Arkansas politics and government / Diane D. Blair and Jay Barth.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Blair, Diane D., 1938-

Contributor:

Barth, Jay, 1966-

Blair, Diane D., 1938-

Series:

Politics and governments of the American states

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Arkansas--Politics and government.

Arkansas.

Politics and government.

Physical Description:

xviii, 497 pages : maps ; 23 cm.

Edition:

Second edition.

Place of Publication:

Lincoln : University of Nebraska Press, [2005]

Summary:

Published a decade and a half after the late Diane D. Blair's influential book Arkansas Politics and Government, this freshly revised edition builds on her work, which highlighted both the decades of failure by Arkansas's government to live up to the state's motto of Regnat Populus ("The People Rule") and the positive trends of democracy. Since the first edition, Arkansas has seen the two-term U.S. presidency of a native son, the retirement of players who defined the state's politics in the modern era, the further realignment of the state's electorate, the passage of the nation's most extreme legislative term limits, the complete overhaul of the state's court system, and the declaration that the state's public education system was unconstitutionally inadequate and inequitable.

While maintaining the basic structure of Blair's original work with its focus on important historical patterns and the ways in which the past continues to shape the present, the second edition details the causes and consequences of recent changes in Arkansas and asks whether they are profound and permanent or merely transitory variations in symbol and style. Jay Barth argues that although Arkansas currently expresses a healthier representative democracy than throughout most of its history, its political and governmental entities are still sharply limited as effective instruments of "the people."

Contents:

The past in the present

Some socioeconomic, cultural, and political explanations

Traditional politics and its transformation

Contemporary political patterns

Dealigned voters and disadvantaged political parties in contemporary Arkansas

The influence of interest groups

The Constitution

The power and politics of the executive branch

The power and politics of the legislative branch

The power and politics of the judicial branch

Arkansas in the federal system

Politics at the grassroots

The politics of state services

For the future.

Notes:

Rev. ed. of: Arkansas politics & government. c1988.

Includes bibliographical references (pages [381]-473) and index.

Related Work:

Blair, Diane D., 1938- Arkansas politics & government.

ISBN:

0803261985

OCLC:

56198674