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Books > Social sciences > Politics & government > Political activism > General
You may not realise it, but you are probably already practicing anarchism in your daily life. From relationships to school, work, art, even the way you organise your time, anarchism can help you find fulfilment, empathy and liberation in the everyday. From the small questions such as 'Why should I steal?' to the big ones like 'how do I love?', Scott Branson shows that anarchism isn't only something we do when we react to the news, protest or even riot. With practical examples enriched by history and theory, these tips will empower you to break free from the consumerist trappings of our world. Anarchism is not just for white men, but for everyone. In reading this book, you can detach from patriarchal masculinity, norms of family, gender, sexuality, racialisation, individual responsibility and the destruction of our planet, and replace them with ideas of sustainable living, with ties of mutual aid, and the horizon of collective liberation.
The election of Barack Obama in 2008 was startling, as was the victory of Donald Trump eight years later. Because both presidents were unusual and gained office backed by Congresses controlled by their own parties, their elections kick-started massive counter-movements. The Tea Party starting in 2009 and the "resistance" after November 2016 transformed America's political landscape. Upending American Politics offers a fresh perspective on recent upheavals, tracking the emergence and spread of local voluntary citizens' groups, the ongoing activities of elite advocacy organizations and consortia of wealthy donors, and the impact of popular and elite efforts on the two major political parties and candidate-led political campaigns. Going well beyond national surveys, Theda Skocpol, Caroline Tervo, and their contributors use organizational documents, interviews, and local visits to probe changing organizational configurations at the national level and in swing states. This volume analyzes conservative politics in the first section and progressive responses in the second to provide a clear overview of US politics as a whole. By highlighting evidence from the state level, it also reveals the important interplay of local and national trends.
First published in 2004. Marcus Garvey founded the Universal Negro Improvement Association in 1914. He was one of the first black leaders to encourage black people to discover their cultural traditions and history, and to seek common cause in the struggle for true liberty and political recognition. This book discusses his philosophy and opinions.This series comprises reprints as well as original works covering various aspects of African life- history, institutions, culture, political and social thought, and eminent African personalities. The reprints for the most part are landmarks in African writing and each contains a new introduction placing the author's life, ideas and activities in perspective. The documents are selected and edited by scholars working in the particular field. It is hoped that these documents will not only provide scholars with source materials but also stimulate further research on the topics with which they deal.
View the Table of Contents Read the author's Op Ed on "Boston Globe" "Itas an achievement of Blood and Belief that despite the
bloodletting, Marcus still generates empathyanot for the murderous
Ocalan, but for the desperate Kurds who joined the PKK revolution
feeling they had nowhere else to turn." "Blood and Belief gives meaning and context to the grinding
guerrilla war that claimed tens of thousands of livesa]" a"Blood and Belief" offers unusual insight into the rebels'
shadowy universe and, by extension, into Turkey's festering Kurdish
problem. . . . [A] scholarly, gripping account.a aMarcus has unequalled knowledge of the PKK and her book will be
essential reading for all who are interested in the topic. Blood
and Belief comes out at an important moment when fate of the Kurds
is becoming more and more important to the future of the Middle
East.a aAliza Marcus has written the kind of book that only a
journalist who has covered conflict on the ground could write. She
has brought her superb eye for detail and her deep knowledge of
history of the region to the task of understanding the violent and
painful journey of the Kurds. Blood and Belief is necessary reading
for anyone who seeks to understand all of the moving parts of the
Middle East today.a aMarcus carefully chronicles the scarcely believable saga of
long repressed, but resurgent Kurdish identity inTurkey and the
ongoing quarter century revolt of the PKK inspired by Abdullah
Ocalan, one of the Third World's more paranoid contemporary
nationalist fountainheads. This is the astounding tale of a
ruthless hard scrabble beneficiary of the Turkish Republicas
liberal education system who mounted the twentieth centuryas
longest challenge to Ankaraas authority and sent tens of thousands
of Kurds -- and Turks -- to their deaths from the safety of a
foreign sanctuary. Marcus dissects fatal Kurdish and Turkish
stubbornness which helped perpetuate this sputtering revolt despite
Ocalanas manifest errors, his craven repudiation of the PKK
objectives once in Turkish captivity and mass desertions by true
believers disillusioned by his transparent efforts to save his
neck.a "This is a very good, original work that will add greatly to our
