I am going to be teaching Presidential Politics for the first time at a SLAC. Not really a presidency guy, and haven't taken a course since grad school (about 6 years ago). Any suggestions on a couple of good texts for a 300 level course?
Books on Presidential
(28 posts) (1 voice)-
Posted 1 year ago #
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The Politics Presidents Make, by Skowronek. It's APD, but fascinating.
Posted 1 year ago # -
The Politics of the Presidency by Pika and Maltese
Posted 1 year ago # -
"It's APD, but it's fascinating"
Wow, that's a bit degrading, but I second Skowronek.
Also:
Milkis, The President and the Parties
Neustadt is still a classic
Lowi, The Personal President
Galvin, Presidential Party Building
Howell, Power without PersuasionPosted 1 year ago # -
The Nelson CQ Press reader, The Presidency and the Political System, contains a number of useful essays. I have tried to teach Skowronek's book to undergrads with little success, but if you have an exceptional student body it may work. Look at George Edwards' The Strategic Presidency, too. You can find a vast number of syllabi at http://cstl-cla.semo.edu/renka/PRG/presidency_syllabi.asp.
Posted 1 year ago # -
Check out B.D. Wood's page at TAMU. He has all of his material from an undergrad presidency course listed (syllabus, powerpoints, assignments). Good resource and can get you started since you haven't taught this before.
Posted 1 year ago # -
Interested in this too. Is the Howell book doable for undergraduates? What about Cameron's Veto Bargaining?
Posted 1 year ago # -
""It's APD, but it's fascinating"
Wow, that's a bit degrading, but I second Skowronek."Not degrading, more like a compliment, actually.
Neustadt, Howell, Cameron, Lewis all good, plus articles by Canes-Wrone.
Posted 1 year ago # -
My students always HATE me for teaching Neustadt, but I think they learn a lot from it. Hitting the Ground Running by Pfiffner is a nice "Presidency for Dummies" book on how to manage the transition.
I've taught Skowronek's book on the presidency in political time as well.
Posted 1 year ago # -
Good suggestions here. I'm surprised no-one has mentioned Kernell's Going Public. Accessible for undergraduates and has some nice case studies of going public
Posted 1 year ago # -
Howell not accessible to undergrads. Not even accessible to most grad students.
Cameron Veto Bargaining is also not accessible, but no loss because it's not that important. Really, who cares about veto chains? And vetoes go up under divided government...O RILLY??? Yawn. It's well executed, perfect EITM stuff, but it makes undergrads wonder why we do this crap. And they're right.
Posted 1 year ago # -
OP here-
Thanks for the feedback. I have used Neustadt and Skrownek in my grad American class. Will check into the others. Didn't even think about Wood's page. Should have just emailed him, though I only know him through conferences and such.
Thanks all
Posted 1 year ago # -
In my seminar on the Presidency, we spend the 15 weeks on a line-by-line analysis of "Decision Points"--by far the most robust and insightful book on the Presidency.
Posted 1 year ago # -
Brandice Canes Wrone's Who Leads Whom? Presidents, Policy, and the Public is good.
To substitute these readings there are several good Monkeycage posts about Edwards work and this book. As well Ezra Klein's NewYorker article touches on Edwards very accessibly.
Posted 1 year ago # -
Good suggestions here. I'm surprised no-one has mentioned Kernell's Going Public. Accessible for undergraduates and has some nice case studies of going public
I used to teach a unit with Going Public followed by On Deaf Ears. I'm not sure they got much from Going Public (the president speaks a lot...ok), and I might replace it with Presidential Rhetoric and the Public Agenda: Constructing the War on Drugs or something from the going local literature next time.
Posted 1 year ago # -
I always include a Dallek book...gets to the vision thing, etc.
Posted 1 year ago # -
EXTERMINATE!
Posted 1 year ago # -
Billy Dan!
Posted 1 year ago # -
Also, the Oxford UP Institutions of American Democracy volume on the executive contains numerous useful chapters.
Posted 1 year ago # -
Jefferson's love letters to Sally Hemmings are pretty useful as well!
Posted 1 year ago # -
Any book that sketches the general contours of a paradigm is a good read.
Posted 1 year ago # -
Ellis' Development of the American Presidency i sa good one. It is a lot like Milkis and Nelson, but topically focused, rather than dealing with stuff in chronological order.
Posted 1 year ago # -
You can get away with assigning only Chapter 3 (I think) of Neustadt. His prose is awful and unreadable for many undergrads.
Posted 1 year ago # -
Anyone use Reasoning Voter as presidency text? I know it is a voting book but it seems helpful if someone want to understand behavior during a campaign season.
Posted 1 year ago #