The Irrational Electorate by Larry M. Bartels
A Princeton political scientist reveals that many of our worst fears about America’s voters are true.

An Admirable Folly by Denis MacShane
From afar, America’s presidential contests often look more like playground antics than a shining example of democracy. But looks can be deceiving.

Poll Power by Scott Keeter
“Pollsters and pundits” has become a dismissive epithet in modern politics. Pollsters, at least, deserve much better.

Bury the Hatchet by Gil Troy
The antidote to frenzied partisanship won’t be found in politics as usual but in problem-solving leaders who govern from the center.

Humanitarian Dilemmas by G. Pascal Zachary
The rapid expansion of relief efforts since the end of the Cold War has produced a surprising result: a series of difficult moral questions about the humanitarian enterprise.

Call It Slavery by John R. Miller
The abolition of slavery was the great cause of 19th-century humanitarians. In the 21st century, argues a former U.S. ambassador at large on modern day slavery, it needs new champions.

The New Face of Global Giving by Holly Yeager
A new humanitarianism is emerging as private donors and governments respond to the world’s needs.

Controlling Passions by Matthew Connelly
It seemed an obvious answer to the ills of the developing world. So how did the population control movement go so terribly wrong?

Why Can't We Build an Affordable House? by Witold Rybczynski
One explanation of America’s housing market collapse is that too many people bought too much house. The solution: build more affordable houses. Here’s what stands in the way.

The Traffic Guru by Tom Vanderbilt
An unassuming Dutch traffic engineer showed that streets without signs can be safer than roads cluttered with arrows, painted lines, and lights. Are we ready to believe him?

The Burden of the Humanities by Wilfred M. McClay
What use are the humanities? Even some scholars no longer seem sure. But at a time when bioengineering throws into question what it means to be human, the answer should be obvious.

The Long Dance:
Searching for Arab-Israeli Peace by Aaron David Miller
A veteran American negotiator derives seven rules of the road from his decades of experience in Arab-Israeli peace talks.

Bad Rap on the Schools by Jay Mathews
Bad schools are not going to sink the American economy. Despite what the headlines say, U.S. students fare well in international comparisons. It’s the schools serving the poor that demand our attention.

The Day the TV Died by Stephen Bates
In February 2009, American television will go digital, and millions of sets will fade to fuzz. It’s but the latest episode in TV’s colorful history, as the living-room set has evolved from a clunky box to a sleek rectangle on the wall.

A History of the Past:
'Life Reeked With Joy' by Anders Henriksson
Possibly as an act of vengeance, a history professor--compiling, verbatim, several decades' worth of freshman papers--offers some of his students’ more striking insights into European history from the Middle Ages to the present.

The Micromagic of Microcredit by Karol Boudreaux and Tyler Cowen
It’s wishful thinking to believe that tiny loans to people in developing countries can end poverty, but microcredit does improve the lives of millions in small but meaningful ways.

The Brain: A Mindless Obsession? by Charles Barber
Despite stunning advances in neuroscience and bold claims of revelations from new brain-scan technologies, our knowledge about the brain’s role in human behavior is still primitive.

Pakistan Picaresque by Samia Altaf
A surreal encounter in an Islamabad office reveals in an instant why billions of dollars spent on aid to Pakistan have made so little difference in the lives of the country’s poor.

In Praise of the Values Voter by Jon A. Shields
Political scientists and liberal reformers want to remove highly charged moral issues to the sidelines, but what is the purpose of politics if not to address fundamental moral questions?

The Climate Engineers by James R. Fleming
The next big debate in the global warming arena is going to be about climate engineering. But efforts to manipulate the climate and weather have a long history of exaggerated claims and beliefs, and a dangerous tendency to become militarized. Even if they succeed, who will control the global thermostat?

Current Books
Reviews of new and noteworthy nonfiction.

The Great African Hope
G. Pascal Zachary on Rwandan president Paul Kagame, whose rule "provides the clearest test case in Africa of whether an enlightened authoritarianism can produce better results than liberal democracy."

Married to the Muse
Kate Christensen looks at the wives of three famous French artists, and how their lives, "no matter how difficult, painful, or uncertain, were never boring."

Labors of Love
What makes people volunteer to help others? Reviewer Darcy Courteau tries to find some answers in a study by two sociologists.

Fear Itself
Writing about Daniel Gardner's The Science of Fear, Evelin Sullivan concludes that "for the sake of our survival, one fear ought to become stronger: that of being afraid of the wrong things."

Victims of War
Hew Strachan on Targeting Civilians in War: "Desperation drives even democracies to target civilians in order to coerce the enemy to surrender."

