On December 1, 2010, a spokesperson for Rep. John Boehner, the leader of the incoming House Republican majority, declared that the Republicans will dissolve the House Select Committee on Global Warming, established in 2007 to provide a forum for discussion of climate change issues. Boehner, like most of the Republican leadership, has long denied the urgency of climate change. In April 2009, as a guest on ABC's “This Week with George Stephanopoulos,” he notoriously compared carbon dioxide emissions to cow flatulence, asserting: “George, the idea that carbon dioxide is a carcinogen that is harmful to our environment is almost comical. Every time we exhale, we exhale carbon dioxide. Every cow in the world, you know, when they do what they do, you've got more carbon dioxide.”

There is no integrated regime governing efforts to limit the extent of climate change. Instead, there is a regime complex: a loosely-coupled set of specific regimes. We describe the regime complex for climate change and seek to explain it, using interest-based, functional, and organizational arguments. This institutional form is likely to persist; efforts to build a comprehensive regime are unlikely to succeed, but experiments abound with narrower institutions focused on particular aspects of the climate change problem. Building on this analysis, we argue that a climate change regime complex, if it meets specified criteria, has advantages over any politically feasible comprehensive regime. Adaptability and flexibility are particularly important in a setting—such as climate change policy—in which the most demanding international commitments are interdependent yet governments vary widely in their interest and ability to implement them. Yet in view of the serious political constraints, both domestic and international, there is little reason for optimism that the climate regime complex that is emerging will lead to reductions in emissions rapid enough to meet widely discussed goals, such as stopping global warming at two degrees above pre-industrial levels.

In the aftermath of a potentially demoralizing 2008 electoral defeat, when the Republican Party seemed widely discredited, the emergence of the Tea Party provided conservative activists with a new identity funded by Republican business elites and reinforced by a network of conservative media sources. Untethered from recent GOP baggage and policy specifics, the Tea Party energized disgruntled white middle-class conservatives and garnered widespread attention, despite stagnant or declining favorability ratings among the general public. As participant observation and interviews with Massachusetts activists reveal, Tea Partiers are not monolithically hostile toward government; they distinguish between programs perceived as going to hard-working contributors to US society like themselves and “handouts” perceived as going to unworthy or freeloading people. During 2010, Tea Party activism reshaped many GOP primaries and enhanced voter turnout, but achieved a mixed record in the November general election. Activism may well continue to influence dynamics in Congress and GOP presidential primaries. Even if the Tea Party eventually subsides, it has undercut Obama's presidency, revitalized conservatism, and pulled the national Republican Party toward the far right.

Member-based civic associations, or citizen groups, have two crucial roles in American democracy. They advocate for members' interests in the public arena, but also operate as Tocquevillian “schools of democracy” linking citizens to politics and equipping them with the skills of democratic citizenship. Yet scant research has examined the interrelationships of these two roles. Does the work that civic associations do in developing democratic participants enhance the work they do advocating for members' interests in the public arena? We bring together two previously disparate strands of research on civic associations by arguing that a key factor affecting the political presence of civic associations is leadership quality. We focus on the relationship of leadership quality to political presence, using data from a unique 2003 study of 226 local entities of the Sierra Club. We show that organizations with more skilled and committed leaders have higher levels of political presence. This contrasts with previous research that has focused primarily on community context and resources as explanatory factors. This study shows that political presence is related to the extent to which leaders develop their skills and demonstrate commitment to the organization.

Governing after Crisis: The Politics of Investigation, Accountability, and Learning. Edited by Arjen Boin, Allan McConnell, and Paul 'T Hart. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2008. 336p. $99.00 cloth, $34.99 paper.

Learning from Catastrophes: Strategies for Reaction and Response. Edited by Howard Kunreuther and Micheel Useem. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Wharton School Publishing, 2010. 352p. $37.99 paper.

The Next Catastrophe: Reducing Our Vulnerabilities to Natural, Industrial, and Terrorist Disasters. By Charles Perrow. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2007. 388p. $29.95 paper.

Developed and developing nations alike face low-probability but high-consequence exogenous shocks, including ice storms, chemical spills, terrorist attacks, and regional blackouts. Recently, “natural” disasters have dominated the airwaves; mega-catastrophes that claim more than 1,000 lives have become an almost yearly occurrence. In 2010, the Haiti and Chile earthquakes killed more than 200,000 people between them and felt all too familiar to many observers in the West. Before them were Cyclone Nargis in Burma, which took 130,000 lives in 2008; Hurricane Katrina, which killed more than 1,500 New Orleans residents and left 80% of the city flooded in 2005; and the Indian Ocean tsunami, which claimed roughly a quarter of a million lives in India, Indonesia, Sri Lanka, and Thailand in 2004.

