American Public Policy: An Introduction

Best-selling AMERICAN PUBLIC POLICY: AN INTRODUCTION engages student interest through its unique emphasis on specific, substantive issues of public policy. This text draws students into American public policies by presenting their historical context, prompting students to evaluate and discuss possible alternatives. The discussion kindled by AMERICAN PUBLIC POLICY: AN INTRODUCTION helps make public policy personal as students apply their knowledge to real-life policies. This new edition includes updated and expanded coverage on key policy issues: immigration, global climate change, health care reform, gay rights, and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. The authors present policy material step-by-step, building a picture of the existing policy that students can use to evaluate alternatives.

While updating content to reflect recent research and trends, the authors continue to inform undergraduate students on substantive issues in public policy, including its contexts, its place within the economy and economic issues such as government-business relationships and taxing, energy and environmental issues, crime and criminal justice, income support, health care, education, legal and social equality, immigration policy, foreign and defense policy, private morality and the continuing debates about policy. They pay particularly close attention to such issues as the role of the possibility of terrorism in policy decision-making and recent trends in how health care is operated and regulated in the US. Annotation ©2006 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

Clarke E. Cochran is Vice-President of Mission Integration, at Covenant Health System, in Lubbock, Texas. He is Professor Emeritus of Political Science at Texas Tech University, where he specializes in religion and politics, political philosophy, and health care policy. Dr. Cochran received his Ph.D. from Duke University in 1971. He is the author of five books and numerous journal articles. He won the President's Award for Excellence in Teaching. Dr. Cochran held the position of Research Fellow in the Erasmus Institute at the University of Notre Dame (1998-1999) and the Shannon Chair in Catholic Studies at Nazareth College (Spring 2001). His current research interests include religious institutions and health care policy and Catholic social theory and health care reform.

Dr. Mayer is Professor of Political Science at Texas Tech University. He received his PhD from the University of Texas. His current research interests include party system change, especially in the weakening of mainstream parties of the moderate left and right, and the emergence of populist parties of identity. These include nationalist parties of the extreme right as well as parties of subcultural defense and other parties of identity that do not classify on the left-to-right axis. Dr. Mayer has published several works on the state of the discipline and a methodological critique of the comparative politics field. He is in the planning stages of a sequel to his previous book in this area, COMPARATIVE POLITICAL INQUIRY: A METHODOLOGICAL SURVEY. In addition to AMERICAN PUBLIC POLICY, he is the author or coauthor of four other books: COMPARATIVE POLITICAL INQUIRY; POLITICS IN INDUSTRIAL SOCIETIES REDEFINING COMPARATIVE POLITICS; and COMPARATIVE POLITICS: NATIONS AND THEORIES IN A CHANGING WORLD, 2e. He is also the author of numerous articles.

T. R. Carr is currently Professor and Department Chair of Public Administration and Policy Analysis at Southern Illinois University Edwardsville. He teaches primarily in the areas of quantitative methods and policy analysis. In addition to AMERICAN PUBLIC POLICY, he has published chapters and articles focusing on public management issues. He is active in academic and professional associations and has served in numerous offices in state and local chapters of the American Society for Public Administration. He also serves as Mayor of Hazelwood, Missouri, and is engaged in activities sponsored by the National League of Cities and state and local municipal leagues.

N. Joseph Cayer is Professor of Public Affairs at Arizona State University. He received a PhD from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, and a BA and MPA from the University of Colorado, Boulder. He also has taught at Lamar University; the University of Maine, Orono; and Texas Tech University. He is the author or coauthor of seven books and numerous chapters and articles on public management and policy, with an emphasis on issues of human resources management in the public sector. Books he has authored or coauthored include PUBLIC ADMINISTRATION: SOCIAL CHANGE AND ADAPTIVE MANAGEMENT, AMERICAN PUBLIC POLICY: AN INTRODUCTION, MANAGING HUMAN RESOURCES, HANDBOOK OF TRAINING AND DEVELOPMENT FOR THE PUBLIC SECTOR, and SUPERVISION FOR SUCCESS IN GOVERNMENT.

Mark McKenzie is an assistant professor of political science at Texas Tech University. He received a Ph.D. in Government from the University of Texas at Austin in 2007 and a Doctor of Jurisprudence from the University of Texas School of Law in 1998. He is an active member of the State Bar of Texas, and his areas of research include judicial politics, redistricting, public opinion, and campaigns and elections. He has published articles in Judicature, American Politics Research, and Politics and Policy.