Spencer's popular account of his leading sociological doctrines. Its publication marked the emergence of Spencer as the popular philosopher of the Victorian age. It was a highly influential work in terms of the impetus it gave to the academic pursuit of the new science of sociology and it also played an important role in shaping the outlook of many thoughtful lay persons in the Victorian reading public.

Under the promising potentials of the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA), Africa finds itself at crossroad. Immense agricultural resources coexist with persistent energy scarcity, food insecurity and trade barriers. The AfCFTA promises a transformative path, but can it truly harness trade, agriculture and energy to bring sustainable development in Africa? This edited volume of the New African Thinkers Series cuts through the optimism to ask critical questions about AfCFTA. Emerging scholars from across the continent of
Africa deliver fresh, actionable perspectives on the Trade-Agriculture-Energy-Sustainability Nexus.

They ask:

• How can AfCFTA move beyond rhetoric to boost agricultural production that can solve food insecurity, empower farmers, and create resilient markets?
• What specific policy shifts, technological innovations, and structural reforms are essential to make intra-African trade a powerhouse for sustainable growth and development?
• How can agriculture, trade and energy nexus unlock progress toward Africa's Sustainable Development?

Moving beyond diagnosis, new African thinkers provide a blueprint for action. They blend rigorous analysis with practical solutions needed to transform AfCFTA from a framework into a tangible force for prosperity, self-reliance, and energy stewardship. The volume presents perspectives that are of interest to policymakers tasked with designing strategies for agriculture, trade, and energy; researchers uncovering pathways for sustainability under the framework of AfCFTA; students keen to contribute to Africa’s future under AfCFTA;
and development professionals responsible for building a sustainable Africa.

All of us have in our minds a cartoon image of what an autocratic state looks like, with a bad man at the top. But in the 21st century, that cartoon bears little resemblance to reality. Nowadays, autocracies are run not by one bad guy, but by sophisticated networks composed of kleptocratic financial structures, security services and professional propagandists. The members of these networks are connected not only within a given country, but among many countries. The corrupt, state-controlled companies in one dictatorship do business with corrupt, state-controlled companies in another. The police in one country can arm, equip, and train the police in another. The propagandists share resources―the troll farms that promote one dictator’s propaganda can also be used to promote the propaganda of another―and themes, pounding home the same messages about the weakness of democracy and the evil of America.

Unlike military or political alliances from other times and places, this group doesn’t operate like a bloc, but rather like an agglomeration of companies: Autocracy, Inc. Their relations are not based on values, but are rather transactional, which is why they operate so easily across ideological, geographical, and cultural lines. In truth, they are in full agreement about only one thing: Their dislike of us, the inhabitants of the democratic world, and their desire to see both our political systems and our values undermine.

That shared understanding of the world―where it comes from, why it lasts, how it works, how the democratic world has unwittingly helped to consolidate it, and how we can help bring it down―is the subject of this book.

Written by a star cast of contributors, this introductory undergraduate text provides students with a rich, stimulating and authoritative account of key debates and issues in sociology today. Carefully structured and edited to take account of the undergraduate student reader's needs, the essays explore sociological understandings of a range of core topics and critically examines what key issues have emerged for debate from past and current research.

The Sacred is the Profane collects nine essays written over several years by William Arnal and Russell McCutcheon, specialists in two very different areas of the field (one, a scholar of Christian origins and the other working on the history of the modern study of religion). They share a convergent perspective: not simply that both the category and concept "religion" is a construct, something that we cannot assume to be "natural" or universal, but also that the ability to think and act "religiously" is, quite specifically, a modern, political category in its origins and effects, the mere by-product of modern secularism. These collected essays, substantially rewritten for this volume, advance current scholarly debates on secularism-debates which, the authors argue, insufficiently theorize the sacred/secular, church/state, and private/public binaries by presupposing religion (often under the guise of such terms as "religiosity," "faith," or "spirituality") to historically precede the nation-state. The essays return, again and again, to the question of what "religion"-word and concept-accomplishes, now, for those who employ it, whether at the popular, political, or scholarly level. The focus here for two writers from seemingly different fields is on the efficacy, costs, and the tactical work carried out by dividing the world between religious and political, church and state, sacred and profane. As the essays make clear, this is no simple matter. Part of the reason for the incoherence and at the same time the stubborn persistence of both the word and idea of "religion" is precisely its multi-faceted nature, its plurality, its amenability to multiple and often self-contradictory uses. Offering an argument that builds as they are read, these papers explore these uses, including the work done by positing a human orientation to "religion," the political investment in both the idea of religion and the academic study of religion, and the ways in which the field of religious studies works to shape, and stumbles against, its animating conception.

