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Books > Social sciences > Politics & government > Political control & freedoms > General
From the Palestinian struggle against Israeli Apartheid, to First Nations' mass campaigns against pipeline construction in North America, Indigenous peoples are at the forefront of some of the crucial struggles of our age. Rich with their distinct histories and cultures, they are connected by the shared enemy they face: settler colonialism. In this introduction to the subject, Sai Englert highlights the ways in which settler colonialism has and continues to shape our global economic and political order. From the rapacious accumulation of resources, land, and labour, through Indigenous dispossession and genocide, to the development of racism as a form of social control, settler colonialism is deeply connected to many of today's social ills. To understand settler colonialism as an ongoing process, is therefore also to start engaging with contemporary social movements and solidarity campaigns differently. It is to start seeing how distinct struggles for justice and liberation are intertwined.
Behavioral science is playing an increasing role in public policy, and it is raising new questions about fundamental issues - the role of government, freedom of choice, paternalism, and human welfare. In diverse nations, public officials are using behavioral findings to combat serious problems - poverty, air pollution, highway safety, COVID-19, discrimination, employment, climate change, and occupational health. Exploring theory and practice, this Element attempts to provide one-stop shopping for those who are new to the area and for those who are familiar with it. With reference to nudges, taxes, mandates, and bans, it offers concrete examples of behaviorally informed policies. It also engages the fundamental questions, include the proper analysis of human welfare in light of behavioral findings. It offers a plea for respecting freedom of choice - so long as people's choices are adequately informed and free from behavioral biases.
The U.S. government's prime enemy in the War on Terror is not a shadowy mastermind dispatching suicide bombers. It is the informed American citizen. With Manufacturing Militarism, Christopher J. Coyne and Abigail R. Hall detail how military propaganda has targeted Americans since 9/11. From the darkened cinema to the football field to the airport screening line, the U.S. government has purposefully inflated the actual threat of terrorism and the necessity of a proactive military response. This biased, incomplete, and misleading information contributes to a broader culture of fear and militarism that, far from keeping Americans safe, ultimately threatens the foundations of a free society. Applying a political economic approach to the incentives created by a democratic system with a massive national security state, Coyne and Hall delve into case studies from the War on Terror to show how propaganda operates in a democracy. As they vigilantly watch their carry-ons scanned at the airport despite nonexistent threats, or absorb glowing representations of the military from films, Americans are subject to propaganda that, Coyne and Hall argue, erodes government by citizen consent.
From the Preface to the Twenty-fifth Anniversary Edition: This was a controversial book, and likely remains so.... The world 25 years later looks quite different. With the end of the Cold War, the United States is now the world's only superpower. If this country cannot shape the international system and bring peace and stability to much of the world, surely no other state can. Yet the will to a broadly internationalist foreign policy cannot currently be found in the United States. The near-consensus that ranged across foreign policy elites before the Vietnam War has never been restored. Maybe that's just as well. But I hold to much of the basic perspective of this book as offering some guidance for fellow "cooperative internationalists." The power to shape international affairs is limited; military intervention is a costly, blunt, and dangerous instrument. The five questions I ask on page 108 of this book remain appropriate. I do believe there are appropriate circumstances for military action in international affairs. In most circumstances I do not believe that it is desirable, effective, or just to try to spread democracy or other American values by force of arms. Much more could be done by way of financial assistance as well as consistent ideological and technical support to create a more democratic and interdependent environment within which peace can be secured.... If the Vietnam War derived in substantial part from an overconfident and unilateral interpretation of history, that is a mistake from which we can still learn.
A multivocal account of why Egypt's defeated revolution remains a watershed in the country's political history. Bread and Freedom offers a new account of Egypt's 2011 revolutionary mobilization, based on a documentary record hidden in plain sight—party manifestos, military communiqués, open letters, constitutional contentions, protest slogans, parliamentary debates, and court decisions. A rich trove of political arguments, the sources reveal a range of actors vying over the fundamental question in politics: who holds ultimate political authority. The revolution's tangled events engaged competing claims to sovereignty made by insurgent forces and entrenched interests alike, a vital contest that was terminated by the 2013 military coup and its aftermath. Now a decade after the 2011 Arab uprisings, Mona El-Ghobashy rethinks how we study revolutions, looking past causes and consequences to train our sights on the collisions of revolutionary politics. She moves beyond the simple judgments that once celebrated Egypt's revolution as an awe-inspiring irruption of people power or now label it a tragic failure. Revisiting the revolutionary interregnum of 2011–2013, Bread and Freedom takes seriously the political conflicts that developed after the ouster of President Hosni Mubarak, an eventful thirty months when it was impossible to rule Egypt without the Egyptians.
