The Agenda

Why are the economic interests and priorities of lower- and middle-class Americans so often ignored by the U.S. Congress, while the economic interests of the wealthiest are prioritized, often resulting in policies favorable to their interests? In Hijacking the Agenda, political scientists Christopher Witko, Jana Morgan, Nathan J. Kelly, and Peter K. Enns examine why Congress privileges the concerns of businesses and the wealthy over those of average Americans. They go beyond demonstrating that such economic bias exists to illuminate precisely how and why economic policy is so often skewed in favor of the rich. The authors analyze over 20 years of floor speeches by several hundred members of Congress to examine the influence of campaign contributions on how the national economic agenda is set in Congress. They find that legislators who received more money from business and professional associations were more likely to discuss the deficit and other upper-class priorities, while those who received more money from unions were more likely to discuss issues important to lower- and middle-class constituents, such as economic inequality and wages. This attention imbalance matters because issues discussed in Congress receive more direct legislative action, such as bill introductions and committee hearings. While unions use campaign contributions to push back against wealthy interests, spending by the wealthy dwarfs that of unions. The authors use case studies analyzing financial regulation and the minimum wage to demonstrate how the financial influence of the wealthy enables them to advance their economic agenda. In each case, the authors examine the balance of structural power, or the power that comes from a person or company’s position in the economy, and kinetic power, the power that comes from the ability to mobilize organizational and financial resources in the policy process. The authors show how big business uses its structural power and resources to effect policy change in Congress, as when the financial industry sought deregulation in the late 1990s, resulting in the passage of a bill eviscerating New Deal financial regulations. Likewise, when business interests want to preserve the policy status quo, it uses its power to keep issues off of the agenda, as when inflation eats into the minimum wage and its declining purchasing power leaves low-wage workers in poverty. Although groups representing lower- and middle-class interests, particularly unions, can use their resources to shape policy responses if conditions are right, they lack structural power and suffer significant resource disadvantages. As a result, wealthy interests have the upper hand in shaping the policy process, simply due to their pivotal position in the economy and the resulting perception that policies beneficial to business are beneficial for everyone. Hijacking the Agenda is an illuminating account of the way economic power operates through the congressional agenda and policy process to privilege the interests of the wealthy and marks a major step forward in our understanding of the politics of inequality.

From 2011, when Republicans gained control of the House of Representatives, until the present, Congress enacted hardly any major legislation outside of the tax law President Trump signed in 2017. In the same period, the Supreme Court dismantled much of America's campaign finance law, severely weakened the Voting Rights Act, permitted states to opt-out of the Affordable Care Act's Medicaid expansion, weakened laws protecting against age discimination and sexual and racial harassment, and held that every state must permit same-sex couples to marry. This powerful unelected body, now controlled by six very conservative Republicans, has and will become the locus of policymaking in the United States. Ian Millhiser, Vox's Supreme Court correspondent, tells the story of what those six justices are likely to do with their power. It is true that the right to abortion is in its final days, as is affirmative action. But Millhiser shows that it is in the most arcane decisions that the Court will fundamentally reshape America, transforming it into something far less democratic, by attacking voting rights, dismantling and vetoing the federal administrative state, ignoring the separation of church and state, and putting corporations above the law. The Agenda exposes a radically altered Supreme Court whose powers extend far beyond transforming any individual right--its agenda is to shape the very nature of America's government, redefining who gets to have legal rights, who is beyond the reach of the law, and who chooses the people who make our laws.

From the New York Times bestselling author of All the President's Men comes an in-depth, behind-the-scenes look at the Clinton administration.C., and New York City.

Innovation drives long-term economic growth. It has a crucial role to play as global economies recover from the current financial crisis. This book examines the role of innovation in developing countries, with a focus on Africa. It investigates innovation systems and their application; the key role of knowledge in innovation for development; and the importance of comparable country studies and official statistics on innovation. It stresses the need for innovation to become part of a comprehensive development agenda, and makes recommendations for promoting activities in both the formal and informal sectors, with the aim of transforming agriculture into a knowledge-based industry capable of stimulating economic growth. Innovation and the Development Agenda is an important component of the overall OECD Innovation Strategy, which seeks to create stronger and more sustainable growth, while addressing the key global challenges of the 21st century. It is also part of the Innovation, Technology, and Society programme of IDRC. For more information about the OECD Innovation Strategy, see www.oecd.org/innovation/strategy. For more information on IDRC programmes, see www.idrc.ca.

Organizations, institutions, and individuals get stuck in spite of their innovative ideas and ambitious agendas. Never has the timing been better for a book that cuts through the theoretical jargon and delineates the exact political and managerial skills leaders need to move agendas forward. Whether you're a team leader trying to lead change and innovation in a large corporation, an entrepreneur trying to gain support, a politician trying to expand your coalition, or an individual trying to advance your career and build networks, The Agenda Mover will give you the political and managerial leadership skills necessary to achieve results. Based on the premise that leadership competencies and skills can be learned, The Agenda Mover is the inaugural volume of the practitioner-oriented Pragmatic Leadership Series published in association with Cornell University Press. Each volume emphasizes specific skills of execution that leaders at all levels need to master. Visit pragmaticleadershipseries.com to learn more about the series.

Setting the Agenda describes the mass media’s significant and sometimes controversial role in determining which topics are at the centre of public attention and action. Although Walter Lippman captured the essence of the media’s powerful influence early in the last century with his phrase, “the world outside and the pictures in our heads,” a detailed, empirical elaboration of this agenda-setting role of the mass media did not begin until the final quarter of the 20th century. In this comprehensive book, Maxwell McCombs, one of the founding fathers of agenda-setting tradition of research, synthesizes the hundreds of scientific studies carried out on this central role of the mass media in the shaping of public opinion. Across the world, the mass media strongly influences what the pictures of public affairs "in our heads" are about. The mass media also influences the very details of those pictures. In addition to describing this media influence on what we think about and how we think about it, Setting the Agenda also discusses the sources of these media agendas, the psychological explanation for their impact on the public agenda, and the subsequent consequences for attitudes, opinions and behaviour.

From the legendary mystery author of Dead Men Don’t Ski. “One of the best recent publications of the fair-play puzzle at novel length.” —The New York Times Amazingly enough, Henry Tibbett is at work. Crime tends to catch him when he’s on vacation, but this time around Henry’s at a coppers’ conference, an international effort intended to stop drug-smuggling. The conference is in Switzerland (for a Scotland Yard detective, Henry does manage to get around.) and the always sensible Emmy has come along for the parties and the chocolate. It’s a glittering whirl of attractive folks in their best early-1960s attire until one of Henry’s colleagues winds up dead and Henry, of all people, becomes Suspect No. 1. A minor but real pleasure here? The reappearance of some characters from Dead Men Don’t Ski, widening both the Tibbetts’ social circle and the circle of suspects. “A complicated and clever story, with real detection.” —The Guardian Praise for Patricia Moyes “The author who put the ‘who’ back in whodunit.” —Chicago Daily News “A new queen of crime . . . her name can be mentioned in the same breath as Agatha Christie and Ngaio Marsh.” —Daily Herald “An excellent detective novel in the best British tradition. Superbly handled.” —Columbus Dispatch “Intricate plots, ingenious murders, and skillfully drawn, often hilarious, characters distinguish Patricia Moyes’ writing.” —Mystery Scene

When the government comes for her mother, Emmeline embarks on a plan to save her family and expose the truth behind the objectives of the United Nations' agenda 21.