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PUBLIC POLICY BY THE BOOK

Policy.com has undertaken to designate the 50 Most Influential Policy Books of All Time. Well, not quite 50: They've actually limited themselves to 49 and have invited us to nominate the fiftieth. The list extends chronologically from classical Greece to the late twentieth century. The genres include novels, memoirs, biographies, letters, and muckraking exposes, as well as tamer nonfiction texts. The viewpoints are those of the philosophers, sociologists, political scientists, journalists, diplomats, scientists, cultural critics, and various interdisciplinary permutations thereof. The authors are overwhelmingly male, white, American, and English-speaking, although a handful of women (Harriet Beecher Stowe, Jane Jacobs, Margaret Sanger, Betty Friedan), Europeans (Marx, de Tocqueville, Machiavelli), and persons of color (Martin Luther King, Francis Fukayama) make the list. Links from summaries of the works lead variously to full texts, excerpts, and Amazon.com. My nomination for Book #50 might be Carol Gilligan's "In a Different Voice," or perhaps Randy Shilts's "And the Band Played On." Look at the list and let me know what yours is.

Mon, 05 Jun 2000 14:03:07 -0700

Submitted by: Lois Ambash