Who are the entrepreneurs who have achieved success, wealth, and recognition in their African homelands, and how did they do it? Entrepreneur Dave Fick interviewed several hundred women and men who were willing to assume risks, often spectacular ones, for personal economic gain--but who did it legally, ethically, and who are now giving back to their nations and societies at least as much as they received. They speak openly of their hardships and failures, what they did right and what they did wrong, and their accounts are remarkable. We gain insight into the way business must be done under harsh political and economic circumstances, but we also learn unusual techniques and strategies that others in more favorable milieus can use to accomplish similar feats.

With commentaries from notable scholars and other businesspeople and with Fick's own first-hand onsite observations, the book is a self-educating colloquium, a collection of personal meetings, accounts, letters, emails and telephone calls between Fick, his counterparts in Africa, and others around the world. It is also an attempt to encourage a dialogue that will accelerate the exchange and spread of knowledge and ideas, and a way to help the people of Africa build a peaceful and better society for themselves and the world.

In the early 1990s the collapse of the Iron Curtain and the dissolution of the Soviet Union opened Eastern Europe, Russia, and the newly independent states of the former U.S.S.R. to the West. To meet the demand of rising interest, many new English-language publications about this part of the world have appeared over the last decade. This single volume takes a select portion of recent publications and provides useful descriptions and bibliographic information for historians, scholars, researchers, and students. Titles deal with Russia, the independent states from the former Soviet Union, Albania, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, the Slovak Republic, Hungary, Poland, Romania, and the states of the former Yugoslavia. Timely and important topics span politics, society, and culture, from the Holocaust to the transition from socialist to market economies and the civil war in the former Yugoslavia.

Blackness, as a concept, is extremely fluid: it can refer to cultural and ethnic identity, socio-political status, an aesthetic and embodied way of being, a social and political consciousness, or a diasporic kinship. It is used as a description of skin color ranging from the palest cream to the richest chocolate; as a marker of enslavement, marginalization, criminality, filth, or evil; or as a symbol of pride, beauty, elegance, strength, and depth. Despite the fact that it is elusive and difficult to define, blackness serves as one of the most potent and unifying domains of identity. God and Blackness offers an ethnographic study of blackness as it is understood within a specific community--that of the First Afrikan Church, a middle-class Afrocentric congregation in Atlanta, Georgia. Drawing on nearly two years of participant observation and in‑depth interviews, Andrea C. Abrams examines how this community has employed Afrocentrism and Black theology as a means of negotiating the unreconciled natures of thoughts and ideals that are part of being both black and American. Specifically, Abrams examines the ways in which First Afrikan's construction of community is influenced by shared understandings of blackness, and probes the means through which individuals negotiate the tensions created by competing constructions of their black identity. Although Afrocentrism operates as the focal point of this discussion, the book examines questions of political identity, religious expression and gender dynamics through the lens of a unique black church.

The past century witnessed dramatic changes in the lives of modern Chinese women and gender politics. Whilst some revolutionary actions to rectify the feudalist patriarchy, such as foot-binding and polygyny were first seen in the late Qing period; the termination of the Qing Dynasty and establishment of Republican China in 1911-1912 initiated truly nation-wide constitutional reform alongside increasing gender egalitarianism. This book traces the radical changes in gender politics in China, and the way in which the lives, roles and status of Chinese women have been transformed over the last one hundred years. In doing so, it highlights three distinctive areas of development for modern Chinese women and gender politics: first, women's equal rights, freedom, careers, and images about their modernized femininity; second, Chinese women's overseas experiences and accomplishments; and third, advances in Chinese gender politics of non-heterosexuality and same-sex concerns. This book takes a multi-disciplinary approach, drawing on film, history, literature, and personal experience. As such, it will be of huge interest to students and scholars of Chinese culture and society, women's studies, gender studies and gender politics.