A multivocal account of why Egypt's defeated revolution remains a watershed in the country's political history. Bread and Freedom offers a new account of Egypt's 2011 revolutionary mobilization, based on a documentary record hidden in plain sight-party manifestos, military communiques, open letters, constitutional contentions, protest slogans, parliamentary debates, and court decisions. A rich trove of political arguments, the sources reveal a range of actors vying over the fundamental question in politics: who holds ultimate political authority. The revolution's tangled events engaged competing claims to sovereignty made by insurgent forces and entrenched interests alike, a vital contest that was terminated by the 2013 military coup and its aftermath. Now a decade after the 2011 Arab uprisings, Mona El-Ghobashy rethinks how we study revolutions, looking past causes and consequences to train our sights on the collisions of revolutionary politics. She moves beyond the simple judgments that once celebrated Egypt's revolution as an awe-inspiring irruption of people power or now label it a tragic failure. Revisiting the revolutionary interregnum of 2011-2013, Bread and Freedom takes seriously the political conflicts that developed after the ouster of President Hosni Mubarak, an eventful thirty months when it was impossible to rule Egypt without the Egyptians.
During the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, Britain, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa were increasingly drawn together by an imperial press system. This is the first scholarly study of the development of that system. Simon J. Potter examines key debates during episodes such as the South African War and the First World War, and reveals the ambiguous impact of the system on local, national, and imperial identities.
In this ground-breaking work, Gerasimos Tsourapas examines how migration and political power are inextricably linked, and enhances our understanding of how authoritarian regimes rely on labour emigration across the Middle East and the Global South. Dr Tsourapas identifies how autocracies develop strategies to tie cross-border mobility to their own survival, highlighting domestic political struggles and the shifting regional and international landscape. In Egypt, the ruling elite has long shaped labour emigration policy in accordance with internal and external tactics aimed at regime survival. Dr Tsourapas draws on a wealth of previously-unavailable archival sources in Arabic and English, as well as extensive original interviews with Egyptian elites and policy-makers in order to produce a novel account of authoritarian politics in the Arab world. The book offers a new insight into the evolution and political rationale behind regime strategies towards migration, from Gamal Abdel Nasser's 1952 Revolution to the 2011 Arab Uprisings.
Born in Pondoland in 1917, Oliver Tambo cut his political teeth in the ANC Youth League. This book traces his role as a leader of the legal ANC through the Defiance Campaign, the Congress of the People and the Treason Trial, and his evolution from militant ‘Africanism’ towards acceptance of the idea of the ANC as open to people of different racial groups and political persuasions. The book also traces his role from the aftermath of Sharpeville in 1960 as, for 30 years, the pre-eminent leader of the ANC in exile in London, Tanzania and Zambia. It shows how, placing himself at the political centre of the organisation, he held the ANC together through great difficulties, managing its relations with African states and great powers, and steering it towards the negotiated end of apartheid. The book analyses the sources of Tambo’s strength as a leader, emphasizing his integrity and commitment to democracy, and the importance to him of religion, music and family.
Judith Butler's new book shows how an ethic of nonviolence must be connected to a broader political struggle for social equality. Further, it argues that nonviolence is often misunderstood as a passive practice that emanates from a calm region of the soul, or as an individualist ethical relation to existing forms of power. But, in fact, nonviolence is an ethical position found in the midst of the political field. An aggressive form of nonviolence accepts that hostility is part of our psychic constitution, but values ambivalence as a way of checking the conversion of aggression into violence. One contemporary challenge to a politics of nonviolence points out that there is a difference of opinion on what counts as violence and nonviolence. The distinction between them can be mobilised in the service of ratifying the state's monopoly on violence. Considering nonviolence as an ethical problem within a political philosophy requires a critique of individualism as well as an understanding of the psychosocial dimensions of violence. Butler draws upon Foucault, Fanon, Freud, and Benjamin to consider how the interdiction against violence fails to include lives regarded as ungrievable. By considering how 'racial phantasms' inform justifications of state and administrative violence, Butler tracks how violence is often attributed to those who are most severely exposed to its lethal effects. The struggle for nonviolence is found in movements for social transformation that reframe the grievability of lives in light of social equality and whose ethical claims follow from an insight into the interdependency of life as the basis of social and political equality.
