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Books > Social sciences > Politics & government > International relations
The EU is at a crossroads. Should it choose the path towards protectionism or the path towards free trade? This book convincingly argues that lobbying regulation will be a decisive first step towards fulfilling the European dream of free trade, in accordance with the original purpose of the Treaty of Rome. Without the regulation of lobbyists to try and prevent undue political persuasion, there is a greater risk of abuse in the form of corruption, subsidies and trade barriers, which will come at the expense of consumers, tax payers and competitiveness. This interdisciplinary approach - both theoretical and methodological - offers a wealth of knowledge concerning the effect of lobbying on political decision-making and will appeal to academics across the social sciences, practitioners and policy-makers.
The year 2020 was a watershed event in the history of climate change politics. It marked the end of the second commitment period of the Kyoto Protocol and the beginning of the ambitious Paris Agreement. It was also the year of the pandemic, where the disruption caused severe implications on a global scale. The pandemic also brought before the world the severity and scale of the transboundary challenges in a globally interconnected world. It exposed the weaknesses of the global institutions and governance structures in tackling the complex and imminent threat of climate change.As states prepare for the future of global climate change negotiations post the COP26 event of 2021, there has been a significant shift in the politics of climate change at all levels. The negotiations took place in the shadows of the pandemic, which has challenged the political lethargy and non-committal attitudes of states on the climate change question.Unlike in the past, climate change is now a hot issue on the political high tables. It has also spilled outside these negotiating spaces and into the public sphere. Whether it is the school strikes led by children or the indigenous struggles of marginalized populations, the politics of climate change today is far more diverse, representative, and active. At the same time, we can witness the shifts in the state's understanding of the problem, which is actively inquiring about its security and geopolitical dimensions. The boundaries between traditional and non-traditional threats to security are getting blurred as climate change, and its myriad impacts wreak havoc on ecosystem resilience, the state's welfare capacity, and people's everyday lives.Hence, this volume seeks to decipher the nature of global climate change politics in the post-pandemic and climate insecure world. Who will be its main actors, main stakeholders, and losers? How will questions of equity, sustainability, and finance interplay at the COP26 event and thereafter? How will developing and poor countries engage with the issue in the next phase of climate politics? Finally, how will the ambition of the Paris Agreement, which is reflected in the language of net-zero targets and the two degrees Celsius temperature goals, be brought into action?
'For centuries, it was taken for granted that the West determined the rules of the global game. In the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries, it was the Europeans. In the 20th century, it was the Americans. Now we find ourselves at the dawn of an epochal, worldwide transformation. For the first time, the global center of power is shifting towards Asia.'Frank Sieren Future? China! is the first book that comprehensively examines the influence of a new superpower on all continents and aspects of life. The book explains how China is changing the western-dominated world order to a multi-polar world order - from the perspective of a European who has been living in China for almost three decades. The book argues that the times in which the West sets the standards are over. For the first time in centuries, an Asian country is assuming the position of being a world power. The Chinese are already questioning values that we consider to be universal.China, the new superpower, already contributes to well over 30 percent of the global economic growth. The author believes China is only at the beginning of its ascent. He explains how the Middle Kingdom is expanding its influence throughout the world: whether in the automobile industry, which China is revolutionizing thanks to electric mobility and autonomous driving; or in the field of digitalization and artificial intelligence, where China is on a level-pegging with the USA; whether in Africa, where China has long since been investing in mineral deposits, infrastructure but also in light industry and creating trillions of jobs; or on the scale of the new Silk Road, a one trillion-dollar project, which reaches up to Duisburg and for which China has won the support of numerous Eastern European states.
'For centuries, it was taken for granted that the West determined the rules of the global game. In the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries, it was the Europeans. In the 20th century, it was the Americans. Now we find ourselves at the dawn of an epochal, worldwide transformation. For the first time, the global center of power is shifting towards Asia.'Frank Sieren Future? China! is the first book that comprehensively examines the influence of a new superpower on all continents and aspects of life. The book explains how China is changing the western-dominated world order to a multi-polar world order - from the perspective of a European who has been living in China for almost three decades. The book argues that the times in which the West sets the standards are over. For the first time in centuries, an Asian country is assuming the position of being a world power. The Chinese are already questioning values that we consider to be universal.China, the new superpower, already contributes to well over 30 percent of the global economic growth. The author believes China is only at the beginning of its ascent. He explains how the Middle Kingdom is expanding its influence throughout the world: whether in the automobile industry, which China is revolutionizing thanks to electric mobility and autonomous driving; or in the field of digitalization and artificial intelligence, where China is on a level-pegging with the USA; whether in Africa, where China has long since been investing in mineral deposits, infrastructure but also in light industry and creating trillions of jobs; or on the scale of the new Silk Road, a one trillion-dollar project, which reaches up to Duisburg and for which China has won the support of numerous Eastern European states.
