An examination of teachers in early childhood settings. Areas covered include: factors that impact on teacher quality; transformative pathways in becoming an early childhood teacher; Sensei - early childhood education teachers in Japan; and beliefs of early childhood teachers.

The growth rate of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in the Asia-Pacific region greatly surpasses the world average. When the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) is better realized, then the world's largest free trade zone will be firmly established. It seems that this region has a very rosy outlook indeed; however, this region also faces a large number of serious problems such as: atomic energy in Japan, conflicts about East Asian regional integration, the decline of the Japanese Official Development Assistance (ODA), and the TPP's possible impact on the Japanese universal health insurance system. We now face a possible Sino-Japanese military conflict concerning the Senkaku Islands (or Diaoyutai Islands). In short, the Asia-Pacific region has both a rosy future and the potential influence from unstable and dangerous elements at work within the region at present. The main purpose of this book is to analyze historical development, whilst looking at the contemporary situation of Japan from interdisciplinary perspectives. This book asks three major questions: (1) Is this really globalization? (2) What are Japan's relations with other Asian countries? (3) Do U.S.-Japan relations still matter? Fourteen leading scholars in their fields answer these questions from interdisciplinary perspectives.

This book examines the global campaign to end hunger and malnutrition. Focus is placed on the work of the United Nations which has led international efforts to improve food security in the world's poorest countries. The book first reviews the long-term project to establish access to safe, sufficient, and nutritious food as a universally recognized human right. This is followed by separate chapters that examine the nature and central causes of food insecurity in Latin America, Africa, the Middle East, and Asia. These chapters also review the contemporary work of three United Nations agencies - the World Food Programme, Food and Agriculture Organization, and International Fund for Agricultural Development - in providing both food aid and food assistance to each region of the developing world. This includes the provision of emergency food aid in response to natural disaster and civil conflict, as well as longer-term food assistance to promote agricultural productivity, advance rural development, and preserve natural environments. The concluding chapter considers ways to strengthen food aid and assistance in the years to come, with many of the recommendations advanced reflecting lessons learned from the actual experience of food aid and assistance described in this book.

This book is open access under a CC BY license. This book explores if and how Russian policies towards the Far East region of the country - and East Asia more broadly - have changed since the onset of the Ukraine crisis and Russia's annexation of Crimea. Following the 2014 annexation and the subsequent enactment of a sanctions regime against the country, the Kremlin has emphasized the eastern vector in its external relations. But to what extent has Russia's 'pivot to the East' intensified or changed in nature - domestically and internationally - since the onset of the current crisis in relations with the West? Rather than taking the declared 'pivot' as a fact and exploring the consequences of it, the contributors to this volume explore whether a pivot has indeed happened or if what we see today is the continuation of longer-duration trends, concerns and ambitions.

Winner of the 2018 ILAW Book Award from the International Studies Association (ISA). This book advances innovative arguments and presents original evidence to shed light on the important and surprisingly under-researched question of whether, and how, judicial politics has affected the prospects for cooperation in the WTO through multilateral trade rounds.

This book analyses the representation of North-East England in film and television. It is a response to the way a number of important British films and programmes-for example, Get Carter (1971), Whatever Happened to the Likely Lads (1973-74), Our Friends in the North (1996) and Billy Elliot (2000)-have used this particular setting to explore questions of class, identity and history. It argues for the significance and coherence of a North-East corpus of film and television through a series of case studies relating to specific eras or types of representation. These include regional writers working for television in the 1970s, the achievements of the workshop movement in the 1980s and works produced within the genres of documentary, crime drama, comedy, period drama and reality television. The book discusses how the communities and landscapes of the region have been used to explore processes of cultural change, and legacies of de-industrialisation.

This book examines the governance of Asian student and academic mobility, which has transformed the higher education landscape. While campuses are experiencing an unprecedented level of diversity, knowledge creation remains explicitly Eurocentric and dominated by the Global North. The authors advocate for a new educational paradigm that takes into account the transcultural flow of knowledge on campus as a public good, capitalises on Asian students and academics' multilingual competencies, and offers them equal access to creating quality-orientated education. The book argues that international higher education must be grounded in both a plurality of knowledges and the ethics of cognitive justice, and that the governing policies should facilitate the higher education sector to build a platform of internationalising affect and effect on campus.