A profound rumination on the concept of freedom from the bestselling author of The Perfect Storm 'Sebastian Junger bears witness to a hard-won and an uncertain new world, framed in vital and brilliant prose: a true and honest accounting of everything that underlies the frantic performance of life' Philip Hoare, author of Albert and the Whale Throughout history, humans have been driven by the quest for two cherished ideals: community and freedom. The two don't coexist easily: we value individuality and self-reliance, yet are utterly dependent on community for our most basic needs. In this intricately crafted and thought-provoking book, Sebastian Junger examines this tension that lies at the heart of what it means to be human. For much of a year, Junger and three friends-a conflict photographer and two Afghan war vets-walked the railroad lines of the east coast. It was an experiment in personal autonomy, but also in interdependence. Dodging railroad cops, sleeping under bridges, cooking over fires and drinking from creeks and rivers, the four men forged a unique reliance on one another. In Freedom, Junger weaves his account of this journey together with primatology and boxing strategy, the role of women in resistance movements and apache renegrades, and the brutal reality of life on the Pennsylvania frontier. Written in exquisite, razor-sharp prose, the result is a powerful examination of the primary desire that defines us.
Edward W. Said discusses the importance and centrality of popular resistance in the framework of culture, history, and struggle. He reveals his thoughts on the war on terrorism and the invasion of Afghanistan. On the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, he lays out a compelling vision for a secular, democratic future in the Middle East. He proposes a radical solution that cuts through the current impasse with a promise of reconciliation and peace for both peoples. Prof. Said addresses the origins of Palestinian resistance and the collapse of the so-called peace process that has led to more and more Israeli colonies. He is unsparing in his criticism of Arafat and the PLO. He dissects the role of media propaganda and its golden rolodex of pseudo-experts in shaping public opinion. New introduction by David Barsamian.
Against a backdrop of increasing democracy and the associated
process of aristocratic decline, this book examines the political
influence of the leading Tory hostesses, the Marchionesses of
Londonderry. Over one hundred and fifty years, from 1800-1959,
these women were patrons and confidantes to key political figures
such as Disraeli, Bonar Law, Edward Carson and Ramsay MacDonald. By
the late 19th century upper-class women were at the height of their
prowess, exerting political sway by private means whilst exploiting
more public avenues of political work: canvassing, addressing
meetings and leading the new associations established in an attempt
to educate a mass electorate. At that time this hybrid of private
and public aristocratic politicking aroused little criticism but,
by the interwar period, the hold that the 7th Marchioness of
Londonderry, Edith Vane-Tempest-Stewart, allegedly had over
MacDonald prompted widespread criticism of her role as the 'Mother'
of the National Government.
The mechanisms that lead to the final selection of a president are complex. Some procedures are sketched out in the original Constitution and its amendments, and others in federal law, congressional rules and procedures, state laws, and political party rules. This new, expanded edition of After the People Vote—featuring new sections on public opinion on the Electoral College and proposals for amending the Electoral College system—explains how our system of electing a president works, especially the processes that kick in after the November general election date.
Book 3 in the New York Times bestselling series, now a TV series on Disney+! 'This book reminded me of some of the children's books I grew up with, like Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and The Phantom Tollbooth.' RICK RIORDAN, author of the PERCY JACKSON series on book 1 'Like the Potter books, this story goes beyond mere adventure' BOOKLIST on book 1 Reynie, Kate, Sticky and Constance are back - but so is Mr Curtain, with another devious scheme. Can the Mysterious Benedict Society thwart Mr Curtain's plans, even whilst held prisoner? Join them on their adventure as they face all sorts of dilemmas in a bid to save Stonetown ... Book 3 in the 4-book New York Times bestselling adventure series - ideal for children aged 10 and up The series has been adapted for TV on Disney+, streaming now Join a group of smart and resourceful junior sleuths as they solve a series of page-turning puzzles and mysteries Perfect for fans of Robin Stevens's MURDER MOST UNLADYLIKE series The adventure continues in book 4, THE MYSTERIOUS BENEDICT SOCIETY AND THE RIDDLE OF AGES
When and why do people obey political authority when it runs against their own interests to do so? This book is about the channels beyond direct repression through which China's authoritarian state controls protest and implements ambitious policies from sweeping urbanization schemes that have displaced millions to family planning initiatives like the one-child policy. Daniel C. Mattingly argues that China's remarkable state capacity is not simply a product of coercive institutions such as the secret police or the military. Instead, the state uses local civil society groups as hidden but effective tools of informal control to suppress dissent and implement far-reaching policies. Drawing on evidence from qualitative case studies, experiments, and national surveys, the book challenges the conventional wisdom that a robust civil society strengthens political responsiveness. Surprisingly, it is communities that lack strong civil society groups that find it easiest to act collectively and spontaneously resist the state.
Palestine: A Socialist Introduction systematically tackles a number of important aspects of the Palestinian struggle for liberation, contextualizing it in an increasingly polarized world and offering a socialist perspective on how full liberation can be won. Through an internationalist, anti-imperialist lens, this book explores the links between the struggle for freedom in the United States and that in Palestine, and beyond. It examines both the historical and contemporary trajectory of the Palestine solidarity movement in order to glean lessons for today’s organizers, and compellingly lays out the argument that, in order to achieve justice in Palestine, the movement has to take up the question of socialism regionally and internationally. Contributors include: Jehad Abusalim, Shireen Akram-Boshar, Omar Barghouti, Nada Elia, Toufic Haddad, Remi Kanazi, Annie Levin, Mostafa Omar, Khury Petersen-Smith, and Daphna Thier.