Elgar Research Agendas outline the future of research in a given area. Leading scholars are given the space to explore their subject in provocative ways, and map out the potential directions of travel. They are relevant but also visionary. This innovative Research Agenda draws together discussions on the conceptualization of territory and the ways in which territory and territorial practices are intimately bound with issues of power and control. Expert contributors provide a critical assessment of key areas of scholarship on territory and territoriality across a wide range of spatial scales and with examples drawn from the global landscape. After an introduction to shifting ideas of territory, territoriality and sovereignty, the book deals with territory in its more traditional macro-scale sense at the level of the nation-state before going on to explore questions of territory, identity and belonging at a more micro-scale focusing on issues of citizenship, inclusion and exclusion. A Research Agenda for Territory and Territoriality will be a key resource for scholars and students in geopolitics and social and cultural geography, whilst also being a thought-provoking read for those interested in nations and nationalism, sovereignty, conflict, citizenship, and territory, place and locality.
The last five years saw a significant return of epidemic infectious disease, culminating in COVID-19. In our new post-COVID-19 world, how do we prevent future illnesses by expanding scientific and vaccine diplomacy and cooperation, especially to combat the problems that humans have brought on ourselves? Modern diseases and viruses have been spurred anew by war and conflict as well as shifting poverty, urbanization, climate change, and a new troubling anti-science/anti-vaccination outlook. From such twenty-first-century forces, we have seen declines in previous global health gains, with sharp increases in vaccine-preventable and neglected diseases on the Arabian Peninsula, in Venezuela, in parts of Africa, and even on the Gulf Coast of the United States. In Preventing the Next Pandemic, international vaccine scientist and tropical disease and coronavirus expert Peter J. Hotez, MD, PhD, argues that we can-and must-rely on vaccine diplomacy to address this new world order in disease and global health. Detailing his years in the lab developing new vaccines, Hotez also recounts his travels around the world to shape vaccine partnerships with people in countries both rich and poor in an attempt to head off major health problems. Building on the legacy of Dr. Albert Sabin, who developed the oral polio vaccine with Soviet scientists at the height of the Cold War, he explains how he is still working to refresh and redirect vaccine diplomacy toward neglected and newly emerging diseases. Hotez reveals how-during his Obama-era tenure as the US Science Envoy for the Middle East and North Africa, which coincided with both the rise in these geopolitical forces and climate change-he witnessed tropical infectious diseases and established vaccine partnerships that may still combat them up close. He explores why, since 2015, we've seen the decline of global cooperation and cohesion, to the detriment of those programs that are meant to benefit the most vulnerable people in the world. Unfortunately, Hotez asserts, these negative global events kick off a never-ending loop. Problems in a country may lead to disease outbreaks, but those outbreaks can lead to further problems-such as the impact of coronavirus on China's society and economy, which has been felt around the globe. Zeroing in on the sociopolitical and environmental factors that drive our most controversial and pressing global health concerns, Hotez proposes historically proven methods to soothe fraught international relations while preparing us for a safer, healthier future. He hammers home the importance of public engagement to communicate the urgency of embracing science during troubled times. Touching on a range of disease, from leishmaniasis, schistosomiasis, and Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) to COVID-19, Preventing the Next Pandemic has always been a timely goal, but it will be even more important in a COVID and post-COVID world.
This book provides a unique examination of how a middle power uses international organisations to achieve greater global influence. The authors focus on the OECD, 'the rich man's club' of most of the world's wealthiest nations. It demonstrates how the decision by Australia to apply for membership was a long drawn out process, delayed by political factors. Eventually agreement was reached with assurances that membership would provide access to valuable and timely policy-related information, especially in relation to international trade and finance. In addition, membership would potentially increase influence by providing greater access to its powerful member states at an earlier stage in their policy discussions and agreements. On gaining membership, Australia found that the OECD's comparative research and policy development activities, across a wide range of areas and issues, were a valuable source for policy learning which, in turn, helped the ongoing maintenance and further building of policy capacity in the country. This detailed study of how a nation state engages with an international organisation will be a great source of insight and information for scholars and advanced students of international relations and public policy. It will also be a valuable resource for policymakers and practitioners working in the field.
