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Books > Social sciences > Politics & government > Political ideologies > General
This book argues that the recent political mobilizations in Eastern Europe have been underpinned by a class struggle between a more conservative and a more radical line of contention. The latter line, the book contends, is designed by and for subaltern groups whose anti-systemic programme calls for not just the eradication of corruption, but for more participatory forms of democracy, for social justice, and for freedom from want. The former, on the other hand, is designed by powerful groups of intellectuals, for the middle classes whom the intellectuals see as the historical strata capable of advancing the 'catch-up' projects of modernization and Europeanization which they zealously champion. Based on a critical examination of recent political struggles, including a detailed case study of the 2013 protests in Bulgaria which focuses particularly on their internal antagonisms and drawing on the social theories of Antonio Gramsci and Ernst Bloch, the book provides shrewd insights into class antagonisms in political mobilizations, the distortive nature of ideological constructions and utopian longings, and the factors which propel many people to support projects for social change.
The economist and historian Deirdre Nansen McCloskey has been best known recently for her Bourgeois Era trilogy, a vigorous defense, unrivaled in scope, of commercially tested betterment. Its massive volumes, The Bourgeois Virtues, Bourgeois Dignity, and Bourgeois Equality, solve Adam Smith's puzzle of the nature and causes of the wealth of nations, and of the moral sentiments of modernity. The world got rich, she argues, not chiefly by material causes but by an idea and a sentiment, a new admiration for the middle class and its egalitarian liberalism. For readers looking for a distillation of McCloskey's magisterial work, Leave Me Alone and I'll Make You Rich is what you've been waiting for. In this lively volume, McCloskey and the economist and journalist Carden bring together the trilogy's key ideas and its most provocative arguments. The rise of the west, and now the rest, is the story of the rise of ordinary people to a dignity and liberty inspiring them to have a go. The outcome was an explosion of innovation after 1800, and a rise of real income by an astounding 3,000 percent. The Great Enrichment, well beyond the conventional Industrial Revolution, did not, McCloskey and Carden show, come from the usual suspects, capital accumulation or class struggle. It came from the idea of economic liberty in Holland and the Anglosphere, then Sweden and Japan, then Italy and Israel and China and India, an idea that bids fair in the next few generations to raise up the wretched of the earth. The original shift to liberalism arose 1517 to 1789 from theological and political revolutions in northwest Europe, upending ancient hierarchies. McCloskey and Carden contend further that liberalism and "innovism" made us better humans as well as richer ones. Not matter but ideas. Not corruption but improvement. Leave Me Alone and I'll Make You Rich draws in entertaining fashion on history, economics, literature, philosophy, and popular culture, from growth theory to the Simpsons. It is the perfect introduction for a broad audience to McCloskey's influential explanation of how we got rich. At a time when confidence in the economic system is under challenge, the book mounts an optimistic and persuasive defense of liberal innovism, and of the modern world it has wrought.
The International Workers Order was an American consortium of ethnic mutual self-insurance societies that advocated for unemployment insurance, Social Security and vibrant industrial unions. This interracial leftist organization guaranteed the healthcare of its 180,000 white, black, Hispanic and Arabic working-class members. But what accounted for the popularity-and eventual notoriety-of this Order? Mining extensive primary sources, Robert Zecker gives voice to the workers in "A Road to Peace and Freedom." He describes the group's economic goals, commitment to racial justice, and activism, from lobbying to end segregation and lynching in America to defeating fascism abroad. Zecker also illustrates the panoply of entertainment, sports, and educational activities designed to cultivate the minds and bodies of members. However, the IWO was led by Communists, and the Order was targeted for red-baiting during the Cold War, subject to government surveillance, and ultimately "liquidated." Zecker explains how the dismantling of the IWO and the general suppression of left-wing dissenting views on economic egalitarianism and racial equality had deleterious effects for the entire country. Moreover, Zecker shows why the sobering lesson of the IWO remains prescient today.
