Current events highlight the need for teaching about the Cold War, the logic of nuclear deterrence, the nature of high-level diplomacy, arguments for and against disarmament, the continuing challenge of nuclear arms control, and simply the utter horror of these weapons of mass destruction. I have long thought Fail Safe, Dr. Read more…
“Narrated by Bowdoin College Government Professor Andrew Rudalevige, [Founding Principles] provides an introductory overview and basic understanding to American government, but one that is crucial to building citizen-leaders, promoting civic engagement, and working toward the common good.” The Founding Principles website is located here. Here’s a Table of Contents: Chapter 1: American Governance Read more…
“The Campaign for the Civic Mission of Schools was created to expand and improve civic learning in our schools, K-12 and in Higher Education. The Campaign works with its 60+ coalition partners, the Campaign’s Steering Committee, to bring about changes in state, local, and national policy that promote civic learning and Read more…
News of the tragic death of Nobel Laureate Liu Xiaobo–who was serving an 11-year prison sentence for his role in the writing of the democratic reform document called “Charter 08“–led me to read an English translation of that remarkable expression of yearning and advocacy for liberal democracy. Charter 08–publicly released Read more…
To celebrate the 4th of July, NPR tweeted the Declaration of Independence, and many mistakenly thought they were advocating rebellion against President Trump.
The Seattle experiment with a very high minimum wage has presented a rare opportunity for economists to study the impact of large minimum wage increases. This, in turn, could potentially contribute to a better informed public debate over the costs and benefits of minimum wage increases. Unfortunately, a report today Read more…
This is an interesting story about indecent behavior by incoming Harvard students resulting in the university rescinding their admissions offers. The story discusses why the incident raises no constitutional free speech issues, and so offers a little lesson on civil liberties as well…
I’m going to begin a post dedicated to curating sites that are aimed at facilitating learning about government through data and/or data-driven simulations. I will update this as I find more sites. I’m aiming here at quality more than quantity. For starters, I know of only three: USA Facts: Our Read more…
Well, GSU has won over Bill Gates. (That’s a good thing, right? RIGHT??) Either way, this is an informative summary of the student success initiatives going on at GSU. I wasn’t aware of all of these. Link to article Link to US Civitas Facebook Discussion Thread
Four political scientists — John Carey, Gretchen Helmke, Brendan Nyhan, and Susan Stokes–have started a group devoted to monitoring the health of American democracy. The group is called Bright Line Watch. The following is an excerpt from their Mission Statement … “One of the greatest threats to democracy is the idea Read more…
I think a good discussion / activity to go with Chapter 1 of my textbook is to have students come up with a list of “public goods” and then ask if they are truly, strictly speaking, non-excludable. You don’t want to confuse them, but it might be worth thinking about Read more…
After my first day of class yesterday, I remembered (too late) how important it is to “sell the class” to the students very early on the first day. I saved my “sales pitch” for the last part, whereas it would have been better, I think, to tell them why the Read more…