This book presents a comprehensive overview of China's main foreign and defense policies, providing students, policy makers, and general readers with an up-to-date assessment of this most important country. Global Security Watch-China presents a comprehensive overview of the main foreign and defense policies of the People's Republic of China, emphasizing the political-military developments in the modern era since the 1989 Tiananmen Square incident. It provides a historical overview in the first chapter, followed by information on the domestic factors that affect Chinese national security, such as economics, society, and politics; China's external objectives; its global energy strategy; and its defense policies and security objectives. Drawing upon a wide variety of domestic and foreign primary sources, the work details China's policies and its relationships with the United States, Europe, the Middle East, Latin America, Asia, and Eurasia. It includes biographical sketches of select individuals of importance to modern Chinese history, such as Mao Zedong and Deng Xiaoping. Appropriate for audiences ranging from university students to policy makers to general readers, this book is an excellent resource for academic libraries and suitable as a textbook for courses on contemporary Chinese politics and international relations. A chronology of events A collection of key documents An annotated bibliography of recommended current sources
New from the No.1 Sunday Times bestselling author of Prisoners of Geography; We feel more divided than ever.; This riveting analysis tells you why.; Walls are going up. Nationalism and identity politics are on the rise once more. Thousands of miles of fences and barriers have been erected in the past ten years, and they are redefining our political landscape. ; There are many reasons why we erect walls, because we are divided in many ways: wealth, race, religion, politics. In Europe the ruptures of the past decade threaten not only European unity, but in some countries liberal democracy itself. In China, the Party's need to contain the divisions wrought by capitalism will define the nation's future. In the USA the rationale for the Mexican border wall taps into the fear that the USA will no longer be a white majority country in the course of this century.; Understanding what has divided us, past and present, is essential to understanding much of what's going on in the world today. Covering China; the USA; Israel and Palestine; the Middle East; the Indian Subcontinent; Africa; Europe and the UK, bestselling author Tim Marshall presents a gripping and unflinching analysis of the fault lines that will shape our world for years to come.
Increasingly, EU market regulation measures have been introduced in the pursuit of economic justice and welfare. This book illustrates how regulation can help to prevent the abuse of dominance, in particular the abuse of public capital by the state. Comprehensive and interdisciplinary, this book presents the theory of regulation in a highly accessible manner. It explains that whilst the state's ability to make major investments, compete with the private sector and target subsidies may be necessary in supporting infrastructure, the wasteful allocation of public monies can also do immense harm by crowding out private investments, distorting private incentives, and helping to foreclose markets. Against this background, Christian Koenig and Bernhard Von Wendland discuss the strengths and weaknesses of EU regulation in the area of competition in the Internal Market, considering both private and public economic activities and market interventions and providing further analysis in light of global competitive pressures. Contemporary and practical, this book will appeal to academics, students and practitioners interested in regulation both in and outside of the EU. Decision-makers, lawmakers and politicians will also benefit from its strong focus on better law making and regulation in order to promote social welfare.
An eye-opening account of the perils of America's techno-spy empire Ever since the earliest days of the Cold War, American intelligence agencies have launched spies in the sky, implanted spies in the ether, burrowed spies underground, sunk spies in the ocean, and even tried to control spies' minds by chemical means. But these weren't human spies. Instead, the United States expanded its reach around the globe through techno-spies. Nothing Is Beyond Our Reach investigates how America's technophiles inadvertently created a global espionage empire: one based on technology, not land. Author Kristie Macrakis shows how in the process of staking out the globe through technology, US intelligence created the ability to collect a massive amount of data. But did it help? Featuring the sites visited during her research and stories of the people who created the techno-spy empire, Macrakis guides the reader from its conception in the 1950s to its global reach in the Cold War and Global War on Terror. In an age of ubiquitous technology, Nothing Is Beyond Our Reach exposes the perils of relying too much on technology while demonstrating how the US carried on the tradition of British imperial espionage. Readers interested in the history of espionage and technology as well as those who work in the intelligence field will find the revelations and insights in Nothing Is Beyond Our Reach fascinating and compelling.