The International Workers Order was an American consortium of ethnic mutual self-insurance societies that advocated for unemployment insurance, Social Security and vibrant industrial unions. This interracial leftist organization guaranteed the healthcare of its 180,000 white, black, Hispanic and Arabic working-class members. But what accounted for the popularity-and eventual notoriety-of this Order? Mining extensive primary sources, Robert Zecker gives voice to the workers in "A Road to Peace and Freedom." He describes the group's economic goals, commitment to racial justice, and activism, from lobbying to end segregation and lynching in America to defeating fascism abroad. Zecker also illustrates the panoply of entertainment, sports, and educational activities designed to cultivate the minds and bodies of members. However, the IWO was led by Communists, and the Order was targeted for red-baiting during the Cold War, subject to government surveillance, and ultimately "liquidated." Zecker explains how the dismantling of the IWO and the general suppression of left-wing dissenting views on economic egalitarianism and racial equality had deleterious effects for the entire country. Moreover, Zecker shows why the sobering lesson of the IWO remains prescient today.
Politics of Withdrawal considers the significance of practices and theories of withdrawal for radical thinking today. With contributions of major theorists in the fields of contemporary political philosophy, cultural studies and media studies, the chapters investigate the multiple contexts, possibilities and impasses of political withdrawal - from the radical to the seemingly mundane - and reflect a range of case studies varying from the political thinking of Debord, the Invisible Committee, Moten and Harney, feminist notions of 'strike' and 'exit', and indigenous forms of sabotage, to the individual retreat as means of reconfiguring political subjectivity. It looks at technological failure as disconnection from surveillance, and from alternative financial futures to contemporary 'pharmako-politics.' The volume provides a vital grip on a key notion in contemporary radical politics, in all its complexity, contradictions and tribulations.
In this edited collection, an international ensemble of scholars examine what contemporary cinema tells us about neoliberal capitalism and cinema, exploring whether filmmakers are able to imagine progressive alternatives under capitalist conditions. Individual contributions discuss filmmaking practices, film distribution, textual characteristics and the reception of films made in different parts of the world. They engage with topics such as class struggle, debt, multiculturalism and the effect of neoliberalism on love and sexual behaviour. Written in accessible, jargon-free language, Contemporary Cinema and Neoliberal Ideology is an essential text for those interested in political filmmaking and the political meanings of films.
In this edited collection, an international ensemble of scholars examine what contemporary cinema tells us about neoliberal capitalism and cinema, exploring whether filmmakers are able to imagine progressive alternatives under capitalist conditions. Individual contributions discuss filmmaking practices, film distribution, textual characteristics and the reception of films made in different parts of the world. They engage with topics such as class struggle, debt, multiculturalism and the effect of neoliberalism on love and sexual behaviour. Written in accessible, jargon-free language, Contemporary Cinema and Neoliberal Ideology is an essential text for those interested in political filmmaking and the political meanings of films.
This book reassesses Putin's attempt to reverse the decentralization of power that characterised centre-regional relations in the 1990s, focusing on regional responses to Putin's federal reforms. It explains the decline of regionalism after 2000 in terms of the dynamics of regional boundaries, understood as the juridical boundaries which demarcate a region's territorial extent and its resources; institutional boundaries that sustain regional differences; and cultural boundaries that define the ethnic or technocratic principles on which a region could claim legitimate existence. The book questions the conventional wisdom regarding the success of Putin's regime. It shows how regional governors responded not by attempting to deflect the reforms with outright resistance, but by mimicking Putin's centralisation of power at the regional level. In turn, this facilitated the homogenisation of regional political regimes and regional mergers. The book demonstrates how the reordering of regions advanced sporadically, how pockets of resistance persist, and how the potential for the revival of regionalism continues.
This book comprises a systematic analysis of Karl Marx's reasoning on ownership. Marx as the author of an original theory of ownership is yet to be discovered. The creator of a theory which was to interpret social reality is quite a different thinker from the creator of a doctrine which was to alter the world. In designing communist society, Marx ignored the threats which social property bears, despite having skillfully identified them in investigations of diverse pre-capitalistic forms of common ownership. The author seeks to break through one-sided interpretations which discern in Marx a decisive critique of private property and an apologia of common ownership. It becomes apparent that Marx treated both the processes of socialization and privatization of ownership with equal consideration.