The First English-Language Treatise on Consular Law. Warden's was the first English-language treatise on consular law and one of the earliest workson the subject. Both a descriptive and prescriptive work, it outlines the ideal qualities of a consul, his role in diplomatic relations and legal status and a review of consular treaties in force at the time. Highly regarded in its day, it was translated into French, the language of nineteenth-century diplomacy, and circulated widely among diplomatic circles. A scarce work today, our edition is enhanced by Professor Butler's extensive introduction, which examines the historical context of this book and the life of its author. David Bailie Warden 1772-1845], an Irish-born American diplomat, was distinguished for his scientific attainments and varied learning. A member of the French Academy and other prestigious learned societies, he was secretary of the United States Legation to France, agent of prize causes, and for many years the United States consul in Paris. "Consular law, it is widely believed, is among the most venerable of the institutes of the law of nations and an early example, in State practice and doctrinal form, of the comparative investigation and analysis of State practice in the form of treaties, national legislation, and judicial application."--William E. Butler, iv

This book seeks to answer one main question: what is the core concern of great powers that streamlines their behavior in the contemporary system of international relations? Building on the examples of the United States, China, Russia, France, and Britain, it tracks both consistency and fluctuations in global power dynamics and great power behavior. The author examines the genesis, causality, and policy implications of decision makers' fixation with retaining a credible image of power in world politics, while exploring how the dynamics of power distribution in international systems modify perceptions of primacy. Drawing on findings from disciplines such as history, economics, social and political psychology, communication theory, philosophy, political science, strategic studies, and above all, from International Relations theory and practice, the volume proposes a novel theory of power credibility, which offers an original explanation of great powers' behavior at the stage of their relative decline.

Cimbala argues that nuclear complacency is based on a misreading of history and on unsound political and military analysis. The stability factors built into the Cold War international system are now missing. The spread of nuclear weapons after the Cold War moved toward regional actors outside of Europe, some with religious or national scores to settle. Technology transfer of ballistic missiles and other delivery systems for weapons of mass destruction, including biological and chemical as well as nuclear weapons, brings the danger of nuclear eruption closer to reality. Finally, the mechanism of deterrence that seemed so dependable as a means of war prevention from 1947 to 1991 only seems so by virtue of nostalgia.

The early decades of the Cold War were made somewhat unpredictable by uncertain U.S.-Soviet political relations, by nuclear force building based on worst-case estimates, and by rickety command and control systems that could have failed both sides in a crisis. The Soviets and Americans gradually improved their relationship and stabilized Cold War competition, including nuclear rivalry, but they had more than 40 years to practice and no immediate territorial disputes. As Cimbala makes clear, it cannot be assumed that the Soviet-American nonbelligerence of the Cold War is transferable into a multipolar, post-Cold War international system marked by spreading weapons and trigger-sensitive control systems. This provocative analysis will be of interest to all scholars, students, and policy makers involved with defense, security, and foreign policy studies.

The collapse of the Soviet Union and the Soviet bloc had a profound effect on Turkey economically and politically. On the one hand, the collapse further marginalized Turkey's position in Western Europe, as some of the newly liberated Central and Eastern European countries raced ahead of Turkey to join the European Union. On the other hand, the collapse presented Turkey with new opportunities and challenges stemming from geographic proximity and cultural/historical ties with countries that emerged from the Soviet bloc and from the former Soviet Union. In articles focusing on the 1990s and beyond, this book explores how the economic and political fortunes of Turkey have changed since the end of the Cold War. Two main sections of the book examine Turkey's relations with the European Union and with the former Soviet Union and Soviet bloc countries. Each section opens with a chapter providing an overview of Turkey's political relationship with the respective region, followed by chapters that examine facets of the politico-economic relationships. Located in a potentially volatile portion of the world, Turkey plays an important role in maintaining peace and prosperity in its region. The analysis in this volume allows an understanding of the critical factors that influence the political economy of Turkey, and therefore, its ability to contribute to world peace and stability.