understanding of the Kurdish national movement and Kurdish
politics. It is an important contribution to an understanding of
contemporary Kurdish history and of the Kurdish question in
general. I know of no book like it." The Kurds, who number some 28 million people in the Middle East, have no country they can call their own. Long ignored by the West, Kurds are now highly visible actors on the world's political stage. More than half live in Turkey, where the Kurdish struggle has gained new strength and attention since the U.S. overthrow of Saddam Hussein in neighboring Iraq. Essential to understanding modern-day Kurds--and their continuing demands for an independent state--is understanding the PKK, the Kurdistan Workersa Party. Aguerilla force that was founded in 1978 by a small group of ex-Turkish university students, the PKK radicalized the Kurdish national movement in Turkey, becoming a tightly organized, well-armed fighting force of some 15,000, with a 50,000-member civilian militia in Turkey and tens of thousands of active backers in Europe. Under the leadership of Abdullah Ocalan, the war the PKK waged in Turkey through 1999 left nearly 40,000 people dead and drew in the neighboring states of Iran, Iraq, and Syria, all of whom sought to use the PKK for their own purposes. Since 2004, emboldened by the Iraqi Kurds, who now have established an autonomous Kurdish state in the northernmost reaches of Iraq, the PKK has again turned to violence to meet its objectives. Blood and Belief combines reportage and scholarship to give the first in-depth account of the PKK. Aliza Marcus, one of the first Western reporters to meet with PKK rebels, wrote about their war for many years for a variety of prominent publications before being put on trial in Turkey for her reporting. Based on her interviews with PKK rebels and their supporters and opponents throughout the world--including the Palestinians who trained them, the intelligence services that tracked them, and the dissidents who tried to break them up--Marcus provides an in-depth account of this influential radical group.
In the global race to reach the end of AIDS, why is the world slipping off track? The answer has to do with stigma, money, and data. Global funding for AIDS response is declining. Tough choices must be made: some people will win and some will lose. Global aid agencies and governments use health data to make these choices. While aid agencies prioritize a shrinking list of countries, many governments deny that sex workers, men who have sex with men, drug users, and transgender people exist. Since no data is gathered about their needs, life-saving services are not funded, and the lack of data reinforces the denial. The Uncounted cracks open this and other data paradoxes through interviews with global health leaders and activists, ethnographic research, analysis of gaps in mathematical models, and the author's experience as an activist and senior official. It shows what is counted, what is not, and why empowering communities to gather their own data could be key to ending AIDS.
For a revolutionary generation of Irishmen and Irishwomen - including suffragettes, labour activists, and nationalists - imprisonment became a common experience. In the years 1912-1921, thousands were arrested and held in civil prisons or in internment camps in Ireland and Britain. The state's intent was to repress dissent, but instead, the prisons and camps became a focus of radical challenge to the legitimacy and durability of the state. Some of these prisons and prisoners are famous: Terence MacSwiney and Thomas Ashe occupy a central position in the prison martyrology of Irish republican culture, and Kilmainham Gaol has become one of the most popular tourist sites in Dublin. In spite of this, a comprehensive history of political imprisonment focused on these years does not exist. In Imprisonment and the Irish, 1912-1921, William Murphy attempts to provide such a history. He seeks to detail what it was like to be a political prisoner; how it smelled, tasted, and felt. More than that, the volume demonstrates that understanding political imprisonment of this period is one of the keys to understanding the Irish revolution. Murphy argues that the politics of imprisonment and the prison conflicts analysed here reflected and affected the rhythms of the revolution. In doing so, he not only reconstructs and assesses the various experiences and actions of the prisoners, but those of their families, communities, and political movements, as well as the attitudes and reactions of the state and those charged with managing the prisoners.
Palestinian Activism in Israel closely describes Amal El' Sana-Alh'jooj's experiences as a Palestinian Bedouin female activist living in Israel's southern al-Naqab desert. While the "empowering" and organizational aspects of women's activisms in the Middle East have been well canvassed, few works detail the professional and personal practices of charismatic activists leading rights-based initiatives. In response to this gap, this book explores Amal's activisms and how she navigates her identities in sociopolitical relationships with Palestinian, Israeli Jewish, al-Naqab Bedouin, and international representatives. The authors argue that by focusing on activists' biographies we can further understand the pluralisms, strategies of identification, and dialectics of recognition typifying contemporary third sector politics in the Middle East.