Outside the Law: Emergency and Executive Power. By Clement Fatovic. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2009. 368p. $55.00.

Emergency Politics: Paradox, Law, Democracy. By Bonnie Honig. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2009. 218p. $26.95.

States of Emergency in Liberal Democracies. By Nomi Claire Lazar. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2009. 190p. $80.00.

In the wake of 9/11, many political scientists and theorists in the United States of America turned their attention to the topic of emergencies. That required them to confront a fundamental question: Are emergencies to be studied as important in their own right, as altogether exceptional events that threaten the very existence of a society in unforeseeable ways? Or are they important, not because they are radically distinct from the normal situation of politics, but because they bring to the surface otherwise implicit aspects of normal politics?

The Art of Not Being Governed: An Anarchist History of Upland Southeast Asia. By James C. Scott. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2009. 464p. $35.00.

The book under discussion is James C. Scott's latest contribution to the study of agrarian politics, culture, and society, and to the ways that marginalized communities evade or resist projects of state authority. The book offers a synoptic history of Upland Southeast Asia, a 2.5 million–kilometer region of hill country spanning Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, Thailand, Burma, and China. It offers a kind of “area study.” It also builds on Scott's earlier work on “hidden transcripts” of subaltern groups and on “seeing like a state.” The book raises many important theoretical questions about research methods and social inquiry, the relationship between political science and anthropology, the nature of states, and of modernity more generally. The book is also deeply relevant to problems of “state-building” and “failed states” in places like Afghanistan, Iraq, and Somalia. As Scott writes, “The huge literature on state-making, contemporary and historic, pays virtually no attention to its obverse: the history of deliberate and reactive statelessness. This is the history of those who got away, and state-making cannot be understood apart from it. This is also what makes it an anarchist history” (p. x).

In this symposium, I have invited a number of prominent political and social scientists to comment on the book, its historical narrative, and its broader theoretical implications for thinking about power, state failure, state-building, and foreign policy. How does the book shed light on the limits of states and the modes of resistance to state authority? Are there limits, theoretical and normative, to this “anarchist” understanding of governance and the “art of being governed”?

—Jeffrey C. Isaac, Editor

The Art of Not Being Governed: An Anarchist History of Upland Southeast Asia. By James C. Scott. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2009. 464p. $35.00.

The book under discussion is James C. Scott's latest contribution to the study of agrarian politics, culture, and society, and to the ways that marginalized communities evade or resist projects of state authority. The book offers a synoptic history of Upland Southeast Asia, a 2.5 million–kilometer region of hill country spanning Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, Thailand, Burma, and China. It offers a kind of “area study.” It also builds on Scott's earlier work on “hidden transcripts” of subaltern groups and on “seeing like a state.” The book raises many important theoretical questions about research methods and social inquiry, the relationship between political science and anthropology, the nature of states, and of modernity more generally. The book is also deeply relevant to problems of “state-building” and “failed states” in places like Afghanistan, Iraq, and Somalia. As Scott writes, “The huge literature on state-making, contemporary and historic, pays virtually no attention to its obverse: the history of deliberate and reactive statelessness. This is the history of those who got away, and state-making cannot be understood apart from it. This is also what makes it an anarchist history” (p. x).

In this symposium, I have invited a number of prominent political and social scientists to comment on the book, its historical narrative, and its broader theoretical implications for thinking about power, state failure, state-building, and foreign policy. How does the book shed light on the limits of states and the modes of resistance to state authority? Are there limits, theoretical and normative, to this “anarchist” understanding of governance and the “art of being governed”?

—Jeffrey C. Isaac, Editor

The Art of Not Being Governed: An Anarchist History of Upland Southeast Asia. By James C. Scott. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2009. 464p. $35.00.

The book under discussion is James C. Scott's latest contribution to the study of agrarian politics, culture, and society, and to the ways that marginalized communities evade or resist projects of state authority. The book offers a synoptic history of Upland Southeast Asia, a 2.5 million–kilometer region of hill country spanning Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, Thailand, Burma, and China. It offers a kind of “area study.” It also builds on Scott's earlier work on “hidden transcripts” of subaltern groups and on “seeing like a state.” The book raises many important theoretical questions about research methods and social inquiry, the relationship between political science and anthropology, the nature of states, and of modernity more generally. The book is also deeply relevant to problems of “state-building” and “failed states” in places like Afghanistan, Iraq, and Somalia. As Scott writes, “The huge literature on state-making, contemporary and historic, pays virtually no attention to its obverse: the history of deliberate and reactive statelessness. This is the history of those who got away, and state-making cannot be understood apart from it. This is also what makes it an anarchist history” (p. x).