After Saddam: American Foreign Policy and the Destruction of Secularism in the Middle East investigates the manner in which American foreign policy in Iraq artificially shifted the balance of power in the region and brought religious identities to the foreground. Deposing Saddam Hussein resulted in a new regional order that diminished the strength of secular nationalism, elevated Iran and Saudi Arabia as regional rivals, and by implication, established a new ideological paradigm that privileged competing religious factions over secular ideals. The trend first manifested itself in Iraq during the American occupation with Iranian-backed Shiites fighting Saudi-supported Sunnis. A similar dynamic is evident in current regional wars in Syria and Yemen. By elevating particular groups through rhetorical, financial, and military support, civil conflicts in the Middle East reflect the ideologies behind the Saudi-Iranian rivalry. This book therefore looks beyond popular narratives of intractable, long-standing Sunni-Shia conflict to explain the source of current sectarian tension as a product of balance of power dynamics. It also helps to explain the fracturing of the region that created a ripe environment for groups like the Islamic State to capitalize on sectarian grievances. This book relies and builds on balance of power theorizing by looking at the way that traditional competition for power between states and nonstate actors shapes ideological competition. For example, during the Cold War, the two major world powers-the U.S. and the Soviet Union-helped to shape international conflicts so that the narrative of "capitalism vs. communism" played a prominent role in civil and international conflicts-such as in Korea, Nicaragua, or Angola. By meddling in the internal affairs of states, arming rebel groups, and lending support to competing factions, the U.S. and U.S.S.R. shaped not only outcomes, but also the ideas underpinning conflicts. Today, a similar dynamic can be discerned in the Middle East.

"International Politics: A Journal of Transnational Issues and Global Problems" (a Kluwer scholarly quarterly) has, since 1997, published an array of analyses about the world's political metamorphosis. Featuring scholarship that transcends boundaries of states and disciplines, "International Politics" editors and contributors have joined to assemble, from the journal's last few volumes, a far-reaching portrait of actors, identities, norms and institutions that populate a stage once confined to states, power and national interests. Further, interventions to build states, make or keep the peace, impose sanctions or save currencies are examined, as are the institutional enlargements at the forefront of policy in Europe. "Global Society in Transition" offers a variety of policy-relevant scholarship about a world-in-making - not yet detached from Cold War or even Westphalian roots, but certainly in the process of moving towards a qualitatively different global system. Published after rigorous peer review, the chapters in this book should provide comparative politics, international relations and world affairs courses at undergraduate and graduate level with access to contemporary research and innovative thinking in these fields.

Twentieth-century Europe, especially Central Eastern Europe, has been largely defined by Russia and Germany. In this century, cultural and economic exchanges between the two countries were as active as the fires of hatred intense. The smaller states in between, with their unstable borders and internal minorities, suffered from the powers' alliances and their antagonisms. This volume of new research in political and cultural history examines the two powers' turbulent relationship, including the pre-1914 era of exchange and cooperation; the projects of modernity in post-revolutionary Russia and Weimar Germany; the struggle for dominance over Central Europe in World War II; and mutual views of Germans and Russians after 1945. In the wake of the crucial events of 1989 and the transformation of German-Russian relations, it asks whether the configuration of Russian-German relations that once dominated twentiehth-century Europe has now dissolved, leaving us to find new ways of cooperation between 'New Russia' and 'New Europe'.

This book investigates the links between human trafficking and national security in Southern Africa. Human trafficking violates borders, supports organised crime and corrupts border officials, and yet policymakers rarely view the persistence of human trafficking as a security issue. Adopting an expanded conceptualisation of security to encompass the individual as well as the state, Richard Obinna Iroanya lays the groundwork for understanding human trafficking as a security threat. He outlines the conditions and patterns of human trafficking globally before moving into detailed case studies of South Africa and Mozambique. Together, these case studies bring into focus the lives of the 'hidden population' in the region, with analysis and policy recommendations for combating a global phenomenon.

