Blog
Politics reading list update
21st June 2011
I have made a couple of additions to my Politics reading list, which should be of interest to anyone looking to support their UCAS application with evidence of some depth to their interest of politics. The following can also be useful as a guide for those who want to read around the subject. Those titles below marked with a double asterisk were highlighted as being helpful by successful applicants for PPE.
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
The Assault on Liberty: What Went Wrong with Rights, Dominic Raab, 4th Estate, ISBN: 0007293399
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
The Bridge: The Life and Rise of Barack Obama, David Remnick, Picador, ISBN: 0330509969
Tony Blair: Prime Minister, John Rentoul, ISBN: 0751530824
William Pitt the Younger: A Biography, William Hague, Harper, ISBN: 0007147201