In this symposium, I have invited a number of prominent political and social scientists to comment on the book, its historical narrative, and its broader theoretical implications for thinking about power, state failure, state-building, and foreign policy. How does the book shed light on the limits of states and the modes of resistance to state authority? Are there limits, theoretical and normative, to this “anarchist” understanding of governance and the “art of being governed”?

—Jeffrey C. Isaac, Editor

The Art of Not Being Governed: An Anarchist History of Upland Southeast Asia. By James C. Scott. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2009. 464p. $35.00.

The book under discussion is James C. Scott's latest contribution to the study of agrarian politics, culture, and society, and to the ways that marginalized communities evade or resist projects of state authority. The book offers a synoptic history of Upland Southeast Asia, a 2.5 million–kilometer region of hill country spanning Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, Thailand, Burma, and China. It offers a kind of “area study.” It also builds on Scott's earlier work on “hidden transcripts” of subaltern groups and on “seeing like a state.” The book raises many important theoretical questions about research methods and social inquiry, the relationship between political science and anthropology, the nature of states, and of modernity more generally. The book is also deeply relevant to problems of “state-building” and “failed states” in places like Afghanistan, Iraq, and Somalia. As Scott writes, “The huge literature on state-making, contemporary and historic, pays virtually no attention to its obverse: the history of deliberate and reactive statelessness. This is the history of those who got away, and state-making cannot be understood apart from it. This is also what makes it an anarchist history” (p. x).

In this symposium, I have invited a number of prominent political and social scientists to comment on the book, its historical narrative, and its broader theoretical implications for thinking about power, state failure, state-building, and foreign policy. How does the book shed light on the limits of states and the modes of resistance to state authority? Are there limits, theoretical and normative, to this “anarchist” understanding of governance and the “art of being governed”?

—Jeffrey C. Isaac, Editor

The Art of Not Being Governed: An Anarchist History of Upland Southeast Asia. By James C. Scott. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2009. 464p. $35.00.

The book under discussion is James C. Scott's latest contribution to the study of agrarian politics, culture, and society, and to the ways that marginalized communities evade or resist projects of state authority. The book offers a synoptic history of Upland Southeast Asia, a 2.5 million–kilometer region of hill country spanning Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, Thailand, Burma, and China. It offers a kind of “area study.” It also builds on Scott's earlier work on “hidden transcripts” of subaltern groups and on “seeing like a state.” The book raises many important theoretical questions about research methods and social inquiry, the relationship between political science and anthropology, the nature of states, and of modernity more generally. The book is also deeply relevant to problems of “state-building” and “failed states” in places like Afghanistan, Iraq, and Somalia. As Scott writes, “The huge literature on state-making, contemporary and historic, pays virtually no attention to its obverse: the history of deliberate and reactive statelessness. This is the history of those who got away, and state-making cannot be understood apart from it. This is also what makes it an anarchist history” (p. x).

In this symposium, I have invited a number of prominent political and social scientists to comment on the book, its historical narrative, and its broader theoretical implications for thinking about power, state failure, state-building, and foreign policy. How does the book shed light on the limits of states and the modes of resistance to state authority? Are there limits, theoretical and normative, to this “anarchist” understanding of governance and the “art of being governed”?

—Jeffrey C. Isaac, Editor

Global Governance of Hazardous Chemicals: Challenges of Multilevel Management. By Henrik Selin. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2010. 235p. $44.00 cloth, $22.00 paper.

In his book, Henrik Selin introduces readers to the complex and fragmented international regime governing the management of hazardous chemicals. He presents a compelling account of the environmental and human health threats posed by international trade and the transboundary movement of hazardous chemicals and waste, building a strong case for this problem as an appropriate target for international cooperation and governance. He then analyzes the development and contents of the chemicals regime, with particular emphasis on the way that linkages among issues and actors contribute to the design of chemicals management policy.

First, I want to thank Megan Mullin for her careful review of my book, which raises several important issues worthy of careful consideration. These will be helpful to me in my continued research and analysis of global environmental governance. A main criticism offered by Mullin's review is that my book includes a great deal of empirical detail but is less focused on testing propositions. This is largely by design, however, and her critique reflects our different views on research design and our varying ways of approaching empirical case studies and analysis.

This notable book on a little-studied but central aspect of American water politics addresses analytical issues important to a range of political science fields. It is, for example, of considerable relevance to scholars working in areas of American federalism and community politics, as well as to those who are interested in cross-cutting issues of public administration and policy fragmentation, public and private stakeholder participation and democracy, and multilevel governance. In Governing the Tap, Megan Mullin analyzes the institutional context and means through which local public services are provided, the governance structures that shape policy outcomes and how they are able to meet developing community goals, and the ways in which specialized structures fit into the complex political landscape of city, county, state, and federal policymaking. Because of both its broad appeal and its own qualities, this book deserves a wide readership.

