The Administrative Presidency Revisited

Public Lands, the BLM, and the Reagan Revolution

By Robert F. Durant

Subjects: Environmental Studies
Series: SUNY series in Environmental Public Policy, SUNY series on the Presidency: Contemporary Issues
Paperback : 9780791409602, 401 pages, July 1992
Hardcover : 9780791409596, 401 pages, July 1992
Out of print (Paperback)

Alternative formats available from:

Read Excerpt View Table of Contents

Request Desk or Examination Copy
Request a Media Review Copy

Table of contents

List of Tables and Figures

Preface

Acknowledgments

PART I. THE ANATOMY OF AN ADMINISTRATIVE PRESIDENCY

1. A Passion to Prevail

2. Prometheus Unbound or Sisyphus Redux

3. Public Lands, the BLM, and the Reagan Revolution

PART II. A VIEW FROM THE GRASSROOTS

4. Politics, Position, and Power Production

5. Backdoor Privatization, "Cold Welfare," and the BLM

6. Toward Becoming a "Good Urban Neighbor"? Or, "You're Not a Man Till You Do a Land Exchange"

7. Thou Shalt Not Covet Thy Neighbor's Water

8. Wilderness, King Coal, and the San Juan Basin

PART III. BEYOND FEAR OR FAVOR: LESSONS FOR THEORY AND PRACTICE

9. Missing Links, Links Gone Missing, and Natural Resource Management

10. "Fire Alarms," "Garbage Cans," and the Administrative Presidency

Notes

References

Index

About the Author

Robert F. Durant is Professor of Government and Public Administration at the William Donald Schaefer Center for Public Policy, University of Baltimore.

Reviews

"One of the most substantial and penetrating empirical investigations yet made into the consequences of an aggressive administrative strategy for presidential leadership." — American Political Science Review

"Robert Durant's new book is destined to become a classic. The product of years of painstaking research, The Administrative Presidency Revisited is brimming with findings, insights, and theoretical contributions that speak to some of the central questions of governance. . . The concluding chapters alone are so theoretically inventive and integrative that they are likely to provide the stimulus for further scholarship for years to come." — Laurence J. O'Toole, Jr., University of Georgia

"I am impressed by the detailed analysis of the mechanisms of the administrative-presidency strategy and the manner in which the Reagan administration applied them. This study represents an excellent example of how presidents employ their political resources in an attempt to influence bureaucratic policy." — Richard Waterman, University of New Mexico