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Civil society organizations, nonprofit organizations, national and international nongovernmental organizations, and a variety of formal and informal associations have coalesced into a world political force. Though the components of this so-called third sector vary by country, their cumulative effects play an ever-greater role in global affairs. Looking at relief and welfare organizations, innovation organizations, social networks, and many other kinds of groups, this book explores the functions, impacts, and composition of the nonprofit sector in six key countries. Chinese organizations, for example, follow the predominantly Asian model of government funding that links their mission to national political goals. Western groups, by contrast, often explicitly challenge government objectives, and even gain relevance and cache by doing so. In addition, the book examines groups in real-world contexts, providing a wealth of political-historical background, in-depth consideration of interactions with state institutions, region-by-region comparisons, and suggestions for how groups can borrow policy options across systems. The book provides a rare international view of organizations and agendas driving change in today's international affairs.

Based on historical case studies in Chicago, this book focuses on both the theoretical and practical explanations for why neighborhoods change today. It shows that a diverse collection of people including urban policy experts, elected officials, investors, resident leaders, institutions, community-based organizations, and many others compete to control how neighborhood change is characterized. The book argues that neighborhoods have become sites of consumption and spaces to be consumed. Discourse is used to add and subtract value from them. The romanticized image of “the neighborhood” exaggerates or obscures race and class struggles while celebrating diversity and income mixing. Scholars and policy makers must reexamine what sustains this image and the power effects produced in order to explain and govern urban space more equitably. The book explores major changes in the structure and dynamics of urban space, with particular emphasis on neighborhoods over the past few decades. The book examines prevailing approaches to the study of neighborhoods and neighborhood change, paying attention to how they help describe and explain as well as produce urban dynamics. It examines the effects of classifying neighborhoods based on ecological indicators, both in the form of representations of space and in the policies/interventions derived from their use. Further, the book explores how today's neighborhoods operate as flexible spaces of accumulation that range between the extremes of gentrification and ghettoization.

This book offers refreshing and intelligent new perspectives on postwar American liberalism. The book challenges popular myths about liberalism in the United States. It presents the Democratic Party and liberal reform efforts such as civil rights, feminism, labor, and environmentalism as a more united, more radical force than has been depicted in scholarship and the media emphasizing the decline and disunity of the left. Chapters assess the problems liberals have confronted in the twentieth century, examine their strategies for change, and chart the successes and potential for future liberal reform. Each chapter tackles a different example of the challenges and achievements of liberal politics, from organized labor to the links between liberalism and social democracy in U.S. political life. The book emphasizes the powerful liberal reform impulse in making modern American politics, while remaining cognizant of the importance of the right in shaping policy and ideology.

Barack Obama's campaign and electoral victory demonstrated the dynamic nature of American democracy. Beginning as a special issue of The Black Scholar, this probing collection illustrates the impact of “the Obama phenomenon” on the future of U.S. race relations through readings on Barack Obama's campaign as well as the idealism and pragmatism of the Obama administration. Some of the foremost scholars of African American politics and culture from an array of disciplines—including political science, theology, economics, history, journalism, sociology, cultural studies, and law—offer critical analyses of topics as diverse as Obama and the media, Obama's connection with the hip hop community, the public's perception of first lady Michelle Obama, voter behavior, and the history of racial issues in presidential campaigns since the 1960s.