Developing politics knowledge beyond the classroom. Part three: wider reading

Equally I could have called this boosting your personal statement for UCAS.

Excited about going to pick up my copy of Obama’s biography tomorrow (£17 with a voucher from the Guardian), I have made a couple of additions to my Politics reading list.

The following can also be useful as a guide for those who want to read around the subject. Those marked with a double asterisk were highlighted as being helpful by successful applicants for Politics at Oxbridge.

I haven’t made any hyperlinks to Amazon – other booksellers are available.

Classic texts

Democracy in America, Alexis de Tocqueville, Penguin, ISBN: 0140447601

Leviathan, Thomas Hobbes, Oxford, ISBN: 0192834983

**On Liberty, John Stuart Mill, Oxford, ISBN: 0192833847

Second Treatise of Government, John Locke, Hackett, ISBN: 0915144867

Utilitarianism, John Stuart Mill, Oxford, ISBN: 019875163X

The Communist Manifesto, Karl Marx, Oxford, ISBN: 0192834371

The English Constitution, Walter Bagehot, Oxford, ISBN: 0192839756

The Federalist Papers, James Madison et al, Penguin, ISBN: 0140444955

The Prince, Niccolo Machiavelli, Oxford, ISBN: 019280426X

The Republic, Plato, Penguin, ISBN: 0140449140

The Rights of Man, Thomas Paine, Oxford, ISBN: 0192835572

**The Social Contract, John-Jacques Rousseau, Penguin, ISBN: 0140442014

More recent attempts to explain Politics

After Blair: David Cameron and the Conservative Tradition, Kieron O’Hara, Icon, ISBN: 1840467959

In Defence of Politics, Bernard Crick, Continuum, ISBN: 0826487513

Presidential Power, Richard Neustadt, The Free Press, ISBN: 0029227968

What’s Left?: How Liberals Lost Their Way, Nick Cohen, Fourth Estate, ISBN: 0007229690

Who Runs This Place?: The Anatomy of Britain in the 21st Century, Anthony Sampson, John Murray, ISBN: 0719565669

Why Politics Matters: Making Politics Work, Gerry Stoker, Palgrave, ISBN: 1403997403

The End of History, Francis Fukuyama, Harper, ISBN: 0380720027

The Right Nation: Why America is Different, John Micklethwait, Penguin, ISBN: 0141015365

The Ideas that Conquered the World, Michael Mandelbaum, Publicaffairs Ltd, ISBN: 1586482068

How Democratic is the American Constitution?, Robert Dahl, Yale, ISBN: 0300095244

Readable biographies

Dreams from My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance, Barack Obama, Three Rivers, ISBN: 1400082773

Gladstone, Roy Jenkins, Pan, ISBN: 0330411713

Harold Wilson, Ben Pimlott, Harper Collins, ISBN: 0006379559

The Natural: The Misunderstood Presidency of Bill Clinton, Joe Klein, Broadway, ISBN: 0767914120

Tony Blair: Prime Minister, John Rentoul, ISBN: 0751530824

William Pitt the Younger: A Biography, William Hague, Harper, ISBN: 0007147201