Addressing the contentious debate surrounding the future of the European Atomic Energy Community Treaty (Euratom), Anna Soedersten offers one of the first examinations of Euratom from an institutional and structural perspective, and in doing so, investigates the legal implications of its continued separate existence. Using primary material as key sources for analysis, as well as examining all of the treaty?'s titles, this book explores the relationship between Euratom and two other core EU treaties, the Treaty on European Union (TEU) and the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU). In considering whether it is still relevant that one of the EU?'s founding treaties is the promotion of nuclear energy, Soedersten concludes that there is no need for the Euratom as a separate treaty. Euratom at the Crossroads will be essential reading for scholars in the fields of EU institutional law and EU energy law. EU officials and practitioners in the field of energy law, at national legislatures and regulator authorities, will find this indispensable reading.
Investigating 20th century Chinese ideology through the two main elements of passionate belief and cultivation of rage, this timely book examines how Maoist thinking has influenced Western politics. Tracing the origins of Maoist ideas in Western politics, David Martin Jones and M.L.R. Smith expertly apply the principles of strategic theory to provide an understanding of how Mao's ideas made their way from China into Western societies where they exert a profound and little understood impact on contemporary political conduct. The book offers critical insights into key theoretical discourses and their practical applications, including: Maoism, Orientalism and post-colonial discourse theory, Maoism and the mind, and Maoism and the politics of passion. Forward-thinking in its approach, it addresses the important question of where Maoism will end, analysing the trajectory that Maoism is likely to take and what the cumulative impact of it upon Western societies may be. This invigorating read will be a fascinating resource for scholars of political theory and history wishing to gain an insight into the impact of Maoist ideas in the West. It will also provide students of international politics and international studies with a much greater understanding of China's revolutionary thinking in world politics. 'This insightful volume exposes the influence of Maoism on left wing intellectuals in the West. Jones and Smith reveal how not just Mao's thought but the anti-democratic and often inhumane practices that came to be associated with China's Cultural Revolution are today being rehabilitated in woke form. This superb book is a must-read for anyone wanting to understand what lies behind today's dominant political trends.' - Joanna Williams, Founder and Director of Cieo, UK
After 20 years of freedom in South Africa we have to ask ourselves difficult questions: are we willing to perpetuate a lie, search for facts or think wishfully? Freedom has been enabled by apartheid's end, but at the same time some of apartheid's key institutions and social relations are reproduced under the guise of 'democracy'. This collection of essays acknowledges the enormous expectations placed on the shoulders of the South African revolution to produce an alternative political regime in response to apartheid and global neo-liberalism. It does not lament the inability of South Africa's democracy to provide deeper freedoms, or suggest that since it hasn't this is some form of betrayal. Freedom is made possible and/or limited by local political choices, contemporary global conditions and the complexities of social change. This book explores the multiplicity of spaces within which the dynamics of social change unfold, and the complex ways in which power is produced and reproduced. In this way, it seeks to understand the often non-linear practices through which alternative possibilities emerge, the lengthy and often indirect ways in which new communities are imagined and new solidarities are built. In this sense, this book is not a collection of hope or despair. Nor is it a book that seeks to situate itself between these two poles. Instead it aims to read the present historically, critically and politically, and to offer insights into the ongoing, iterative and often messy struggles for freedom.
The Franklin Book Programs (FBP) was a private not-for-profit U.S. organization founded in 1952 during the Cold War and was subsidized by the United States' government agencies as well as private corporations. The FBP was initially intended to promote U.S. liberal values, combat Soviet influence and to create appropriate markets for U.S. books in 'Third World' of which the Middle East was an important part, but evolved into an international educational program publishing university textbooks, schoolbooks, and supplementary readings. In Iran, working closely with the Pahlavi regime, its activities included the development of printing, publishing, book distribution, and bookselling institutions. This book uses archival sources from the FBP, US intelligence agencies and in Iran, to piece together this relationship. Put in the context of wider cultural diplomacy projects operated by the US, it reveals the extent to which the programme shaped Iran's educational system. Together the history of the FBP, its complex network of state and private sector, the role of U.S. librarians, publishers, and academics, and the joint projects the FBP organized in several countries with the help of national ministries of education, financed by U.S. Department of State and U.S. foundations, sheds new light on the long history of education in imperialist social orders, in the context here of the ongoing struggle for influence in the Cold War.
Russia's brutal February 2022 invasion of Ukraine has attracted widespread condemnation across the West. Government and media circles present the conflict as a simple dichotomy between an evil empire and an innocent victim. In this concise, accessible and highly informative primer, Medea Benjamin and Nicolas Davies insist the picture is more complicated. