Suchergebnisse

Boldly and eloquently contributing to the argument against the prison system in the United States, these provocative essays offer an ideological and practical framework for empowering prisoners instead of incarcerating them. Experts and activists who have worked within and against the prison system join forces here to call attention to the debilitating effects of a punishment-driven society and offer clear-eyed alternatives, emphasizing working directly with prisoners and their communities.

"This eye-opening and well-researched companion to the first volume of Executing Democracy enters the death-penalty discussion during the debates of 1835 and 1843, when pro-death penalty Calvinist minister George Barrell Cheever faced off against abolitionist magazine editor John O'Sullivan. In contrast to the macro-historical overview presented in volume 1, volume 2 provides micro-historical case studies, using these debates as springboards into the discussion of the death penalty in America at large. Incorporating a wide range of sources, including political poems, newspaper editorials, and warring manifestos, this second volume highlights a variety of perspectives, thus demonstrating the centrality of public debates about crime, violence, and punishment to the history of American democracy. Hartnett's insightful assessment bears witness to a complex national discussion about the political, metaphysical, and cultural significance of the death penalty."--Publisher's website

AbstractArchival evidence sheds new light on the Truman administration's 1951 investigation into the "China Lobby" and its links to McCarthyism. Truman's advisors suspected connections among illicit funding streams generated by Chiang Kai‐shek's Nationalist regime in Formosa, illegal lobbying by unregistered agents, and a barrage of anti‐Communist propaganda from activists connected to McCarthy and the "China Lobby." The White House worried that by flooding America's public discourse with charges of treason, the alleged conspirators were destabilizing the nation's ability to engage in reasoned deliberation about foreign policy. However, the White House could not persuade any congressional committees to manage an investigation, so it instead ran an executive operation that produced tantalizing clues but no prosecutable conclusions. Rather than proving its suspicions, the investigation created confusion and sowed doubts about Truman's judgment. Analyzing the administration's investigation provides new insights into the confusions and contradictions besetting America's grappling with the early Cold War and offers lessons on how not to defend democracy in a time of crisis.

The Quemoy crisis of 1954–1955 found the Eisenhower White House struggling to appear tough against Mao's China and supportive of Chiang Kai‐shek's Taiwan while not triggering World War III. When the initial rhetorical campaign of "fuzzing" failed, Eisenhower's team switched to launching threats of imminent nuclear war—yet both strategies of deterrence were beside the point, for we now know that Mao had no intention of invading Quemoy or Taiwan. In this classic Cold War conundrum, what I call "the agony of sovereignty" left American leadership grasping at straws while misreading the trajectory of postcolonial nationalisms in Asia. Nonetheless, I demonstrate how, by the spring of 1955, Mao, Eisenhower, and Chiang all felt a sense of triumph, as they each evolved responses that left their main interests intact while avoiding what observers had feared might become "a chain reaction of disaster."

"A World of Turmoil offers case studies of five critical moments: the end of World War II and the start of the Long Cold War; the almost-nuclear war over the Quemoy Islands in 1954-1955; the détente, deceptions, and denials surrounding the 1972 Shanghai Communiqué; the Taiwan Strait Crisis of 1995-1996; and the rise of postcolonial nationalism in contemporary Taiwan"--

Based on analyses of seven pre-war intelligence documents, we demonstrate that estimates of Iraq's alleged weapons of mass destruction (WMD) programs were laced with ambiguities and contradictions. Yet President Bush turned this contested intelligence into a heroic rhetoric of certainty, hence dragging the U.S. into war on the basis of lies. Based on a comprehensive critique of their post-9/11 speeches and testimonies, we offer a four-step rhetorical schema for analyzing how President Bush and Secretary of State Colin Powell constructed these lies. We thus offer readers both a critique of Bush administration deceptions and the critical rhetorical tools necessary to recognize and decode future governmental deception. Then, focusing on the post-war revelations offered by Joseph Wilson, which in turn prompted a vicious administration attack on Wilson and his wife, Valerie Plame, we analyze the labyrinthine cover-up the Bush administration has used to conceal its lies about Iraqi WMD.

This book contains practical approaches to prison education and advocacy. This collection documents the efforts of the Prison Communication, Activism, Research, and Education collective (PCARE) to put democracy into practice by merging prison education and activism. Through life-changing programs in a dozen states (Arizona, Colorado, Illinois, Indiana, Massachusetts, Michigan, New Jersey, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Texas, Virginia, and Wisconsin), PCARE works with prisoners, in prisons, and in communities to reclaim justice from the prison-industrial complex. The materials in this volume present a sweeping inventory of how communities and individuals both within and outside of prisons are marshaling the arts, education, and activism to reduce crime and enhance citizenship. Documenting hands-on case studies that emphasize educational initiatives, successful prison-based programs, and activist-oriented analysis, this book provides readers with real-world answers based on years of activism and teaching.