'Could there be a more relevant book for our times? While there are plenty of books on persuasion, none tells us how to influence others through the quiet art of understanding. Vengoechea implores us to truly hear other people (maybe for the first time) and is the perfect author of a book on why we should listen like we mean it' Nir Eyal, bestselling author of Hooked and Indistractable Hear me out. Does this sound like you? You end a team meeting and can't recall a single thing that was said. You leave a conversation with a friend feeling disconnected and unfulfilled. You think you and your boss are on the same page, only to find out you haven't been meeting expectations. Fortunately, listening, like any communication skill, can be improved, and Ximena Vengoechea can show you how. As a user researcher, she has spent nearly a decade facilitating hundreds of conversations at LinkedIn, Twitter and Pinterest. It's her job to uncover the truth behind how people use, and really think about, her company's products. In Listen Like You Mean It, she reveals the tips and tricks of the trade, including: - How to quickly build rapport with strangers - Which questions help people unlock what they need to say - When it's time to throw out the script entirely - How to recover from listener's drain

Despite the rhetoric, the people of Sub-Saharan Africa are becoming poorer. From Tony Blair's Africa Commission, the G7 finance ministers' debt relief, the Live 8 concerts, the Make Poverty History campaign and the G8 Gleneagles promises, to the United Nations 2005 summit and the Hong Kong WTO meeting, Africa's gains have been mainly limited to public relations. The central problems remain exploitative debt and financial relationships with the North, phantom aid, unfair trade, distorted investment and the continent's brain/skills drain. Moreover, capitalism in most African countries has witnessed the emergence of excessively powerful ruling elites with incomes derived from financial-parasitical accumulation. Without overstressing the 'mistakes' of such elites, this title contextualises Africa's wealth outflow within a stagnant but volatile world economy.

No other phenomenon has shaped human history as decisively as capitalism. It structures how we live and work, how we think about ourselves and others, how we organise our politics. Sven Beckert situates the story of capitalism within the largest conceivable geographical and historical framework in this fascinating new book.

Capitalism, argues Beckert, was born global. Emerging from merchant communities across Asia, Africa and Europe, capitalism’s radical recasting of economic life rooted itself only gradually. Then it burst onto the world scene, as European states and merchants built a powerful alliance that would propel them across the oceans. This epic drama corresponded at no point to an idealised dream of free markets. All along, state-backed institutions and imperial expansions shaped its dynamics.

Capitalism decentres the European perspective, highlighting agency, resistance, innovation and ruthless coercion around the world through to the present with the rise of Asian economies, particularly China. Sven Beckert doesn’t merely add up capitalism’s debits and credits in this monumental book, but allows us to think afresh about the past to help us re-imagine the future.

Despite the ongoing global expansion of Christianity, there remains a lack of comprehensive scholarship on its development in Asia. This volume fills the gap by exploring the world of Asian Christianity and its manifold expressions, including worship, theology, spirituality, inter-religious relations, interventions in society, and mission. The contributors, from over twenty countries, deconstruct many of the widespread misconceptions and interpretations of Christianity in Asia. They analyze how the growth of Christian beliefs throughout the continent is linked with the socio-political and cultural processes of colonization, decolonization, modernization, democratization, identity construction of social groups, and various social movements. With a particular focus on inter-religious encounters and emerging theological and spiritual paradigms, the volume provides alternative frames for understanding the phenomenon of conversion and studies how the scriptures of other religious traditions are used in the practice of Christianity within Asia. The Oxford Handbook of Christianity in Asia draws insightful conclusions on the historical, contemporary, and future trajectory of its subject by combining the contributions of scholars in a wide variety of disciplines, including theology, sociology, history, political science, and cultural studies. It will be an invaluable resource for understanding Christianity in a global context.

Since its publication in 1974, Blood of My Blood has become the most highly esteemed book on the subject. It is also rare in that it has been a popular best-seller and is widely used as a college text.