In the aftermath of national unification in the 1860s, the Italian army was tasked with molding generations of men from warring regions and different social strata into obedient citizens of a centralized state. Integrating large numbers of the educated middle classes into the young kingdom's armed forces proved decisive in establishing the army as the 'main school' and backbone for mass nationalization. Lorenzo Benadusi examines the intersection of Italian military and civil society over the last century as they coalesced in the figure of the gentleman-officer-an idealized image of an altruistic, charming, and competent ruling class that could influence the choices, values, and behavior of the 'new Italians.'Respectability and Violence traces the relationship between civic virtues and military values from the post-Risorgimento period through the end of World War I, when the trauma of trench warfare made it necessary to again redefine ideas of chivalry and manliness and to accept violence as a necessary tool in defense of society and state. The language of conflict and attitudes about war forged in these decades-characterized by patriotism, heroism, and sacrifice-shaped the cultured bourgeoise into loyalists who ushered in Italy's transition to a powerful Fascist political system. This unique study of the officer is crucial for understanding the military, social, and political history of Italy.
How do rebel groups decide how to recruit members? To answer this question, Obayashi classifies recruitment techniques of rebel groups into two types, coercion and inducement, and develops a theory of rebel recruitment that simultaneously addresses agency problems inside rebel groups and the rebel-state contest over information. Important themes such as desertion, counterinsurgency strategies including amnesties and civil war termination are also examined to further understand the dynamics of rebellion and violent disorder. The theory is applied to examine the changes in conflicts involving the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam in Sri Lanka and the Lord's Resistance Army in Uganda.
This book draws upon theory and theology to consider how religious institutions engage with post-conflict statebuilding and why they would choose to lend their resources to the endeavour. Drawing from the theologies of Roman Catholicism and Sunni Islam, Dragovic explores their possible motivations to engage alongside the international community.
Originally published in 1984. At that time many formerly prosperous regions were becoming impoverished and many former "core" areas were being demoted to peripheral status. This book considers this crisis, its nature and manifestations and its implications. It looks in particular at how the regional crisis affects the socialist analysis of capitalism and it analyses how the crisis affects the political outlook and political actions of the working class in afflicted regions. The theories and analysis put forward apply throughout the world in both advanced and less developed countries.
Death lies at the beginning of the Arab uprisings, and death continues to haunt them. Most narratives about the 'Arab Spring' begin with Mohammed Bouazizi, a Tunisian fruit vendor who set himself on fire. Egyptian protesters in turn referred to Khaled Said, a young man from Alexandria whom the police had beaten to death. This book places death at the centre of its engagement with the Arab uprisings, counterrevolutions, and their aftermaths. It examines martyrdom and commemoration as performative acts through which death and life are infused with meaning. Conversely, it shows how, in the making, remembering, and erasing of martyrs, hierarchies are (re)produced and possible futures are foreclosed. The contributors argue that critical anthropological engagement with death, martyrdom, and afterlife is indispensable if we want to understand the making of pasts and futures in a revolutionary present. This book was originally published as a special issue of Ethnos: Journal of Anthropology.
