Unequal social and economic status is at least as much a function of skin color as of identification by race and ethnicity in Latin America, according to sociology professor Edward Telles. Pigmentocracies: Ethnicity, Race, and Color in Latin America, which is based on an original anthropological study, examines contemporary attitudes toward ethnicity and race in Brazil, Colombia, Mexico, and Peru.

“Property rights” and “Russia” do not usually belong in the same sentence. But in A Public Empire: Property and the Quest for the Common Good in Imperial Russia, history professor Ekaterina Pravilova challenges the familiar narrative about Russia and ownership rights by tracing the contours of debates over public property from the early 19th century to the collapse of the Russian empire.