservatives, Labour and the Liberal Democrats each allow their members to participate in the selection of the party leader. It also examines the consequences of all-member ballots in leadership elections. It looks at how parties remove leaders, showing that each of the major British parties sought to make it harder to evict incumbents.

The social and economic shifts of the past few decades have hardened deeply held scepticism and distrust of ‘the establishment’. In an age of historically low party membership and identification, voter volatility, rising abstentionism and greater individualism, mainstream parties are struggling to be representative.This book is about the turbulent political scene unfolding in Britain and across western Europe. It focuses on why large swathes of voters feel that politics does not wo...

Dramatic and immersive, Redmond is a provocative reassessment of John Redmond, Home Rule campaigner and one of Ireland's most brilliant political minds.'A vivid portrayal of one of the great political campaigns in Irish history.' Stephen Collins, Political Editor, The Irish TimesRedmond brings to life seven pivotal years in Irish history, when the campaign for Home Rule seized the imagination of a nation and brought Ireland to the brink of a negotiated settlement with Britain. The architec...

France Votes analyzes the French elections of 2012 in the context of a France and Europe in crisis. With regard to the economy, Irwin Wall describes the ways in which the country's adherence to the common currency in the Eurozone has stripped France of its freedom of manouver. France Votes shows how a European-wide economic crisis was reflected in political crisis at home and the rise of new political extremism combined with mass disaffection from politics altogether. The result of all of ...

This book provides an in-depth look into the cognitive and argumentative nature of political discourse with a focus on the role and place of conceptual metaphors in practical argumentation. Neagu's empirical investigation centres on the corpus of the American Presidential debates in 2008 and speeches by Barack Obama from 2009-2011.

In 2010 the Conservative Party returned to office after over a decade of largely ineffective opposition to New Labour. This book explains why it took so long to recover, and why the party was unable to win an overall majority despite the charismatic leadership of David Cameron. It covers all aspects of Conservative Party politics since 1997.

This engaging exploration of the French Socialist Party details the exceptional problems that the party has faced and the way it has dealt with them. The result is a comprehensive and compelling guide to the quiddities of political infighting, the structure of power and of the environment in which the party operates.