Description
Book SynopsisNo Escape proves that liberal government and nationalism can mutually reinforce each other, taking as its example a preeminent and seemingly universal liberal legal right, freedom of speech, and illustrating how it can function in a way that actually reproduces nationally exclusive conditions of power.
Trade ReviewThis is a thought-provoking and well-written book. * American Political Science Association *
Passavants argument depends on establising a paradoxical tension between two principles conventionally involved in an adversary relationship. * Journal of American Studies *
A significant contribution to the field. Its focus on the exclusionary practices involved in legalizing rights to free expression make this a provocative and important book. -- Sanford Schram,Bryn Mawr College
A brilliant critical historical look at the thinkers who have contributed to the construction of the collective American subject. -- Michael Shapiro,University of Hawaii
Using freedom of speech as a lens onto the meaning of being American, Passavant has written a remarkable book.
No Escape is a nuanced and sophisticated treatment of the complex connections of legal rights and nationalism. It is enormously important and timely in its exploration of the ways identity plays out on the terrain of liberal government. Sharply argued and theoretically rich, it makes a cutting-edge contribution to interdisciplinary legal scholarship. -- Austin Sarat,Amherst College
Table of Contents1 Liberal Legal Rights and the Grounds of Nationalism 2 John Burgess Is to Woodrow Wilson as Individual Rights Are to Community? Nation, Race, and the Right of Free Speech 3 A Moral Geography of Liberty: John Stuart Mill and American Free Speech Discourse 4 The Landscape of Rights Claiming: The Shift to a Post-Cold War American National Formation 5 Whose First Amendment Is It, Anyway? 6 The Governmentality of Discussion
