The FBI and American Democracy: A Brief Critical History |
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You Are Here: Home > History Books > Kansas History > Item 128
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The FBI and American Democracy: A Brief Critical History
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by Athan Theoharis
Sales Rank: 740002
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List Price: $24.95
$18.96
At Amazon
on 8-4-2008.
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Features
Cover Type: Hard Cover with 195 pages
Published by: University Press of Kansas October 2004
Written in: English
ISBN 10 Number: 0700613455
ISBN 13 Number: 978-0700613458
Book Dimensions:
9.3 x 6.2 x 1 inches
Weighs: 1 pounds
Book Description
For nearly a century, the Federal Bureau of Investigation has been famous for tracking and apprehending gangsters, kidnappers, spies, and, much more recently, international terrorists. The agency itself has done much to promote its successes, helping to embellish its legendary aura. Athan Theoharis, however, contends that a closer look at the historical record reveals a much less idealized and much more disturbing vision of the FBI.
Created in 1908 with a staff of three dozen, the FBI has grown to more than 27,000 agents and support personnel, while its role has shifted dramatically from law enforcement to intelligence operations. Theoharis, America's leading authority on the FBI, assesses the consequences of this shift for democratic politics, showing how the agency's obsession with absolute secrecy has undermined both civil liberties and agency accountability.
As Theoharis reveals, FBI history has been marked by operational failures, overrated abilities, and the frequent use of highly suspect means-wiretaps, buggings, break-ins-that challenge the Constitution's guarantee against illegal searches. The agency has also gathered and disseminated derogatory (and often untrue) information in an effort to discredit citizens whose views are seen as "dangerous." Most disturbing, it has drifted toward equating political dissent with genuine subversion, an approach with potentially grave consequences for free and open public discourse.
Theoharis also shows that the FBI's vaunted spy-catching prowess has been vastly overrated, from the early days of the "Communist conspiracy" to the more recent Wen Ho Lee and Robert Hanssen fiascos. And he criticizes Hoover's longstanding refusal to admit that organized crime actually existed, perhaps due to his preoccupation with the sex lives of public figures like JFK, Martin Luther King, and Rock Hudson, whose amorous escapades he recorded in his "Do Not File" files. More recently, the notorious incidents at Ruby Ridge, Waco, and Oklahoma City, as well as the 9/11 attacks, have further eroded public confidence in the FBI and tarnished its reputation.
Throughout, Theoharis raises serious questions about the extralegal nature of the FBI's activities and its troubling implications for the rule of law in America.
Back Cover Copy
"Athan Theoharis has owed us this book for some time. He has had a career battling and pursuing the FBI and forcing it to open files that meticulously document the FBI's imperial aggrandizement and constant intrusion into the political sphere. . . . All of us are in his debt."--Stanley I. Kutler, author of The Wars of Watergate
"Brings to light missing or previously hidden parts of the FBI's storied history to help us more clearly see its potential for both good and harm as we try to balance national security and civil liberties in a post-9/11 world."--Steven Aftergood, Federation of American Scientists
"A short but amazingly comprehensive and up-to-date account."--John Prados, author of Lost Crusader: The Secret Wars of CIA Director William Colby
Reader Reviews
As an FBI employee with thirty years of service, I can honestly state that Athan Theoharis' book is a fascinating, detailed, and accurate review of the FBI. His understanding of the FBI's filing system and of the FBI's senior management for almost 100 years is remarkable. Although I do not agree with all of Dr. Theoharis' conclusions or analysis of why the FBI has "failed" the American people, his highly critical book on the FBI should be a "must read" by those in the government interested in improving the FBI or by anyone who wants to learn about the FBI in a short, easy to read book.
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The FBI and American Democracy: A Brief Critical History
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Price: $18.96
Updated on 8-4-2008.
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