Dartmouth Authors
Marjorie Hope and James Young '40, The South African Churches in a Revolutionary Situation. Orbis Books, 1981. 268 pp. One commentator on this book begins, "Theology is the key to understanding South Africa," and if she is correct, its publication should help improve discussion of one of the tinderbox problems of our generation. Based upon on-the-spot observations and numerous interviews with church leaders as well as upon the literature about apartheid, the authors' contribution to the debate both analyses current attitudes in the various denominations and examines the growth of Christian dissent as a factor in the liberation movement.
Ronald H. Chilcote '57, Theories of Comparative Politics: The Search for a Paradigm. Westview Press, 1981. 480 pp. A professor of political science at the University of California at Riverside, Chilcote has written a text which sets out to bring together, and to assess, the numerous theories upon which the study of comparative politics is based at the present time. Dealing with both orthodox and insurgent approaches, he challenges the student with the variety of the points of view which are held and the desirability of establishing an acceptable synthesis from them.
Reed Browning, '60, Political and Constitutional Ideas of the Court Whigs. Louisiana State University Press, 1982. 281 pp. An account of the work of five of the principal apologists for the policies of Sir Robert Walpole, the first British Prime Minister, and his immediate successors, this volume opens up the subject of the ideologies upon which the administrations during the 35 years of Court Whig dominance based their policies. Felicitously written, it also shows how choosing Cicero rather than Cato as the beau ideal of sound political philosophy affected the whole climate of government in mid-eighteenth century Britain.
John J. Duffy and H. Nicholas Muller III '60, An Anxious Democracy: Aspects of the1830s. Greenwood Press, 1982. 172 pp. A recent development in American historiography recognizes the importance of studying local history as a means of opening up larger social and cultural issues concerns which had counterparts of one kind or another all over the nation. This volume makes an unusually interesting contribution to this kind of enrichment of our knowledge of the past by dealing with eight very varied topics drawn from the history of Vermont during the tumultuous decade of Jacksonian government.
Professor J. Clark Archer and Peter J. Taylor, Section and Party. Research Studies Press, 1981. 271 pp. This "political geography" of American presidential elections from Andrew Jackson to Ronald Reagan will be well worth getting out of your local university library as the pace hots up on the road to November 1984. It will be especially interesting then to see whether one of the authors' principal findings holds up (the thesis that whereas from 1828 to 1860 there was sectional competition-the sections being the south, the northeast, and the west and from 1864 to 1944 there was sectional dominance, since 1948 we have had sectional volatility) or whether a new stability emerges based on the electoral college strength and common interests of the western states. A treasury of data will help you plot the trends.
