American Government is designed to meet the scope and sequence requirements of the single-semester American government course. This title includes innovative features designed to enhance student learning, including Insider Perspective features and a Get Connected Module that shows students how they can get engaged in the political process. The book provides an important opportunity for students to learn the core concepts of American government and understand how those concepts apply to their lives and the world around them. American Government includes updated information on the 2016 presidential election.Senior Contributing AuthorsGlen Krutz (Content Lead), University of OklahomaSylvie Waskiewicz, PhD (Lead Editor)

Contents include:

1. Why Government? Why Politics? 2. The U.S. System of Constitutional Government 3. Congress 4. The Presidency 5. The Judiciary 6. Federalism 7. The Media, Government, and Politics 8. Public Opinion 9. Political Ideology 10. Political Participation 11. Political Parties 12. Interest Groups 13. Public Policy 14. Economic Policy 15. Food Policy 16. Crime Policy 17. Global Affairs 18. Civil Liberties and Civil Rights

This course examines the birth and international expansion of an American industry of political marketing. It focuses attention on the cultural processes, sociopolitical contexts and moral utopias that shape the practice of political marketing in the U.S. and in different countries. By looking at the debates and expert practices at the core of the business of politics, the course explores how the "universal" concept of democracy is interpreted and reworked through space and time, while examining how different cultural groups experimenting with political marketing understand the role of citizens in a democracy.

This 5-day curriculum teaches digital storytelling and media literacy skills through engaging youth to think critically on issues relevant to their life and future. This unit is guided by the question, "How does media contribute to positive social change?”

This graduate-level course focuses on mass political behavior within the American political system. The goal of this course is to give an introduction to some of the major questions in the study of American political behavior, and how people have gone about answering them. The background goal is to help students practice reading work critically, and thinking through the difficulties of social science research, in preparation for individual research projects. The course examines political ideology, public opinion, voting behavior, media effects, racial attitudes, mass-elite relations, and opinion-policy linkages.

This course provides a substantive overview of U.S. politics and an introduction to the discipline of political science. It surveys the institutional foundations of U.S. politics as well as the activities of political elites, organizations, and ordinary citizens. It also explores the application of general political science concepts and analytic frameworks to specific episodes and phenomena in U.S. politics.

This class introduces students to innovative as well as classic approaches to studying U.S. government. The writing assignments will help you explore, through a variety of lenses, statis and change in the American political system over the last three decades. In the end each student will have a solid grounding in our national political institutions and processes, sharper reading and writing skills, and insight into approaching politics critically and analytically.

This course aims to get students thinking about politics and policy as a part of their everyday life. We treat politics as a struggle among competing advocates trying to persuade others to see the world as they do, working within a context that is structured primarily by institutions and cultural ideas. We’ll begin by developing a policymaking framework, understanding ideology, and taking a whirlwind tour of the American political system. Then, we’ll examine six policy issues in depth: health care, gun control, the federal budget, immigration reform, same-sex marriage, and energy and climate change.

This course covers the current state of incarceration in the United States and proposals for reform. Class materials include a mix of firsthand/media accounts of incarceration and social science literature on the causes and effects of high incarceration rates. Topics include race and the criminal legal system, collateral consequences of incarceration, public opinion about incarceration, and the behavior of recently elected "reform" prosecutors.

The articles in this edited collection were written and published on E-IR as events unfolded during the contentious Iranian elections of June 2009.

This is a module framework. It can be viewed online or downloaded as a zip file.

As taught Autumn Semester 2010/2011.

This module will introduce students to key debates in the study of political behaviour. The module will focus specifically on the core ‘pillars’ of political behaviour (elections, voting, political participation and, to a lesser extent, public opinion). Through the module students will explore theories and methodologies used by political scientists to study these key aspects of political behaviour. Voters, political parties, party members and activists, and forms of political participation more generally will be addressed.

The module will build on the knowledge students might have gained during their undergraduate degrees while introducing them to new debates and literatures. Students will be introduced to, and encouraged to critically assess, major approaches to studying these political phenomena and will gain a firm understanding of the interplay between theory and empirical research.

Module Code: M13128

Suitable for study at: Undergraduate level 3

Credits:20

Dr Matthew Goodwin, School of Politics and International Relations

Dr Matthew Goodwin obtained his BA (First Class Hons) in Politics and Contemporary History at the University of Salford and MA in Political Science at the University of Western Ontario. He completed his PhD at the Department of European Studies and Modern Languages at the University of Bath, under the supervision of Professor Roger Eatwell and Professor Anna Cento Bull. Before being appointed Lecturer at the University of Nottingham, Dr Goodwin was Temporary Lecturer at the University of Bath, Research Associate at the University of Manchester and an ESRC Postdoctoral Research Fellow (Manchester).

At broad level Dr Goddwin's research clusters around electoral behaviour and, to a lesser extent, public policy. His research interests are mainly in extremist political parties and the roots of their support, especially extreme right-wing parties. He also has a strong interest in party membership and activism, and the study of political participation more generally. This research has been published in journals including the European Journal of Political Research, Political Studies and the Journal of Elections, Public Opinion and Parties (JEPOP), among others. Dr Goodwin has also recently co-edited a volume - The New Extremism in 21st Century Britain (Routledge) which explores support for alternative forms of extremism and implications for public policy, police and practice.

This course will examine public opinion and assess its place in the American political system. The course will emphasize both how citizens' thinking about politics is shaped and the role of public opinion in political campaigns, elections, and government.

Surveys show that both left- and right-leaning Americans support policies that slow climate change. So why aren’t we seeing more of these policies pass as legislation? In this episode of TILclimate (Today I Learned: Climate), MIT alum Parrish Bergquist joins host Laur Hesse Fisher to explain the significance of public opinion and climate change: what people believe, what influences their opinion and how policies are implemented. They also explore what bipartisan policy making could look like, and how to bridge the gap between support and action.

This course examines the nature of attitudes, beliefs, and values, and the influences which indiviudals' attitudes have upon their behavior. Various theories of attitude organization and attitude change are discussed, and the development of social attitudes is explored by examining the differential impact of the family, the educational system, the mass media, and the general social environment. The changing content of public opinion over time and its relationship to the political system are also discussed.

This course provides an introduction to the vast literature devoted to public opinion. In the next 12 weeks, we will survey the major theoretical approaches and empirical research in the field of political behavior (though we will only tangentially discuss political  participation and voting). For the most part we will focus on American public opinion, though some of the work we will read is comparative in nature.

This is a complete course on Texas State government, developed by Austin Community College.