On December 2-3, 1984, India witnessed arguably the world's worst industrial disaster in Bhopal, Madhya Pradesh, which continues to this day as an economic, medical, environmental, and political disaster. "Surviving Bhopal" draws on oral testimonials of the affected community and analyzes the cause and aftermath of the disaster from the perspective of those who suffered the severe consequences of systemic failure and travesty of justice. The event resulted in a resistance movement, led by women, against corporate and state power. Mukherjee explores the underlying gender politics, showing how activism challenged and redefined the contemporary model of development.
This book examines how Martin Luther King's life and work had a profound, if unpredictable, impact on the course of the United States since the civil rights era. A global icon of freedom, justice, and equality, King is recognized worldwide as a beacon in the struggles of peoples seeking to eradicate oppression, entrenched poverty, social deprivation, as well as political and economic disfranchisement. While Dr. King's work and ideas have gained broad traction, some powerful people misappropriate the symbol of King, skewing his legacy. With unique, multidisciplinary works by scholars from around the country, this anthology focuses on contemporary socialpolicies and issues in America. Collectively, these pieces explore wide-ranging issues and contemporary social developments through the lens of Dr. King's perceptions, analysis, and prescriptions. Essayists bring a multidisciplinary and interdisciplinary approach to social policies and current issues in light of his ideals. They strive to glean new approaches and solutions that comport with Dr. King's vision. Organized into three sections, the book focuses on selected issues in contemporary domestic politics and policy, foreign policy and foreign affairs, and social developments that impinge upon African Americans and Americans in general. Essays shed light on Dr. King's perspective related to crime and justice, the right to vote, the hip hop movement, American foreign policy in the Middle East and Africa, healthcare, and other pressing issues. This book infers what Dr. King's response and actions might be on important and problematic contemporary policy and social issues that have arisen in the post-civil rights era. With contributions by: Rosa M. Banda, Michael L. Clemons, Lakeyta M. Bonnette-Bailey, Donathan L. Brown, Hannah Firdyiwek, Alonzo M. Flowers III, Helen Taylor Greene, William G. Jones, Athena M. King, Taj'ullah Sky Lark, Jamela M. Martin, Marcus L. Martin, Byron D'Andra Orey, Amardo Rodriguez, Audrey E. Snyder, James L. Taylor, Leslie U. Walker, and Jason M. Williams.
Social movement studies have grown enormously in the last few decades, spreading from sociology and political science to other fields of knowledge, as varied as geography, history, anthropology, psychology, economics, law and others. With the growing interest in the field, there has been also an increasing need for methodological guidance for empirical research. This volume addresses this need by introducing the main methods of data collection and data analysis as they have been used in past research on social movements. Unlike other volumes, the book offers a practical, how-to approach and not simply a review of the methodological literature. Each author writes on a method they are very familiar with, having used it extensively in their own work. And each chapter presents specific discussions on every stage of research: from research design to data collection and the use of the information gathered. Throughout, research dilemmas and choices are presented, illustrated, and discussed. The volume offers an essential point of references for anyone undertaking research on social movements.
In this groundbreaking new study on ladinas in Guatemala City, Patricia Harms contests the virtual erasure of women from the country's national memory and its historical consciousness. Harms focuses on Spanish-speaking women during the "revolutionary decade" and the "liberalism" periods, revealing a complex, significant, and palpable feminist movement that emerged in Guatemala during the 1870s and remained until 1954. During this era ladina social activists not only struggled to imagine a place for themselves within the political and social constructs of modern Guatemala, but they also wrestled with ways in which to critique and identify Guatemala's gendered structures within the context of repressive dictatorial political regimes and entrenched patriarchy. Harms's study of these women and their struggles fills a sizeable gap in the growing body of literature on women's suffrage, social movements, and political culture in modern Latin America. It is a valuable addition to students and scholars studying the rich history of the region.
Why has the Chinese government sometimes allowed and sometimes repressed nationalist, anti-foreign protests? What have been the international consequences of these choices? Anti-American demonstrations were permitted in 1999 but repressed in 2001 during two crises in US-China relations. Anti-Japanese protests were tolerated in 1985, 2005, and 2012 but banned in 1990 and 1996. Protests over Taiwan, the issue of greatest concern to Chinese nationalists, have never been allowed. To explain this variation in China's response to nationalist mobilization, Powerful Patriots argues that Chinese and other authoritarian leaders weigh both diplomatic and domestic incentives to allow and repress nationalist protests. Autocrats may not face electoral constraints, but anti-foreign protests provide an alternative mechanism by which authoritarian leaders can reveal their vulnerability to public pressure. Because nationalist protests are costly to repress and may turn against the government, allowing protests demonstrates resolve and increases the domestic cost of diplomatic concessions. Repressing protests, by contrast, sends a credible signal of reassurance, facilitating diplomatic flexibility and signaling a willingness to spend domestic political capital for the sake of international cooperation. To illustrate the logic, the book traces the effect of domestic and diplomatic factors in China's management of nationalist protest in the post-Mao era (1978-2012) and the consequences for China's foreign relations.
