Politics in Europe

Thoroughly updated, Politics in Europe remains an approachable, yet rigorous introduction to the region. Its strong analytic framework and organization, coupled with detailed country coverage, ensure that students not only get a robust introduction to each country, but also are able to make meaningful cross-national comparisons.

Key updates include: an expanded introduction that situates European politics within a comparative framework; more substantive discussions in the "Future of..." chapters; the latest in European politics, including the election in Britain, the aftermath of the deaths of Polish government leaders, the financial crisis affecting Greece and other European countries, and more; updates of key social and political issues including immigration, gender, religion, civic society, and trans-Atlantic relations; and up-to-date tables and figures with key cross-national data.

M. Donald Hancock is professor emeritus of political science at Vanderbilt University. He has previously taught at Columbia University, the University of Texas (UT) at Austin, and the universities of Bielefeld and Mannheim in Germany. Hancock is the founding director of two centers for European Studies―the first at UT Austin and the second, founded in 1981, at Vanderbilt. The latter is now designated the Max Kade Center for European and German Studies (which Hancock has also served as associate director for outreach activities). He is the coauthor (with Henry Krisch) of Politics in Germany (2009), and co-editor and coauthor of Transitions to Capitalism and Democracy in Russia and Central Europe (2000), German Unification: Process and Outcomes (1994), and Managing Modern Capitalism: Industrial Renewal and Workplace Democracy in the United States and Western Europe (1991). Hancock has served as co-chair of the Council for European Studies and as president of the Society for the Advancement of Scandinavian Studies and the Conference Group on German Politics. He is currently working on a collaborative study of economic, societal, and military security in the Baltic region.

Stephen White is James Bryce Professor of Politics at the University of Glasgow, and also Visiting Professor at the Institute of Applied Politics in Moscow. He was chief editor of the Journal of Communist Studies and Transition Politics until 2011, and is currently coeditor of the Journal of Eurasian Studies. His recent publications include Putin′s Russia and the Enlarged Europe (with Roy Allison and Margot Light, 2006), Understanding Russian Politics (2011), Developments in Central and East European Politics 5 (coedited, 2013) and Developments in Russian Politics 8 (coedited, 2014). He is currently working on the implications of EU and NATO enlargement for Russia, Ukraine, and Belarus, and on changes in the political elite over the Putin and Medvedev presidencies. He was elected a Fellow of the British Academy in 2010.

B. Guy Peters is Maurice Falk Professor of American Government at the University of Pittsburgh. He has written extensively in the areas of public administration and public policy, both for the United States and comparatively. Among his recent publications are the Handbook of Public Administration and The Quest for Control: Politicization of the Public Service.

Marjorie Castle is associate professor (lecturer) in political science at the University of Utah. She is the author of two books on Polish politics: Triggering Communism′s Collapse: Perceptions and Power in Poland′s Transition (2003) and Democracy in Poland (2002), coauthored with Ray Taras.

Christopher J. Carman is the John Anderson Senior Research Lecturer in politics at the University of Strathclyde. He previously taught at Glasgow, Pittsburgh, and Rice Universities. His research specializes in the behavioral and institutional aspects of political representation. He is a co-author of Elections and Voters in Britain (2011), with David Denver and Robert Johns, and Of Conscience and Constituents: Religiosity and the Political Psychology of Representation in America (2011) with David Barker. He has also published a variety of articles on British, Scottish and American politics as well as conducted evaluations of the Scotland’s Public Petitions System for the Scottish Parliament.