New Books in Public Policy

How the urban-rural divide drives partisan polarization Why have Americans living in different places come to experience politics as a battle between “us” and “them”? In Rural Versus Urban: The Growing Divide That Threatens Democracy (Princeton UP, 2025) Suzanne Mettler and Trevor Brown argue that political polarization is not just about red states and blue states, or coastal elites who alienate those in fly-over country. Instead, polarization permeates every region and every state—and has become organized through a pernicious rural-urban division. Mettler and Brown explain the evolution of this gulf across five decades, charting political trends in both places. Drawing on data on individuals, communities, and members of Congress, as well as interviews with local party leaders and former elected officials, they show how the divide emerged and why it poses a threat to democracy. Until about thirty years ago, both political parties attracted support from rural and urban voters. But after place-based inequality grew due to deregulation and trade liberalization, white rural dwellers began to view urban people and Democrats as affluent elites out of touch with their needs. Politically active evangelical churches, antiabortion organizations, and gun groups helped deepen the divide, encouraging many of these rural residents to become staunch supporters of the GOP. Now, regional one-party rule in rural America gives Republicans a systematic edge for gaining control of crucial political institutions, including the Senate, House of Representatives, the Presidency, and even the Supreme Court. This is helping enable an extremist political party and pushing democracy to the brink. Mettler and Brown argue that the divide can be repaired—but only if the Democrats build their own robust local organizations and offer citizens a meaningful choice.

Host Ursula Hackett is Reader in Politics at Royal Holloway, University of London, where she specialises in the study of public policymaking and litigation in the US. A former British Academy Mid-Career Fellow, she is the author of the award-winning book,America’s Voucher Politics: How Elites Learned to Hide the State (Cambridge University Press, 2020).

Trevor Brown is a Postdoctoral Fellow at Johns Hopkins University. In Fall 2026, he will join the University of Oregon's Department of Political Science as Assistant Professor of Inequality.
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Worker Centered: Allyship & Action in the Contemporary Labor Movement (Oxford UP, 2024) is a close-to-the-ground, ethnographic narrative of a workplace organizing campaign at a company whose workforce was primarily low wage and immigrant. The book details the overall strategy of the campaign and its ultimate failure to win its core demands. The organization used an innovative strategic model and insisted on the importance of worker leadership. And yet allies and staff participated in a campaign that, although continually framed as such, was decidedly not led by workers. Ultimately, Worker Centered challenges conventional notions of political representation, inviting reflection on the complexities of organizing the marginalized and speaking on their behalf.

Our guest Biko Koenig is an Assistant Professor in the Government and Public Policy programs at Franklin & Marshall college in Lancaster, PA. He is also co-founder of Research Action, a worker-owned research and organizing firm that performs research and analysis for unions, solidarity economy organizations, community groups and social justice campaigns. Trained as an ethnographer and qualitative specialist at the New School for Social Research, Koenig's research investigates questions of political behavior and mobilization that centers the experiences of everyday actors as they seek to challenge status-quo power relationships.

My co-host today is Joe Zerilli, and MA student in the Communication program at Oakland University.
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In Heart of Science: A Philosophy of Scientific Inquiry (University of Chicago Press, 2026), philosopher Jacob Stegenga breaks with the most dominant epistemologies of science to argue that in judging scientific activity, we should focus on its justification, not the achievement of truth or knowledge. Yet, Stegenga argues, the aim of science goes far beyond justification and is, instead, a special kind of truth—common knowledge, a broadly shared and mutually justified scientific finding.

Drawing on both historical examples and recent events like the COVID-19 pandemic, Stegenga outlines his approach before delving into its implications for scientific evaluation, testimony, values, progress, and credit, as well as the nature of science during times of crisis. Truth, he shows, may not be easily identified in the short term. However, an evaluation of scientific justification, grounded in shared standards, is possible. This framework helps us appraise—and appreciate—historical theories that ultimately weren’t accurate and offers fresh insights about appropriate science communication and public trust in scientific research. Justification and scientific rigor are not just means to an end, Stegenga writes, but the very heart of good science.Ambitious, authoritative, and accessible, Heart of Science offers a new vision for the philosophy of science.