This book is the first attempt to rethink and appraise the role of temporary commoning experiences that develop in contexts of crisis. Activist and urban planner, Angelos Varvarousis, argues that there is a certain type of commons - the liminal commons - which despite their often short lives play a crucial function in contemporary societies; they demarcate and facilitate transitions at the individual, collective and ultimately the societal level. Through an intense exploration of grassroots projects such as occupied squares, self-organised refugee camps, solidarity food structures and social clinics in crisis-ridden Greece, the author observes that humans still invent such collectively performed rituals in order to prepare, symbolize and practically explore the possibility of transformation and transition. In a period in which traditional rites of passage have faded away but many changes are urgently needed, liminal commons can be a key element in the process of claiming awareness and control over the mechanisms of individual, collective and societal emancipation.
Powerful and enlightening. How to Overthrow the Government is an impassioned call to arms from one of America's sharpest and most independent commentators. In its pages Huffington breaks away from the party-line platitudes of Republicans and Democrats alike while challenging Amerians to rise up and take back their government. From the power of special interests to the ravages of the war on drugs, Huffington offers radical yet viable strategies for reclaiming our nation from the corporate and political powers that hold it hostage. For, as she argues, if We the People are to preserve and protect our more perfect union, we must stand up and fight for our country -- before it's too late.
'Ground-breaking and ambitious' - Nick Srnicek, author of Platform Capitalism Whoever controls the platforms, controls the future. Platform Socialism sets out an alternative vision and concrete proposals for a digital economy that expands our freedom. Powerful tech companies now own the digital infrastructure of twenty-first century social life. Masquerading as global community builders, these companies have developed sophisticated new techniques for extracting wealth from their users. James Muldoon shows how grassroots communities and transnational social movements can take back control from Big Tech. He reframes the technology debate and proposes a host of new ideas, from the local to the international, for how we can reclaim the emancipatory possibilities of digital platforms. Drawing on sources from forgotten histories to contemporary prototypes, he proposes an alternative system and charts a roadmap for how we can get there.
Behind the walls of a church, Liliana and her baby eat, sleep, and wait. Outside, protestors shout ''Go back to Mexico!'' and ''Tax this political church!'' They demand that the U.S. government deport Liliana, which would separate her from her husband and children. Is Liliana a criminal or a hero? And why does the church protect her? Grace Yukich draws on extensive field observation and interviews to reveal how immigration is changing religious activism in the U.S. In the face of nationwide immigration raids and public hostility toward ''illegal'' immigration, the New Sanctuary Movement emerged in 2007 as a religious force seeking to humanize the image of undocumented immigrants like Liliana. Building coalitions between religious and ethnic groups that had rarely worked together in the past, activists revived and adapted ''sanctuary,'' the tradition of providing shelter for fugitives in houses of worship. Through sanctuary, they called on Americans to support legislation that would keep immigrant families together. But they sought more than political change: they also pursued religious transformation, challenging the religious nationalism in America's faith communities by portraying undocumented immigrants as fellow children of God. Yukich shows progressive religious activists struggling with the competing goals of newly diverse coalitions, fighting to expand the meaning of ''family values'' in a globalizing nation. Through these struggles, the activists both challenged the public dominance of the religious right and created conflicts that could doom their chances of impacting immigration reform.
In a time of great gloom and doom internationally and of major global problems, this book offers an invaluable contribution to our understanding of alternative societies that could be better for humans and the environment. Bringing together a wide range of approaches and new strands of economic and social thinking from across the US, Mexico, Latin America, Europe, Asia, Middle East and Africa, Luke Martell critically assesses contemporary alternatives and shows the ways forward with a convincing argument of pluralist socialism. Presenting a much-needed introduction to the debate on alternatives to capitalism, this ambitious book is not about how things are, but how they can be! |
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