Political Knowledge

Since at least the time of Plato, political scientists and philosophers have been concerned about what citizens and rulers should know if they are to be governed―and govern―well. Moreover, the increasing complexity of modern societies has revivified thinking about and around the critical concept of political knowledge. Vital questions arise, such as:

• does effective democracy demand an informed electorate?
• is such an aspiration realistic, given the size and reach of modern governments?
• how can electorates compensate for their ignorance, given the vast amount of information that might be necessary to make sound political judgements?
• or is such ignorance ‘rational’?

This new collection from Routledge brings together canonical and cutting-edge research to interrogate these and other issues. Edited by leading scholars, Political Knowledge assembles in four volumes the best and most important scholarship, from the ancients to the work of the deliberative democrats. The collection also gathers the key survey research, from the Columbia and Michigan schools down to the present. Further, it makes sense of the main lines of normative debate about these findings, and addresses the various causal and theoretical understandings of political knowledge and ignorance, while illuminating directions for future research.

With a full index, together with a comprehensive introduction, newly written by the editors, which places the collected material in its historical and intellectual context, Political Knowledge is an essential work of reference. The collection will be particularly useful as an essential database allowing scattered and often fugitive material from less accessible books and specialized journals to be easily located. It will also be welcomed as a crucial tool permitting rapid access to less familiar―and sometimes overlooked―texts. For researchers, students, and policymakers, it is a vital one-stop research and pedagogic resource.