This book examines a series of questions associated with the increasing application and implications of biometrics in contemporary everyday life. In the wake of the events of 9/11, the reliance on increasingly sophisticated and invasive technologies across a burgeoning field of applications has accelerated, giving rise to the term 'biometric state'. This book explores how these 'virtual borders' are created and the effect they have upon the politics of citizenship and immigration, especially how they contribute to the treatment of citizens as suspects. Finally and most importantly, this text argues that the rationale of 'governing through risk' facilitates pre-emptory logics, a negligent attitude towards 'false positives', and an overall proliferation of borders and ubiquitous risk, which becomes integral to contemporary everyday life, far beyond the confined politics of national borders and frontiers. By focusing on specific sites, such as virtual borders in airports, trusted traveller programs like the NEXUS program and those delivered by airlines and supported by governmental authorities (TSA and CATSA respectively), this book raises critical questions about the emerging biometric state and its commitment and constitution vis-a-vis technology of 'governing through risk'. This book will be of interest to students of biopolitics, critical security, surveillance studies and International Relations in general. Benjamin J. Muller is assistant professor in International Relations at Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, Canada. He completed his PhD in the School of Politics and International Studies at Queen's University Belfast, Northern Ireland, in 2005."
As the world evolves in increasingly unpredictable directions, one of the key determinants of the future global order will surely be the impact of China. No country and no society can escape China's reach-indeed many seek its embrace. China brings benefits to many-but it's also a problematic interlocutor for others. In China and the World, one of the world's leading China specialists David Shambaugh has assembled fifteen leading international authorities on China to create the most comprehensive and up-to-date scholarly assessment of China's foreign relations and roles in international affairs. The volume covers China's contemporary position in all regions of the world, with all major powers, and across multiple arenas of China's international interactions. It also explores the sources of China's grand strategy, how the past shapes the present, and the impact of domestic factors that shape China's external behavior. China and the World is a uniquely focused and well-organized volume that provides many insights into China's calculations and behavior, and identifies a number of challenges China will face in the future.
Now in its fourth edition, After the People Vote remains an indispensable concise guide to help students and all citizens understand this critical and controversial American political institution. The mechanisms that lead to the final selection of a president are complex. Some procedures are sketched out in the original Constitution and its amendments, and others in federal law, congressional rules and procedures, state laws, and political party rules. This new, expanded edition of After the People Vote--featuring new sections on public opinion on the Electoral College and proposals for amending the Electoral College system--explains how our system of electing a president works, especially the processes that kick in after the November general election date.
An exploration of military responses to revolutions and how to predict such reactions in the future We know that a revolution's success largely depends on the army's response to it. But can we predict the military's reaction to an uprising? How Armies Respond to Revolutions and Why argues that it is possible to make a highly educated guess—and in some cases even a confident prediction—about the generals' response to a domestic revolt if we know enough about the army, the state it is supposed to serve, the society in which it exists, and the external environment that affects its actions. Through concise case studies of modern uprisings in Iran, China, Eastern Europe, Burma, and the Arab world, Zoltan Barany looks at the reasons for and the logic behind the variety of choices soldiers ultimately make. Barany offers tools—in the form of questions to be asked and answered—that enable analysts to provide the most informed assessment possible regarding an army's likely response to a revolution and, ultimately, the probable fate of the revolution itself. He examines such factors as the military's internal cohesion, the regime's treatment of its armed forces, and the size, composition, and nature of the demonstrations. How Armies Respond to Revolutions and Why explains how generals decide to support or suppress domestic uprisings.
Drawing data from multiple sources, Un argues that following the 1993 United Nations intervention to promote democracy, the Cambodian People's Party (CPP) perpetuated a patronage state weak in administrative capacity but strong in coercive capacity. This enabled them to maintain the presence of electoral authoritarianism, but increased political awareness among the public, the rise in political activism among community-based organizations and a united opposition led to the emergence of a counter-movement. Sensing that this counter-movement might be unstoppable, the CPP has returned Cambodia to authoritarianism, a move made possible in part by China's pivot to Cambodia.
An introductory guide to some of the most significant perspectives on the subject of power within social and political theory. Contains extracts from such leading contemporary thinkers as Giddens, Lukes and Bourdieu alongside recent conceptions of power from important twentieth century figures including Weber, Arendt and Foucault. Each chapter concentrates on an individual theoretical perspective, and contains a substantial article or extract with its own comprehensive introduction which places the work in context. An excellent point of departure for understanding more about social and political power. -- . |
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