Self-Styled Moses
Michael Anderson on Marcus Garvey, "the most confounding figure in the history of black America."

Waking Nightmare
D. T. Max on a study of insomnia, written by one of its sufferers.

Russia's Flawed Hero
Lynn Berry on Boris Yeltsin, the complicated figure who "gave Russians a personal independence that they will not easily relinquish."

Meet Mrs. Warren
Edith Gelles looks at the muse of the American Revolution, Mercy Otis Warren.

Meet and Greet
Karl E. Scheibe looks at the social meaning behind the Nazi salute.

In the Genes
Bonnie J. Rough on the rapidly changing world of the gene.

Dead Tree Scrolls
Stephen Bates examines the hard realities of modern-day journalism.

Bad to the Bone
Jeffrey Burton Russell looks at original sin.

The Holy Web
Mary Swander on pantheism and the epiphany of Sharman Apt Russell.

A Real Gusher
Eric Hand on the history of Niagara Falls.

Bath and Body Works
Winifred Gallagher inspects two books on dirt: both offer rich details, but she finds one more scholarly, the other "livelier...riddled with gossipy anecdotes about the rich and famous."

In Essence
Our review of notable articles in other magazines and journals.

The Inside-Out City
Cities are undergoing a complicated and profound demographic inversion.

The Battle of the Caspian Sea
Who gets what share of the mineral riches at the bottom of the Caspian depend on whether it's a sea or a lake.

Crime's New Address
Memphis demolished inner-city projects and transferred residents into better neighborhoods, but only succeeded in spreading crime to the new areas.

Happiness Paradoxes
What makes people happy keeps confounding the experts.

Nut Gets Nukes!
The news media focused on Kim Jong Il's peculiarities while missing the story on North Korea developing nuclear capabilities.

Better Living Through Chemistry
What's wrong with using drugs to improve the brain's performance?

Nietzsche and the Nazis
Many scholars view Friedrich Nietzsche's exploitation by the Nazis as a travesty based on ignorance and willful distortion, but the truth may be more complicated.

E Pluribus Cacophony
Multitasking is bad on the road, bad in the office, and, well, just plain bad.

Spain's Memory Wars
Spain's calls for justice against Augusto Pinochet raised a clamor for the country to come clean about atrocities during the Franco years.

Dad's Biological Clock
Women have long been warned that their own unheathful practices can be devastating for children they bear, but new research is showing that fathers contribute their own medical legacies.

The Daughters Vote
Lobbyists take note: Having a female child significantly increases the likelihood that a legislator will cast a liberal vote, particularly on reproductive rights issues.

Cultural Learnings of Kazakhstan
Kazakhstan officials are frustrated by their most famous "citizen": Borat, the comic buffoon created by comedian Sacha Baron Cohen, who has brought unasked-for attention to the former Soviet satellite but boosted tourism.

The Death of Mercy
The quality of mercy may not be strained, as Portia said in Shakespeare’s Merchant of Venice, but its quantity certainly is—at least if you’re an accused or convicted lawbreaker.

New Directions in Pork
Some little-known tips for reaping Federal pork dollars. Hint: Vote against the president.

Dictator Regret
Four Middle East dictators, backed by the U.S. for the stability they bring, are getting old, and none have a successor with clear popular support.

Earth Exceptionalism
Maybe life really is one in a hundred billion. If so, that might be good news for Earth.

Imperial Edifice
If embassy size relates proportionately to international prestige, what are we to make of two mammoth new entries--the Chinese embassy in Washington, and the new U.S. embassy in Baghdad?

In Praise of Renting
One things been made clear by the housing crisis: not everyone should own their own home. Renting has its merits.

Ghost Bird
Those looking for the elusive ivory-billed woodpecker would do well to listen to the locals.

Yoknapatawpha Diplomacy
William Faulkner, a reclusive writer fond of drink, might seem a curious emissary to foster American goodwill abroad. But in those Cold War times, artists and intellectuals were considered not only relevant but vital to U.S. foreign policy.

News Virgins
How does today's young generation get their news? Mostly they don't.

School Choice Apostasy?
A recent book criticizes the school choice movement, and opens up a hornets' nest of angry retorts.

Currying Maximum Favor
The French turned over far more money to the Nazi occupiers in World War II than the armistice called for, so much, in fact, that the Germans could not spend it all.

Worth Every Penny
Chief executive pay went up by more than 500 percent, on average, from 1980 to 2003, but so did the value of the top 1,000 firms.

Unmasking the Surge
A foreign policy expert warns that the troop surge in Iraq, while yielding short-term gains, may endanger Iraqis later on.