Gijsbert Heeck (1619-1669) was a medicinal specialist who served the Dutch East India Company (VOC). His journal, written more than three hundred and fifty years ago, is based on the daily notes he made during his third trip to the East. This volume presents the selections from his journal that deal with Siam, accompanied by the original Dutch text. This publication is the initiative of a group of Dutch and Thai scholars who intend to provide access to important Dutch texts about Siam from the VOC period by translating them into English along with a transcript of the original Dutch text. Heeck's journal was chosen for the strength of its observations of mid-seventeenth century Siam. Transcribed from the handwritten Dutch manuscript by Renee Hoogenraad. Published with Silkworm Books.

This book contributes to an increasingly important branch of critical security studies that combines insights from critical geopolitics and postcolonial critique by making an argument about the geographies of violence and their differential impact in contemporary security practices, including but not limited to military intervention. The book explores military intervention in Libya through the categories of space and time, to provide a robust ethico-political critique of the intervention. Much of the mainstream international relations scholarship on humanitarian intervention frames the ethical, moral and legal debate over intervention in terms of a binary, between human rights and state sovereignty. In response, O'Sullivan questions the ways in which military violence was produced as a rational and reasonable response to the crisis in Libya, outlining and destabilising this false binary between the human and the state. The book offers methodological tools for questioning the violent institutions at the heart of humanitarian intervention and asking how intervention has been produced as a rational response to crisis. Contributing to the ongoing academic conversation in the critical literature on spatiality, militarism and resistance, the book draws upon postcolonial and poststructural approaches to critical security studies, and will be of great interest to scholars and graduates of critical security studies and international relations.

Economic transformation in traditional development economics refers to the transition from an agricultural society to an industrial one. Based on the practical conditions and the experience since reform and opening up in the late 1970s, the author observes that the path China's economy takes is a dual transformation, namely, developmental transformation from an agricultural society to an industrial economy, and institutional transformation from planned economy to market economy. Centering on property ownership reform which is the supreme reform of the dual transformation, this book discusses land ownership approval, stock-holding system reform and the maintaining ownership of private enterprises, etc. Besides, the book expounds on the urbanization in China, believing that it is not only the outcome of the dual transformation but also the booster that will help China's economy continue to develop at a high speed. Independent innovation and industrial upgrading which is the key to the enhancement of enterprises' competitiveness is also covered. The combination or overlapping of the two types of transformations in China has had no precedent in history, and it has not been discussed in traditional development economics. Scholars and students in China's economic studies and development economics studies will be attracted by this book. In addition, this book will be a valuable reference for other developing countries which are undergoing economic transformation.

The collapse of the state-controlled economies of the former Eastern Bloc will certainly change the way the global economy operates. Bringing together scholars from a wide variety of theoretical perspectives, different nations and different empirical research traditions, this title examines the ongoing transition and the implications of market transitions for individual life chances, state economic policy and social stratification systems. The volume includes scholarship that focuses on both single nation and cross-national research, plus research contributions that compare state socialist/former state socialist political economies with conditions elsewhere in the world.

After the Second World War, the international migration regime in Europe took a course different from the global migration regime and the migration regimes in other regions of the world. Cumbersome and arbitrary administrative practices prevailed in the late 1940s in most parts of Europe. The gradual implementation of regulations for the free movement of people within the European Community, European citizenship, and the internal and external dimensions of the Schengen agreements profoundly transformed the European migration regime. These instruments produced a regional regime in Europe with an unparalleled degree of intraregional openness and an unparalleled degree of closure towards migrants from outside Europe. This book relies on national and international archives to explain how German strategies during the Cold War shaped the openness of that original regime. This migration regime helped Germany to create a stable international order in Western Europe after the war, conducive to German Reunification and supported German economic expansion. The book embraces the whole period of development of this regime, from 1947 through 1992. It deals with all types of migrants between and towards European countries: unskilled labourers, skilled professionals, self-employed workers, and migrant workers' family members, examining both their access to economic activity and their social and political rights.