This book examines the many ways in which the Communist Party in China is still revolutionary by focusing on how, in recent years, it has attempted to mobilize Party members to become ethical subjects. In the context of the Party's history of the military revolution, Cultural Revolution and Economic Reform (or economic revolution), the authors argue that under President Xi Jinping the Party has launched an ethical revolution within the Party for the sake of sustaining its legitimacy. This book examines the various combined components of this ethical revolution, including anti-corruption, anti-four undesirable working styles and Mass-Line Education programme from the perspective of the fifty current Communist Party officials.

Contrary to dominant narratives which portray East European politics as a pendulum swing between democracy and authoritarianism, conventionally defined in terms of an ahistorical cultural geography of East vs. West, this book analyzes post-socialist transformation as part of the long downturn of the post-WWII global capitalist cycle. Based on an empirical comparison of two countries with significantly different political regimes throughout the period, Hungary and Romania, this study shows how different constellations of successive late socialist and post-socialist regimes have managed internal and external class relations throughout the same global crisis process, from very similar positions of semi-peripheral, post-socialist systemic integration. Within this context, the book follows the role of social movements since the 1970s, paying attention both to the level of differences between local integration regimes and to the level of structural similarities of global integration. The analysis maintains a special focus on movements' class composition and inter-class relationships and the specific position of middle-class politics in movements.

This book uses the body to peel back the layers of time and taken-for-granted ideas about the two defining political forms of modernity, the state and the subject of rights. It traces, under the lens of the body, how the state and the subject mutually constituted each other all the way down, by going all the way back, to their original crafting in the seventeenth century. It considers two revolutions. The first, scientific, threw humanity out of the centre of the universe, and transformed the very meanings of matter, space, and the body; while the second, legal and political, re-established humans as the centre-point of the framework of modern rights. The book analyses the fundamental rights to security, liberty, and property respectively as the initial knots where the state-subject relation was first sealed. It develops three arguments, that the body served to naturalise security; to individualise liberty; and to privatise property. Covering a wide range of materials-from early modern Dutch painting, to the canon of English political thought, the Anglo-Scottish legal struggles of naturalization, and medical and religious practices-it shows both how the body has operated as history's great naturaliser, and how it can be mobilised instead as a critical tool that lays bare the deeply racialised and gendered constructions that made the state and the subject of rights. The book returns to the origins of constructivist and constitutive theorising to reclaim their radical and critical potential.

This book offers a critical analysis of the rise of the US to global hegemony against a background of increased erosion of democracy and rule of law, and a rising linear pattern of near-absolute capitalist development. The author argues that the significant shrinkage of the ideological spectrum globally, as a result of worrisome levels of business and government interpenetration, has created a dangerous 'prefascist configuration' whereby unthinkable levels of violence have been normalized through the use of technologies such as drones, increasingly condoned even by 'liberal' groups and the so-called political left. Using the example of the Obama administration and its increased reliance on drone assassinations, the volume makes a case for the dangers that lie in today's unique convergence of lack of transparency in government, business-government interpenetration, informal social regimentation, and militarization of capitalism.

The author offers an analysis of forms of U.S. mass culture that support, parallel, or critique official national, regional, and intergovernmental peace policy, prevention, and peacemaking. Major popular culture forms such as film, television, news media, peace parks and public memorials, and peace and justice movements are considered as public discourses influencing and reflecting public understanding of peace and war themes. The discussion includes events following September 11, 2001.

"World Peace, Mass Culture, and National Policy" takes a critical and analytical approach to Washington foreign policy; unilateralist methods; and corporatism as global hegemony. It includes a wide discussion of these issues based on cultural institutions and ideologies of mass culture in the U.S. The work critiques the notion that corporate capitalism and the consumer affluence of the U.S. alone can bring other societies to democratic practice.

This thoughtful text demonstrates how the mass media constructs a politics of fear in the United States. Using a social interactionist perspective, the chapters examines such issues as the expansion of surveillance on the Internet, the construction of a terrorism-fighting hero to promote patriotism, the use of social media by terror groups, the fear of the other fostered by the refugee crisis and western radicalization, as well as the mass-mediated reaction to recent terrorist attacks. Also covered are the politics of fear involving disease (Ebola, Zika), social control efforts, and harsh attacks on American governmental officials for not keeping people safe from harm. All chapters in this new edition have been updated with descriptions and relevant analysis of significant events, including two Israeli-Hamas wars, terrorism attacks (e.g., Boston Marathon, Charlie Hebdo, San Bernadino, etc.), global reactions-often hostility-to refugees in the United States and especially Europe, the development of ISIS, surveillance (Wiki Leaks, Snowden, NSA), and the growing significance of social media. The text explains how the social construction of fear is used to steer public and foreign policy, arguing that security policies to protect the citizenry from violence have become control systems that most often curtail privacy and civil liberties.

