Imagining a Great Republic (Hardback) | Released: 10 Nov 2017

In the first comprehensive reading of dozens of American literary and social culture classics, Tom Cronin, one of America's most astute students of the American political tradition, tells the story of the American political experiment through the eyes of forty major novelists, from Harriet Beecher Stowe to Hunter S. Thompson. They have been moral and civic consciousness-raisers as we have navigated the zigs and zags, the successes and setbacks, and the slow awkward evolution of the American political experiment. Constitutional democracy, equal justice for all, the American Dream, and American Exceptionalism are all part of our country's narrative. But, as Imagining a Great Republic explains, there has never been just a single American narrative--we have competing stories, just as we have competing American Dreams and competing ways of imagining a more perfect political union. Recognizing and understanding these competing values is a key part of being American. Cronin's book explains how this is possible and why we should all be proud to be American.
About the Author: Tom Cronin (Stanford University, PhD) is McHugh Professor of American Institutions and Leadership at Colorado College. He is President Emeritus of Whitman College (1993-2005) and served as Acting President at Colorado College (1991). He has served as President of the Presidency Research Group, and President of the Western Political Science Association, and on the Executive Council of the American Political Science Association. He has authored and co-authored best-selling text-books on American government and the American presidency. He has won several awards for teaching, advising and for his research, including the American Political Science Association's Charles E. Merriam Award for significant contributions to the art of government, and Best Leadership Book Award of 2013. His latest books are Leadership Matters: Unleashing the Power of Paradox (Paradigm Publishers, 2012); Colorado Politics and Policy: Governing a Purple State, co-authored with Robert D. Loevy (University of Nebraska Press, 2012); and The Paradoxes of the American Presidency, 5th edition, co-authored with Michael A. Genovese (Oxford University Press, 2017). He has published many articles in major political science and public policy journals, as well as in Science, Saturday Review, The New York Times Magazine, TV Guide, and The Daily Beast. He writes regular feature essays for The Denver Post.