Tsong khapa (14th-century) is arguably the most important and influential philosopher in Tibetan history. An Ocean of Reasoning is the most extensive and perhaps the deepest extant commentary on Nagarjuna's Mulamadhyamakakarika (Fundamental Wisdom of the Middle Way), and it can be argued that it is impossible to discuss Nagarjuna's work in an informed way without consulting it. It discusses alternative readings of the text and prior commentaries and provides a detailed exegesis, constituting a systematic presentation of Madhyamaka Buddhist philosophy. Despite its central importance, however, of Tsong khapa's three most important texts, only An Ocean of Reasoning remains untranslated, perhaps because it is both philosophically and linguistically challenging, demanding a rare combination of abilities on the part of a translator. Jay Garfield and Ngawang Samten bring the requisite skills to this difficult task, combining between them expertise in Western and Indian philosophy, and fluency in Tibetan, Sanskrit, and English. The resulting translation of this important text will not only be a landmark contribution to the scholarship of Indian and Tibetan Buddhism, but will serve as a valuable companion volume to Jay Garfield's highly successful translation of The Fundamental Wisdom of the Middle Way.

The issue of Taiwan is the single most difficult factor in the relationship between China and the United States. Any cross-straits conflict between China and Taiwan is likely not only to pit the world's two leading powers against each other, but also to suck in many other countries. This book provides a comprehensive analysis of other countries' foreign policies towards Taiwan. It considers the position of the United States and key regional powers including Japan and South and North Korea, examines the attitude of Russia and other countries which support China on this issue, and discusses the surprising policies of some smaller countries, which have recognised Taiwan's independence. The book also relates the overall picture to various international relations theories.

The first definitive book on researching gay and lesbian market behavior, Untold Millions: The Truth About Gay and Lesbian Consumers in America will help marketers, advertisers, and public relations managers learn how to successfully market and research products for gay and lesbian consumers. Author Grant Lukenbill, a leading consultant on the cultural and motivational aspects of gay and lesbian consumer behavior, provides you with important procedures, research, and guidelines that businesses today are following in order to develop successful marketing strategies to this growing target audience. From this updated and revised edition, you'll receive current methods, new data, and sure-fire strategies that will help your company break into this market segment, satisfy intended customers, and boost company sales.Providing you with statistics and data from the first market research study of its kind, the Yankelovich MONITOR's Gay and Lesbian Perspective, this book gives you suggestions on what things need to be done within your company before planning your marketing strategies. You'll benefit from ideas and suggestions in Untold Millions that will help you create consumer-driven market strategies to gays and lesbians, including: recognizing that there are families and relationships in society that are not heterosexual acknowledging age differences and the needs of particular generations attracting customers by circulating non-discriminatory hiring policies through press releases and company memos, installing domestic partner health care plans, and identifying cultural reference points to which gays and lesbians can relate remembering that many gays and lesbians may look at business with cynicism and doubt and may be quick to interpret actions as victimization referring to the Wall Street project before addressing gay- and lesbian-specific issues focusing on the areas of individuality, a need for association, and the need to allevia

'A people who do not preserve their memory are a people who have forfeited their history.' So argues Wole Soyinka, in his book The Burden of Memory, the Muse of Forgiveness, and this provides the overarching thematic concept for African pasts as a whole. Colonialism for Africans is not an event encapsulated in the past, but is a history whose repercussions and traumatic consequences are still actively evolving in today's political, historical, cultural and artistic scenes. African pasts examines African literatures in English since the end of colonialism, investigating how they represent African history through the twin matrices of memory and trauma. Inextricably tied up with the historical conditions of Africa's colonisation, charting the emergence of its independence, and scrutinising Africa's contemporary neo-colonial and postcolonial states as a legacy of the colonial past, African literatures are continually preoccupied with exploring modes of representation to 'work through' their different traumatic colonial pasts. Among other issues, this book deals with literature in the era of apartheid, the post-apartheid aftermath, metafictional experiments in African fiction, gender representation in reaction to the trauma of colonialism and 'imprisonment narratives'. African pasts covers a wide range of African literatures (drawn from West, East and Southern Africa) and a cross-section of genres - fiction, poetry, prison-narratives, postcolonial theory - and embraces such well-known writers as Soyinka, Coetzee, Ngugi and Achebe, and more recent writers such as Nuruddin Farah, Tsitsi Dangarembga, Achmat Dangor, Etienne van Heerden, Zakes Mda, Gillian Slovo and Calixthe Beyala.