Jacob Stegenga is professor of philosophy in the School of Humanities at Nanyang Technological University, Singapore. He is the author of Medical Nihilism and Care and Cure: An Introduction to Philosophy of Medicine

Morteza Hajizadeh is a Ph.D. graduate in English from the University of Auckland in New Zealand. His research interests are Cultural Studies; Critical Theory; Environmental History; Medieval (Intellectual) History; Gothic Studies; 18th and 19th Century British Literature.

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Fifty years of changemaking and reform haven't fixed Congress—what does that reveal about American democracy? In Stuck: How Money, Media and Violence Prevent Change in Congress, Maya Kornberg chronicles the efforts of congressional reformers over the last fifty years and documents the mounting forces that have kept their reforms from creating meaningful change.

Dr. Kornberg reveals how political violence, astronomical campaign costs, relentless fundraising demands, shrinking staff, and centralized party leadership all constrain the ability of new members to legislate and represent their constituents. Social media, while offering new platforms for political expression, has also heightened harassment and fed a performative culture that rewards spectacle over substance. Bolstered by dozens of interviews, congressional records, and the voices of lawmakers past and present—including Henry Waxman, Toby Moffett, Phil English, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, and Lauren Underwood—Stuck offers a sobering portrait of a legislative body paralyzed by its own internal dynamics.

Dr. Kornberg outlines tangible reforms that could restore Congress's capacity to function and amplify the power of its newest members. At a time when Americans are losing faith in democracy's most representative institution, Stuck makes the case for how it could be saved.

A Neuroscientist's Guide to a Healthier, Happier Life

Our guest is: Dr. Maya Kornberg, who is a senior research fellow and manager in the Brennan Center’s Elections and Government Program. She’s taught political science at NYU, Georgetown and American University, worked on democratic governance issues at numerous institutions, and led research for a UNDP and IPU project examining civic engagement in the work of over 80 parliaments around the world. She is the author of Stuck.

Our host is: Dr. Christina Gessler, who is an academic writing coach and editor. She is the producer and show host of the Academic Life podcast.

Playlist for listeners:

Bears and Ballots

House of Diggs

The Fight To Save The Town

The End of White Politics

Understanding Disinformation

You Are Not American

The Vice-President's Black Wife

You Have More Influence Than You Think

We Refuse

Dear Miss Perkins

Welcome to Academic Life, the podcast for your academic journey—and beyond! Please join us again to learn from more experts inside and outside the academy, and around the world. Missed any of the 300+ Academic Life episodes? Find them here. And thank you for listening!
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The push for net zero has become a new arena for class conflict, where the powerful profit and the rest suffer. Existing policies won’t limit global heating to anything close to a safe level. Claims of sustainability disguise a zero-sum battle where the powerful profit and everyone else foots the bill. Green growth was supposed to bring increased wealth for all. Instead, work has been degraded, energy bills have soared, and the most basic necessities have become expensive and scarce. We need to disrupt green capitalism. In Or Something Worse: Why We Need to Disrupt the Climate Transition (Verso, 2025), Nicholas Beuret follows those already fighting back through ‘don’t pay’ campaigns, blockades of fossil-fuel infrastructure, and community counter-planning. He shows we have the tools not only to stop climate change but to build a fairer future.

Nicholas Beuret is a lecturer in environmental politics and economic geography at the University of Essex. With a background in both activism and academia, he explores the intersections of climate change, capitalism, and social justice. His work has been featured in the Guardian, The Ecologist, Open Democracy, and Undercurrents. Nicholas lives in the UK, where he continues to write, teach, and engage in environmental advocacy.

Alec Fiorini is a PhD student at Queen Mary University London's Centre for Labour, Sustainability and Global Production (CLaSP) researching the political economy of nitrogen fertilizer supply chains.
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