In Defence of Politics (Continuum Impacts)

by Bernard Crick (Author)

• Used

  Paperback
  2005

  $7.49

  Crick asserts that politics, with its compromises and power struggles, remains the only tested alternative to government by coercion, making both freedoma nd order possible in heterogeneous societies. For Crick, politics is necessarily imperfect, messy anmd complex, yet his book defends it against htose who would identify it with (and reduce it to) ideology, nationalism, technology or populist democracy. In this fifth edition, Crick warns us that present-day politicians are in danger of threatening both citizenship and common humanity. He discusses the popular distrust for politicians in both the UK and USA, arguing that they have lowered the level of publicdebate for short-term gain; and he discusses how suchvshort-termism is preventing timely attempts to tackle despoliation of the global environment.

• Used

  Paperback
  1993

  $5.80

  At a time of brittle cynicism about the activities of politicians, this essay attempts to justify politics in plain words by saying what it is. In a civilized community the establishment of political order among rival groups and interests marks the birth of freedom. In spite of the compromises and half measures which prompt the impatient idealist to regard politics as a dirty word, indeed because of them, the negotiating processes of politics remain the only tested alternative to government by coercion.

• New

  Paperback
  1993

  $43.45

  This fourth edition has been updated to include an assessment of the revolutions in 1989 in Eastern Europe. It also examines current situations in Northern Ireland, Israel and Palestine, and South Africa.