Exposed to powerful new economic forces, and undergoing dramatic ownership reforms and technological changes, China's industries are modernizing at a breakneck pace. In many industries, the outcomes have been chaotic and poorly aligned with societal objectives. This book analyses the transformation and modernization of China's industries through a detailed investigation of the wool and wool textile industries. The authors argue that to remain internationally competitive in the post WTO accession era, Chinese industries need to confront a critical new phase in the modernization process - that of improving management practices and industry co-ordination. Modernizing China's Industries is a comprehensive, integrated and in-depth investigation of industry transformation and modernization. The extensive first-hand research, across a range of industry segments and participants, spans almost two decades. The analysis reveals much about industry modernization and transition in China for a broad range of industries and therefore provides invaluable information for developing strategies and accessing opportunities within China. This book offers unique insights for academics and researchers in Asian studies, transition studies and industrial transformation, as well as policymakers and industry leaders interested in both the intricacies and mega-forces involved in China's industrial modernization. The comprehensive industry analysis also provides a valuable reference for professionals in the increasingly China-centric world of wool and wool textiles as well as offering insights for other textile industry professionals.

Dancing on the beach after a swim in the Mediterranean, taking the waters in fashionable Baden-Baden, boating on the Black Sea - the myriad uses of water imply that the term itself possesses multiple meanings. Focusing on Europe, this book addresses how using water for relaxation intersects with ideas about class, gender, nationality, and consumption. It also explores the ways Europeans have turned to water for pleasure, relaxation, and profit over the last two hundred years as the enjoyment of free time developed from a privilege into a right. Contributors capture key moments of social and cultural transition in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries -- moments during which new social distinctions emerged, debates about nationalism and cosmopolitanism flourished, concepts of hygiene became politicized, and attitudes about travel and vacationing developed.
What kinds of relationships exist between recreational uses of water and cultural, social, or political practices? How have such relationships found representation in art, landscaping, or architecture? Who visits water resorts or beaches and what role have these places played in the emergence of collective identities or in lending authority to social distinctions? How does the organization of leisure activities around water reflect ideas about purity and pollution, in a moral, social, or physical sense?
This exciting venture into 'uncharted waters' will fascinate historians, geographers and anyone with a keen interest in European cultural studies, art and landscape.

The Stranger-kings of Sikka is the first monographic study of an origin myth and history of an indigenous eastern Indonesian state and the first contemporary ethnography of the Ata Sikka of Flores.

This book explores the role of new modes of governance in helping future member states to cope with their accession to the European Union. The authors demonstrate that the accession countries of the Southern and Eastern enlargements have lacked two fundamental preconditions for the emergence and effectiveness of new modes of governance: state and non-state actors with sufficient resources to engage in non-hierarchical coordination to improve the effectiveness of public policy. This 'governance capacity' has been largely taken for granted by the governance literature since it has almost exclusively focused on Western democracies. The double weakness of transition countries results in a serious dilemma for governance research and practice alike - the stronger the need for non-hierarchical modes of governance, the less favourable are the conditions for their emergence and effectiveness.

How did the the descendants of Tamerlane, collectively known as the Timurids, make the transition from a nomadic empire to a sedentary polity based on the Perso-Islamic model, and what effect did the process of transition have on their Turko-Mongolian customs and identity? This volume seeks to answer these questions by utilizing the Weberian concepts of the "routinization" of charismatic authority and the patrimonial household state. Focusing on the period of the last Timurid ruler, Sul n-?usain Bayqara (1469-1506), the author examines the impact of the introduction of Persian modes of bureaucratic administration on the evolution of Timurid government and describes the development of the agrarian economy of the eastern Iranian province of Khorasan through the Islamic institution of the pious endowment. Based on an exceptionally broad range of sources in Persian, Arabic, and Turkic languages, the book provides a new paradigm for understanding the Timurids within the framework of post-Mongol history and offers fresh insights into Turko-Persian relations and the problem of acculturation in medieval Iran.