In his careful and generous review of my book, Henrik Selin asks why I selected responsiveness and intergovernmental coordination as dependent variables for my analysis, therefore setting aside other policy effects that special district governance might produce. This is an important question: the delegation of policy authority to autonomous, specialized governments is a significant departure from the normal politics that takes place in a multidimensional legislature and could have a variety of consequences. To the extent that special districts have received any scholarly attention, it has focused mostly on estimating how specialization affects the level of public spending. My interest lies more in the quality of governance. What do we want from representative government? Central among our goals should be policy outcomes that are responsive both to public preferences and to public problems.

Blue–Green Coalitions: Fighting for Safe Workplaces and Healthy Communities. By Brian Mayer. Ithaca, NY: ILR Press and Cornell University Press, 2009. 240p. $57.95 cloth. $19.95 paper.

When do labor-environmental coalitions emerge and endure? In a period when headlines are dominated by economic recession, unemployment, and oil spills, the focus of Brian Mayer's book takes on practical urgency. The question is theoretically intriguing as well. Labor unions are often characterized as archetypical interest-based organizations, representing industrial workers' concerns for their own material well-being. Environmental mobilization, in contrast, is seen as a quality-of-life movement most commonly associated with members of the postindustrial middle class who possess leisure time and resources sufficient to enable their activism. When the question of how to regulate industries that employ toxic chemicals arises, these two groups can become locked in an acrimonious jobs versus the environment debate, making them more likely antagonists than allies. This sense of latent opposition is captured by one worker's assertion that greens want to “save the whales and kill the workers” (p. 2). How can these divisions be overcome? In his clearly written and compelling book, Blue–Green Coalitions, Mayer argues that concern over the effects of hazardous materials on human health offers one avenue for generating powerful and enduring coalitions.

Both the labor and environmental movements have recently experienced significant crises of faith in their ability to mobilize enough popular support to carry on with their respective missions. At a 2004 meeting of the Environmental Grantmakers Association, a report entitled “The Death of Environmentalism” proclaimed that environmentalism as a special interest group had accomplished its goal of raising awareness but had ultimately failed to galvanize a sustainable social movement. Mirroring that debate within the environmental movement, in 2004 the Service Employees International Union called for major reforms within the AFL-CIO; demanding that the labor federation focus on organizing new workers rather than defending its existing members. This divide within the AFL-CIO ultimately led to the formation of the Change to Win coalition, with several other major unions joining the SEIU in a new reformist coalition federation.

In this richly detailed and comprehensive account of environmental organizations in post-Soviet Russia, Laura A. Henry delivers an insightful analysis of the strengths and weaknesses of the many green groups to emerge during the post-Soviet era and the challenges they face in sustaining a vibrant movement. Red to Green delivers an important contribution to the field of contemporary Russian politics by utilizing the environmental movement to illustrate the growth of civil society and the strategies used by civic organizations to overcome the institutional and normative barriers created by the legacy of Soviet rule. Given the deplorable state of the Russian Federation's environment, a strong environmental movement would seem a logical outcome of the internationally desired democratization and participation in civil society among the Russian citizenry. Yet as Henry is careful to point out, participation in social movement organizations is not always a natural consequence of environmental grievances, and in order for green groups to survive, they must make use of preexisting norms, institutions, and social networks that both enable and constrain their efforts to advocate for a safe and healthy environment.

In his thoughtful review, Brian Mayer identifies some of the key factors that will shape the future development of Russia's environmental movement. In doing so, he provides me the opportunity to highlight and expand upon these themes. Mayer's comments suggest that the study of social movements is enriched by the interaction of scholars focused on vastly different societies. In this vein, attention to one key aspect of my argument—how activists' diverse interpretations of the Soviet period shape their current perceptions—helps respond to some of the questions that Mayer raises.

Treading Softly: Paths to Ecological Order. By Thomas Princen. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2010. 224p. $22.95.

When you are trying to get someone to embrace new habits of mind and body, like, say, those of ecological sustainability, it sometimes works to appeal to common sense. Thomas Princen employs this stragegy of persuasion—he also invokes enlightened self-interest, but I think he prefers to appeal to common sense—in his bold, tolerant, honest, and powerful short book. To be more specific, he invokes a set of minor or currently rather quiet “segments” (p. 171) inside the mixed bag that is American common sense. Common sense is not, after all, a stable block but a conglomeration of diverse parts, some of which do not fit at all well with the others. And it is the heterogeneity of the common store of wisdom that makes possible Princen's reorganization of it. He highlights some underutilized segments of the “old normal” and harnesses their power to the project of building a society that “takes infinite material growth as impossible,” “embraces limits” (p. 187), and is devoted to “living well by living well within our means” (p. 124).