The ultrarich hold more of America’s wealth than they did in the heyday of the Carnegies and Rockefellers. Here, Evan Osnos’s incisive reportage yields an unforgettable portrait of the tactics and obsessions driving this new Gilded Age, in which superyachts, luxury bunkers, elite tax dodges, and a torrent of political donations bespeak staggering disparities of wealth and power.

With deft storytelling and meticulous reporting, this is a book about the indulgences, incentives, and psychological distortions that define our economic age. In each essay, Osnos delves into a world that is rarely visible, from the outrageous to the fabulous to the ridiculous: a private wealth manager who broke with members of an American dynasty and spilled their secrets; the pop stars who perform at lavish parties for thirteen-year-olds; the status anxieties that spill out of marinas in Monaco and Palm Beach like real-world episodes of Succession and The White Lotus; the ethos behind the largest Ponzi scheme in Hollywood history; the confessions of disgraced titans in a “white-collar support group.” A celebrated political reporter, Osnos delves into the unprecedented Washington influence of Silicon Valley and Wall Street, drawing on in-depth interviews with Mark Zuckerberg and other billionaires, about their power and the explosive backlash it stirs.

Originally published in The New Yorker, these essays have been revised and expanded to deliver an unflinching portrait of raw ambition, unimaginable fortune, and the rise of America’s modern oligarchy. Osnos’s essays are a wake-up call—a case against complacency in the face of unchecked excess, as the choices of the ultrarich ripple through our lives. Entertaining, unsettling, and eye-opening, The Haves and the Have-Yachts couldn’t be more relevant to today’s world.

A revolutionary approach to longevity and ageing

In many western countries, people complain of turning invisible after 50. When they hit their mid-60s, they expect or are forced to retire, cutting them adrift from social networks and leading to a loneliness epidemic. But it doesn’t have to be this way.

In Healthy to 100, Ken Stern uncovers the ground-breaking secrets of the winners in healthy longevity – countries like Singapore, Spain, Japan and South Korea – who are all top-rankers on the ‘Healthy Longevity Index’, the best measure not just of living long, but living long well.

Bringing together the latest science of ageing and real-life stories, this book offers us a personal and societal guide to living a fulfilling life after 65: one where purpose, learning, community and intergenerational connection are the pillars of good health. Rather than advocating for special diets or exercise regimens, Healthy to 100 offers a hopeful, attainable and research-backed model for anyone seeking a longer, healthier and purpose-driven life.

Frank Sayi grew up in Rhodesia, now Zimbabwe, in the 1970s. His childhood straddled two very significant periods in his country's history, both of which heavily influenced his memoir. The first was the war of liberation (1975-1979), closely followed by the post-independence internecine war (1981-1987).

Crucially, Frank was raised in a native reserve in colonial Rhodesia, a country under white minority rule, governed by Ian Smith's racist and illegal regime. Native reserves were places of repression, and containment-replete of hope.

Frank and his two older sisters, Thoko and Gift, lived with their grandmother, a stern, wise, mercurial matriarch, capable of intimidating severity, and her son Uncle Sami. Frank's mother, the main breadwinner, lived in the city. Frank and his siblings didn't see much of her; in his mind she was just another sister.

The memoir is intricately woven around the lives of the members of Frank's immediate family, whom he uses to foreground the tragic lives of a people caught within the web of war.

Their lives were extremely hard. During the war a dusk-to-dawn curfew was declared, schools were closed, and food supply chains and clothing contaminated with poison. Thousands of refugees fled the warring factions. There seemed to Frank to be no difference between government soldiers, various law enforcement agencies, and the guerrillas fighting for freedom: they were all men of violence, who terrorised the civilian population.

However, by June 1979 there was a brief hiatus in fighting. And after protracted negotiations, Blacks gained their independence from white rule in April 1980. The country had a new name: Zimbabwe; Blacks welcomed a new national anthem-Nkosi sikelel'Africa! - God Bless Africa - but after an extra-ordinarily convenient discovery of an arms cache was made on a farm in Matabeleland, the stronghold of the opposition, Robert Mugabe declared total war on Matabeleland. He unleashed Gukurundi, his North Korean-trained partisan army on the Ndebele people who hadn't voted for him. Simply put, this was a war of retribution.

By 1982 Frank had joined his father's family in N'kayi, one of the areas to experience the most intense violence and massacres by Gukurahundi soldiers. By using scorched-earth tactics, they brought famine, disease, murder, rape, and terror.

Within their first week of deployment, they'd ruthlessly dispensed with more than 2000 lives.

And as a silhouette of war, Frank's memoir showcases human capacity for extra-ordinary violence, but also, compassion, endurance, survival and the triumph of the human spirit. It binds together the narratives from two wars and acts as lens through which the implications of political violence in Zimbabwe can be understood. Frank goes beyond and beneath standard historical narratives of war and examines the psychological impact of war on ordinary people.

But more importantly, Frank's memoir tells of a childhood conditioned in the shadow of the mayhem brought about by the structure and dehumanising effects of colonialism and it's dreadful legacy, and the impact of civil war. Yet it is full of moving, hilarious, and beautiful stories of innocence and the increasingly hard-won experience of a war-torn childhood, and the development of a man who was determined to leave this violence behind.

This collection of insights about The Book of Mormon adds to and complements the author's legal publications about freedom of conscience, evidence and comparative constitutional law. The book includes insights distilled from contemporary anthropology, careful analysis of the doctrine of resurrection taught in The Book of Mormon, philosophical questions about the rule of law which inform life in contemporary society, and how reflection on the pervasive New Testament intertexuality in The Book of Mormon should increase the knowledge of modern readers. Important reading for scholars of religion and faith, and particularly those interested in understanding the beliefs and practices of members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints around the world.

This book provides a detailed history of Hindu goddess traditions with a special focus on the local goddesses of Andhra Pradesh, past and present. The antiquity and the evolution of these goddess traditions are illustrated and documented with the help of archaeological reports, literary sources, inscriptions and art. Tracing the symbols and images of goddess into the brahmanical (Saiva and Vaisnava), Buddhist, and Jaina religious traditions, the book argues effectively how and with what motivations goddesses and their symbolizations were appropriated and transformed. The book also examines the evolution of popular Hindu goddesses such as Durga and Kali, discussing their tribal and agricultural backgrounds. It also deals extensively with how and in what circumstances women are deified and shows how these deified women cults share characteristics with the village goddesses.

In the months leading up to the 2024 presidential election, news spread about Project 2025, a nearly 1,000-page document published by the conservative think tank The Heritage Foundation. The debates—and anxiety—surrounding this initiative have only increased as authors of the Project assume positions of power in the second Trump administration.

So, what is Project 2025, exactly? Who wrote it, what does it actually say, and what does it mean for everyday people around the world, across the political spectrum, in the years to come?

In The Project, award-winning journalist David A. Graham offers much-needed context and distills the essential elements of this sprawling document. Breaking down the Project’s strategy for transforming—and radically empowering—the executive branch, Graham then explains what the architects behind Project 2025 would do with that power: restoring traditional gender norms and the supremacy of the nuclear family, decimating the civil service, performing mass deportations, reducing corporate regulation and worker protections, and more.

Project 2025 is the intellectual blueprint for the new administration, Graham argues, and its tenets should not be legible only to policy wonks. Authoritative yet highly accessible, The Project demystifies it for those whose lives it will impact most.

Exploring the potential of poetry and poetic language as a means of conveying perspectives on ageing and later life, this book examines questions such as 'how can we understand ageing and later life?' and 'how can we capture the ambiguities and complexities that the experiences of growing old in time and place entail?' As poetic language illuminates, transfigures and enchants our being in the world, it also offers insights into the existential questions that are amplified as we age, including the vulnerabilities and losses that humble us and connect us. Literary gerontology and narrative gerontology have highlighted the importance of linguistic representations of ageing. While the former has been concerned primarily with the analysis of published literary works, the latter has foregrounded the individual and collective meaning making through narrative resources in old age. There has, however, been less interest in how poetic language, both as a genre and as a practice, can illuminate ageing. This volume suggests a path towards the poetics of ageing by means of presenting analyses of published poetry on ageing written by poets from William Shakespeare to Wallace Stevens; the use of reading and writing poetry among ordinary people in old age; and the poetic nuances that emerge from other literary practices and contexts in relation to ageing - including personal poetic reflections from many of the contributing authors. The volume brings together international scholars from disciplinary backgrounds as diverse as cultural psychology, literary studies, theology, sociology, narrative medicine, cultural gerontology and narrative gerontology, and will deploy a variety of empirical and critical methodologies to explore how poetry and poetic language may challenge dominant discourses and illuminate alternative understandings of ageing.