Economic growth in Asia over the past half century has led to significant changes in societies, business organization and the nature of work. This has been accompanied by the rise in some countries of trade unions and also of employers' associations. This book explores the nature of employers' associations in the major countries of Asia. It considers how employers' associations have developed in recent decades, how changes in market structures and the profile of economies have affected employers' associations, how employers' associations deal with issues to do with pay and employment conditions, and how they interact with regulation and the state. The book shows how the differing political and institutional contexts of different countries, and different economic conditions, greatly affect the nature of employers' associations and also the wider context of labour markets and trade unions.

Since the Buddha did not fully explain the theory of persons that underlies his teaching, in later centuries a number of different interpretations were developed. This book presents the interpretation by the celebrated Indian Buddhist philosopher, Candrakirti (ca. 570-650 C.E.). Candrakirti's fullest statement of the theory is included in his Autocommentary on the Introduction to the Middle Way (Madhyamakavatarabhasya), which is, along with his Introduction to the Middle Way (Madhyamakavatara ), among the central treatises that present the Prasavgika account of the Madhyamaka (Middle Way) philosophy. In this book, Candrakirti's most complete statement of his theory of persons is translated and provided with an introduction and commentary that present a careful philosophical analysis of Candrakirti's account of the selflessness of persons. This analysis is both philologically precise and analytically sophisticated. The book is of interest to scholars of Buddhism generally and especially to scholars of Indian Buddhist philosophy.

This collection examines change within the major regional organizations of the Asia Pacific: The Asian Development Bank (ADB), the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) and the ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF). It has two simultaneous foci: the nature of institutional change in regional organizations, and the process of regionalism in the Asia Pacific. It combines the views of both officials and practitioners, providing new insights into both its major questions.

During recent years, the topic of participation has increasingly been gaining importance in Iran - in the scientific field, in practice and rhetoric. However, in current scientific literature - and especially in English literature - there is little knowledge on the conditions, legal background, perceptions, experiences and processes of citizens' participation in Iran. This book aims to shed light on the paradoxical question of participation in Iran: it is old and new, dysfunctioning and functioning, disappointing and promising. This slippery status of participation convinces scholars to suggest contradictory interpretations and understandings about the existence, functionality, and potentiality of this concept. The book therefore shows the different perspectives, interpretations, historical developments and case studies of participation in Iran, thus giving the reader a kaleidoscope view on the question of participation in Iran.

Church History reveals that Christianity has its roots in Palestine during the first century and was spread throughout the Mediterranean countries by the Apostles. However, despite sharing the same ancestry, Muslims and Christians have been living in a challenging symbiotic co-existence for more than fourteen centuries in many parts of South-Eastern Europe and the Middle East. This book analyses contemporary Christian-Muslim relations in the traditional lands of Orthodoxy and Islam. In particular, it examines the development of Eastern Orthodox ecclesiological thinking on Muslim-Christian relations and religious minorities in the context of modern Greece and Turkey. Greece, where the prevailing religion is Eastern Orthodoxy, accommodates an official recognised Muslim minority based in Western Thrace as well as other Muslim populations located at major Greek urban centres and the islands of the Aegean Sea. On the other hand, Turkey, where the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople is based, is a Muslim country which accommodates within its borders an official recognised Greek Orthodox Minority. The book then suggests ways in which to overcome the difficulties that Muslim and Christian communities are still facing with the Turkish and Greek States. Finally, it proposes that the positive aspects of the coexistence between Muslims and Christians in Western Thrace and Istanbul might constitute an original model that should be adopted in other EU and Middle East countries, where challenges and obstacles between Muslim and Christian communities still persist. This book offers a distinct and useful contribution to the ever popular subject of Christian-Muslim relations, especially in South-East Europe and the Middle East. It will be a key resource for students and scholars of Religious Studies and Middle Eastern Studies.