Since 9/11, the United States and its allies have been waging an endless War on Terror to counter violent extremism by "winning hearts and minds," particularly in Afghanistan. However, violent extremism remains on the rise worldwide. The effort and sacrifice of the War on Terror have been continually undermined by actions, narratives, and policies that many of the 1.8 billion Muslims worldwide perceive as Islamophobic. Incidents of Islamophobia on the part of Western governments, media, and civilians, whether intentional or unintentional, alienate the majority of Muslims who are law-abiding and would be key allies in the fight against violent extremism. In Afghanistan, for example, violent extremist groups portray U.S. and NATO forces as blasphemous, anti-Muslim invaders to frighten Afghan villagers into compliance. A similar perception weakens domestic countering violent extremism programs in the West that rely on cooperation with Muslim communities. As the Great Powers Competition emerges among the U.S., Russia, and China, America and the West can ill afford any further impairment in their counterterrorism strategy. The dangers of Islamophobia must be recognized and eradicated immediately. In Countering Violent Extremism by Winning Hearts and Minds, Adib Farhadi demonstrates how Islamophobia poses a threat to U.S. national security by utilizing historical context, statistical analysis, and in-depth case studies. Farhadi, who headed Afghanistan's National Development Strategy, describes how Koran burnings, anti-Islamic rhetoric, and racial profiling harm relationships with the majority of Muslims who are not involved in violent extremism and thus perpetuate the War on Terror. America has sacrificed thousands of lives and has spent more than $6 trillion on the War on Terror. It can ill afford to squander more valuable resources in a strategy undermined by Islamophobia or perception of Islamophobia. As Farhadi explains, only through a reconciliatory narrative, can we work toward a shared future where violent extremism is eradicated. This book is essential reading for scholars, policymakers, practitioners, and executives who are invested in maintaining and rebuilding American credibility essential to global security and peace.

The explosion of Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland, in December 1988, should never have happened. Wallis, who has extensive, direct, personal knowledge of aviation security matters gained from his position at the crossroads of security information and the industry's endeavors to combat aviation terrorism, had warned the industry one year before the bombing that the interline element of baggage represented the prime opportunity for terrorist activity and had urged the adoption of passenger and baggage matching, a system that he had helped to develop. Mandated by the FAA for use at high risk airports, it was the feature missing from Pan AM's activity at Frankfort, an omission so cruelly exploited by the bombers. Wallis argues that the priority given by governments to technological solutions to the continuing terrorist threat puts the flying public at unnecessary risk every day.

This volume brings together all of the facts surrounding the sabotage of Flight 103, including the investigation and the civil litigation in which so much of the story unfolded for the first time. It uncovers the fundamental weaknesses in Pan AM's communication and management policies. Wallis supports the policy that politics are politics and explores the possibility that U.S. and U.K. policy towards a neutral trial for the two Libyans indicted for the bombing, which may have been affected by the wider scenario of Middle East politics rather than simple justice for the victims of Lockerbie. Although the tragedy has led to improvements in defense technology for use against acts of aviation sabotage, these methods have yet to be applied universally.

This book intersects the distributed ledger technology (DLT) community with the international security community. Given the increasing application of blockchain technology in the fields of business and international development, there is a growing body of study on other use cases. For instance, can blockchain have a significant role in preserving and improving international security? This book explores this question in the context of preventing the proliferation of some of the most dangerous materials in the world-items that if not secured can lend to the development of weapons of mass destruction. It considers how blockchain can increase efficiencies in the global trade of nuclear and chemical materials and technology, thereby increasing assurances related to compliance with international nonproliferation and disarmament treaties.