Godfrey Hodgson

Godfrey Hodgson was director of the Reuters' Foundation Programme at Oxford University, and before that the Observer's correspondent in the United States and foreign editor of the Independent. He is the author of The Myth of American Exceptionalism (Yale University Press, 2009).

Barack Obama: at the crossroads of victory

The extraordinary, compelling race in the United States for the Democratic Party's presidential nominee has been settled in favour of Barack Obama. But a moment of triumph can

By Godfrey Hodgson

/ 11 Jun 2008

The lost election year

Hillary Clinton won a handsome victory on 13 May 2008 in the Democratic primary election in West Virginia, whose people are among the poorest, most racially homogeneous, and least educated

By Godfrey Hodgson

/ 15 May 2008

“Superdelegates” and the US election

Those who practice and those who report American politics have - almost overnight - woken up to the existence of a group of people called "superdelegates". There may

By Godfrey Hodgson

/ 25 Feb 2008

America’s change election: reality or mirage?

The cumbersome calendar and complex arithmetic of the race for the party nominations in the United States presidential election - particularly on the Democratic side - present two fascinating questions

By Godfrey Hodgson

/ 11 Feb 2008

The United States election: time for “change”

Forty years ago, in the early weeks of the last "critical election" in the United States, I travelled to California with Robert Kennedy as he tried to assess

By Godfrey Hodgson

/ 10 Jan 2008

Washington discovers Islamabad

The American political scientist, the late Nelson Polsby, once pointed out to an Oxford seminar how far better informed the American government had become since the early days of the

By Godfrey Hodgson

/ 27 Nov 2007

America in 2008: the next realignment?

One of the most enduring concepts of America political science is the idea of "realignment". This is the idea that some presidential elections mark something more than the

By Godfrey Hodgson

/ 6 Nov 2007

The United States: democracy in trouble

The George W Bush administration proclaimed the invasion of Iraq as part of the United States's effort to bring to the middle east the benefits of democracy. It

By Godfrey Hodgson

/ 3 Sep 2007

The politics of justice

Long after George W Bush and his largely discredited administration are history, a legacy of their partisan zeal and ideological extremism will remain: a Supreme Court frequently controlled by conservative

By Godfrey Hodgson

/ 9 Jul 2007

America’s open-cast election

Seventeen months before polling day for the 2008 presidential election in the United States, the scene is more chaotic and harder to predict than for many decades. The result, at

By Godfrey Hodgson

/ 2 Jul 2007

Tony Blair : farewell letters

Mariano Aguirre, Fride Chukwu-Emeka Chikezie, Afford Patrice de Beer, journalist Brian Brivati, Kingston University Camilla Toulmin, IIED Godfrey Hodgson, author Ruth Lister, Loughborough University Nasrin Alavi, author Abdul-Rehman Malik, Q-News

By Patrice de Beer, Godfrey Hodgson, Mariano Aguirre, Camilla Toulmin, Chukwu-Emeka Chikezie and Brian Brivati

/ 27 Jun 2007

Queen Elizabeth meets President George

First Helen Mirren, now Elizabeth Windsor. Her Majesty's visit to Jamestown and - no doubt more to her taste - to the Kentucky Derby, have brought Americans face

By Godfrey Hodgson

/ 8 May 2007