"This book offers an alternative perspective on popular music and youth culture in the 1980s and beyond. Based on interviews with disc jockeys, record label owners, musicians, producers and fans, it describes and analyses the shift from New Pop in the early 1980s to what it calls Political Pop in the mid-late 1980s."--From synopsis.

Madchester may have been born at the Haçienda in the summer of 1988, but the city had been in creative ferment for almost a decade prior to the rise of acid house. The end-of-the-century party is the definitive account of a generational shift in popular music and youth culture, what it meant and what it led to. First published right after the Second Summer of Love, it tells the story of the transition from new pop to the political pop of the mid-1980s and its deviant offspring, post-political pop. Resisting contemporary proclamations about the end of youth culture and the rise of a new, right-leaning conformism, the book draws on interviews with DJs, record company bosses, musicians, producers and fans to outline a clear transition in pop thinking, a move from an obsession with style, packaging and synthetic sounds to content, socially conscious lyrics and a new authenticity. This edition is framed by a prologue by Tara Brabazon, asking how we can reclaim the spirit, energy and authenticity of Madchester for a post-youth, post-pop generation. It is illustrated with iconic photographs by Kevin Cummins.

In 1966, everyone who was anyone wanted an invitation to Truman Capote's "Black and White Dance" in New York, and guests included Frank Sinatra, Norman Mailer, C. Z. Guest, Kennedys, Rockefellers, and more. Lavishly illustrated with photographs and drawings of the guests, this portrait of revelry at the height of the swirling, swinging sixties is a must for anyone interested in American popular culture and the lifestyles of the rich, famous, and talented.

This fundamental re-evaluation of the origins and importance of the idea of 'party' in British political thought and politics in the eighteenth century draws on the writings of Rapin, Bolingbroke, David Hume, John Brown and Edmund Burke to demonstrate that attitudes to party were more complex and penetrating than previously thought.

Soccer fandom has traditionally been seen as an important part of adolescent, generally male, identity making. In Post-Fandom and the Millennial Blues , Steve Redhead shows how this tradition of youth culture of fandom has been eroded in the last years of the twentieth century by the more fleeting, style conscious allegiances inspired by television, films and music. The clubs that young people follow are determined by advertising and popular music; the games that they watch are brought to them by the globalized culture of television, as in the world cup staged in America; even their fears of so-called soccer hooliganism are determined by media-engendered moral panics at a time when the phenomenon itself seems to be dying away.

Democracy thrives on vigorous competition between political parties. However, in several established democracies one party manages to dominate national politics for decades at a time, seemingly creating a democratic one-party unnatural democracy. This book examines five such countries - Canada, Ireland, India, Japan, Italy - to understand what kind of party comes to dominate democratic competition, and how and why they do so. In different countries with different political challenges, an analysis of their 'Government Parties' reveals their common relationship with the origins and operations of the states they dominate, and the nation- and/or state-building challenges they face. Democratic dominance cannot last forever; how a government party responds to the seemingly inevitable decline of long-term support defines the prospects for its unnatural democracy. Comparative Politics is a series for researchers, teachers, and students of political science that deals with contemporary government and politics. Global in scope, books in the series are characterized by a stress on comparative analysis and strong methodological rigour. The series is published in association with the European Consortium for Political Research. For more information visit www.ecprnet.eu The series is edited by Susan Scarrow, John and Rebecca Moores Professor of Political Science at the University of Houston, and Jonathan Slapin, Professor of Political Institutions and European Politics, Department of Political Science, University of Zurich.

Reforming health care, revamping the welfare system, preserving or cutting Social Security, creating employment programs for displaced employees, and revising U.S. social programs to help working parents with children - all of these endeavors and more are part of ongoing national debates about the future of social policy in the United States. In this wide-ranging collection of essays, renowned social scientist Theda Skocpol shows how historical understanding, centered on U.S. governmental institutions and shifting political alliances, can illuminate the limits and possibilities of American social policymaking both past and present.