Panarchy is a normative political meta-theory that advocates non-territorial states founded on actual social contracts that are explicitly negotiated and signed between states and their prospective citizens. The explicit social contract, or a constitution, sets the terms under which a state may use coercion against its citizens and the conditions under which the contract may be annulled, revised, rescinded, or otherwise exited from. Panarchy does not advocate any particular model of the state or social justice, but intends to encourage political variety, innovation, experimentation, and choice. With its emphasis on explicit social contracts, Panarchy offers an interesting variation on traditional social contract theories. Today, Panarchist political thought is particularly relevant and interesting in the context of globalization, increased international migration, the weakening of national sovereignty, the rise of the internet "cloud" as a non-territorial locus of political and protopolitical social networks that are not geographic, the invention of cryptocurrencies that may replace national currencies, and the rise of urban centers where people of many different political identities live and work together. This is the first volume to bring together key philosophically and politically interesting yet often overlooked Panarchist texts. From the first published translation of de Puydt seminal 1860 article to contemporary Silicon Valley political theory, the volume includes Panarchist texts from different eras, cultures and geographical regions. The amassed wealth of theoretical insight enables readers to compare different texts in this tradition of political thought and distinguish different streams and varieties within this political tradition, in comparison with Cosmopolitanism, Contractarianism, and Anarchism.
One of the main themes running through Gandhi's life and work was the battle against evil. This book offers a fascinating reconstruction of Gandhi and the doctrine of Ahimsa or non-violence. Gandhi's moral perfectionism is contrasted with other forms of perfectionism, but the book stresses that Gandhi also offered a doctrine of the second best. Following Gandhi, the author argues that outward violence with compassion is intrinsically not as good as non-violence with compassion, but it is a second best that is sometimes a necessary evil in an imperfect world. The book provides an illuminating analysis of coercion, non-co-operation, civil disobedience and necessary evil, comparing Gandhi's ideas with that of some of the leading western moral, legal and political philosophers. Further, some of his important ideas are shown to have relevance for the working of the Indian Constitution. This book will be essential for scholars and researchers in moral, legal and political philosophy, Gandhi studies, political science and South Asian studies.
Why do some individuals from the imagined "non-West" view the "West" favorably and others do not? Grounded in psychological authoritarianism and the psychological reactions to experiences of rejection, Bjoern Goldstein provides a theoretical model to explain and predict attitude toward the "West." Using accounts from high-ranking politicians from different socioeconomic groups in the Tamil Nadu region of India-a region independent from the often too "emotionalized" discourse regarding (political) Islam-Goldstein challenges the conventional narrative that the most important factors for attitude formation toward the West are experiences of disregard and oppression perpetrated by the West. Far beyond the personal characteristics of individuals, differences in attitudes follow a regular pattern of variables influencing opinion and attitude formation toward the West in each society. Scoring high on authoritarianism predicts "anti-Western" attitudes far better than socio-economic status, cultural or moral concerns, or normative differences do.
This book seeks to understand the processes of reintegration of former Jihadist detainees, as well as the role that the police and other frontline professionals play in this process. Over the past few decades the number of people who have been detained under the suspicion of terrorist activities has grown significantly. This has resulted in an increased scholarly interest in the topic of prisons and terrorism. However, the main focus of academic research has been on the period of incarceration with researchers paying extensive attention to the conditions under which terrorists have been detained as well as to various processes of alienation and (violent) radicalisation that sometimes take root while in prison. Much less has been written about the period after their incarceration and the steps being taken to prepare them for that transition. This book seeks to fill this gap. It argues that sentencing or incarcerating terrorism suspects is not the end of the story, but just the beginning of the next phase: a process of reintegration, or the start of a new cycle of violence. This exploratory study outlines the factors during and after detention that contribute or hinder the reintegration of those who have been incarcerated for violent extremism and terrorism. The overriding aim of this work is to facilitate further research into the radicalisation and de-radicalisation of jihadist suspects. This book will be of much interest to students of terrorism and counter-terrorism, Islamist radicalisation, criminology and security studies in general.
This book traces the entire trajectory of the farmers' movement in Western India, especially Maharashtra, from the 1980s to the present day. It reveals the fundamental contradictions between populism as an ideology and as political power within the democratic state structure. The volume highlights the ideologies of the movement; its emergence in the wake of a perceived agrarian crisis; how it conflates economics and populism; the role of leadership; stages of development from grassroots agitations rooted in civil society to the attempts to create space within structures of democratic politics; the eventual formation of a separate political party and consequent implications. It maps the linkages between populist ideology and mass participation, and their contested successes and failures in the domain of electoral politics. Further, the author underlines the effectiveness of the movement in addressing class and gender equations in the region. Rich in primary archival sources and informed field studies, this book will interest scholars and researchers of agrarian economy, rural sociology, and politics, particularly those concerned with social movements in India.
