New Edition of Diane Blair’s “Arkansas Politics” to be Released

A freshly revised edition of the late Diane D. Blair’s influential book on Arkansas politics has just been released with co-author Jay Barth of Hendrix College. The Fayetteville Public Library and University of Arkansas Blair Center of Southern Politics and Society will present the book, “Arkansas Politics and Government, Second Edition,” at 2 p.m. Sunday, April 10, in the Fayetteville Public Library’s Walker Meeting Room.

Building on Diane Blair’s influential work, which highlighted both the decades of failure and the positive trends by Arkansas’s government to live up to the state’s motto Regnat Populus (“The People Rule”), the second edition details the causes and consequences of recent changes in Arkansas. It asks, however, whether the changes are profound and permanent or merely transitory variations in symbol and style?

Blair began the second edition a decade and a half after her original publication. In 2000 when she became ill, she invited previous collaborator Jay Barth, associate professor in the Department of Politics at Hendrix College, to join her in bringing the second edition to press. Blair and Barth collaborated until Blair’s death when Barth then carried the project to completion using the numerous notes left by Blair.

Of the revised book, Barth said that “minimal change within the text of certain chapters” will be noticed while “many alterations” in other chapters is evident yet “the general framework of the book is the same as that of the first edition.” In the end, Barth argues that although Arkansas currently expresses a healthier representative democracy, the political and governmental entities are still sharply limited as effective instruments of the people. The UA department of political science and the Blair Center of Southern Politics and Society will host a reception following the book presentation. Books will be offered for purchase and signing at the event. For additional information, call the Fayetteville Public Library at (479) 571-2222.