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Theodore Lowi, in PS (Fall 19831, American Political Science Associ- ation, 1527 New Hampshire Ave. N.W., Washington, D.C. 20036.
For more than a decade, Democrats and Republicans have searched for ways to shore up their party organizations. A vain exercise, declares Lowi, a Cornell political scientist. The best medicine for both would be a third national political party.
Lowi contends that Americans' thinking about third parties is mud- dled political myths. One article of faith, for example,...
don't have many defenders in academe. Yet Tesh, a Yale political scientist, finds it odd that "having a passionate conviction about abortion, disarmament, homosexuality, guns, femi- nism, tax laws, or the environment" is seen as a political vice.
Single-issue groups, she says, are often viewed as just another "spe- cial interest" or "pressure group." But traditional interest groups work for legislation that directly (often economically) benefits their mem- bers; membership...
Do Nonvoters Austin Rannev. in Public Opinion (0ct.-Really Matter? Nov. 1983), American ~nter~rise
Insti-tute for Public Policy Research, 1150 17th St. N.W., Washington, D.C. 20036.
Most political scientists see the steady decline in U.S. voter turnout for presidential and congressional elections since the early 1960s as a sign of failing national political health. Ranney, a political scientist at the American Enterprise Institute, is not so sure.
In 1980, only 53 percent of voting-age Americans...
mail, for example- but doubts that they would boost turnout more than 10 percentage points. Blacks, Hispanics, and poor whites, the main stay-at-homes, won't be lured to the polls, he writes, until they "come to believe that voting is a powerful instrument for getting the government to do what they want it to do."
"The City Council Chamber: From Dis-
tance to Intimacy" by Charles T. Good-
sell, in The public ~n&st (Winter 1984),
Symbolism 20th & Northampton Sts.....
contrast, the contemporary layout of "the pit," as locals call it, where the Fort Worth, Texas, City Council meets, fosters the impression of informal contact between citizen and legislator.
studio" that extends the intimacy to the community at large.
Overall, says Goodsell, the new council chambers suggest that citi- zens and their representatives are equals, "mutually engaged in the work of government." He worries, though, that while the new designs reflect (and perhaps...
the 1972 ABM (antiballistic missile) treaty. But Jastrow contends that Moscow has repeatedly violated the pact. Last summer, for example, U.S. spy satellites discovered a sophis- ticated radar complex located near the Soviets' Siberian ICBM fields. The only possible use for the radar is to direct antimissile rockets. Other evidence suggests that Moscow has tested such ABMs.
Jastrow envisions a three-tier defense of lasers and "mini-missiles.'
If each layer had a 10-percent "leakage rate,"...
Alvin H.
Winning in Bernstein and John D.Wagelstein, in
Policy Review (Winter 1984), The Heritage
El Salvador Foundation, 214 Massachusetts Ave. N.E.,
Washington, D.C. 20002.
A negotiated settlement or a long, inconclusive war seem today to be the only options available to the US.-backed government of El Salva- dor. But Bernstein and Wagelstein, U.S. Naval War College professor and former commander of the 55 U.S. military advisers in El Salvador, respectively, have a plan to help the Salvadoran...
Neil C. Livingstone, inThe Rise World Affairs (Summer 1983), 4000 Albe-
marle St. N.W., Washington, D.C. 20016.
In 1983, terrorist attacks on the U.S. Marine barracks in Beirut and on the U.S. Capitol stunned Americans. More shocks are almost certainly in store, as terrorists around the world step up their campaigns.
Ironically, one of terrorism's major defeats-Israel's 1982 drive into Lebanon, which dislodged the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) from Beirut-is also contributing to its...
7.6 percent in 1982. Even worse, industry analysts see a long-term decline of annual growth in worldwide auto sales to just two percent a year. In Japan, idled plants have already hurt productivity. Nissan, for exam- ple, suffered an 18 percent drop in 1982 auto output per worker. Japan's auto workers no longer see their employers' guarantees as im- mutable, Webber writes. Like their counterparts in Detroit, they are beginning to worry about automation and unemployment. Renewed labor strife is possible.
Auto...