This book examines the development of identity politics amongst the Alevis in Europe and Turkey, which simultaneously provided the movement access to different resources and challenged its unity of action. While some argue that Aleviness is a religious phenomenon, and others claim it is a cultural or a political trend, this book analyzes the various strategies of claim-making and reconstructions of Aleviness as well as responses to the movement by various Turkish and German actors. Drawing on intensive fieldwork, Elise Massicard suggests that because of activists' many different definitions of Aleviness, the movement is in this sense an "identity movement without an identity."
Europeanization as Discursive Practice adopts a poststructuralist reading of Europeanization to study the effects of EU accession in the light of political territoriality and consequent state-building processes in the EU and Central and Eastern European countries (CEECs) and the Western Balkans, from 1990-2013. Focusing on how domestic actors have framed Europe/EU norms in the debates on territorial reforms and the implications of this framing on policy reforms, it asks how competing articulations of the EU and its norms construct state territoriality in the given political and policy debates. The book argues that the European Union acted as a discursive force and a challenge to the established structures of understanding of territoriality, statehood, and power. With this, the author proposes a new research model for the study of Europeanization that goes beyond the neo-institutionalist account of the EU's policy/norm transfer to member/non-member states. This text will be of key interest to students, scholars and practitioners of European integration, EU foreign policy, enlargement policy, and regional policy and territoriality in post-socialist spaces.
What makes people agree to the extension of political rights to those they clearly dislike? This book moves beyond the extensive research on this question in western contexts to focus on the global south, offering unique empirical studies of political tolerance in plural societies where poverty is prevalent and democratic institutions can often be fragile. Based on extensive data gathered in India, Pakistan and Uganda, this volume offers an account of the factors that shape the foundations of a society and its capacity to be democratic, but where the need for the protection of human rights is great and where the state is either weak or even constitutes a counter-force against the rights of individuals and groups. Combining large scale survey data with in-depth interviews in each national setting, the author exemplifies the great variation of factors which are related to political tolerance, shedding light on the fundamental patterns existing in the organization of state-society relations and the ways in which they produce certain results owing to the manner in which the forces of modernization operate. A broad and empirically informed study of what shapes the foundations of a democratic society in modernizing nations, Political Tolerance in the Global South will appeal to scholars of sociology and political science with interests in democracy, human rights, diversity and tolerance.
Whether called pressure groups, NGOs, social movement organisations or organised civil society, the value of 'groups' to the policy process, to economic growth, to governance, to political representation and to democracy has always been contested. However, there seems to be a contemporary resurgence in this debate largely centred on their democratising potential: can groups effectively link citizens to political institutions and policy processes? Are groups an antidote to emerging democratic deficits? Or do groups themselves face challenges in demonstrating their legitimacy and representativeness? This book debates the democratic potential and practice of groups; focussing on the vibrancy of internal democracies, and modes of accountability with those who join such groups and to the constituencies they advocate for. It draws on literatures covering national, European and global levels, and presents new empirical material from the UK and Australia -- .
This exciting book, newly available in paperback, investigates the scope of maternity legislation and family-friendly policies in the European Union. The wider context of the analysis is the development of equal rights as part of a European social dimension. The book is concerned with the influence of values and beliefs about women, equality, politics and employment on the scope of equal rights and maternity provisions. It provides answers to the following questions - what are the stated objectives of family-friendly policies? Which values transpire from the analysis of maternity rights? How do gender power hierarchies shape the overall aim of policies for the reconciliation between work and family life? Through the use of two case studies - one from Italy and one from the UK - it uncovers the values that underpin the policy making process and gives concrete examples of gender policies in action. It will be of vital benefit to anyone studying gender and gender policies in a specific European Union context. -- . |
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