While urban theorist and social commentator Mike Davis holds degrees in History from UCLA and the University of Edinburgh, his work exceeds and expands the usual definition of historical writing. He is best known for his investigations of power and social class in his native Southern California. Davis’ City of Quartz: Excavating the Future in Los Angeles won the Issac Deutscher Award from the London School of Economics and the award for Best Book in Urban Politics from the American Political Science Association. As a journalist and essayist, Davis has written frequently for The Nation and the New Statesman, among others.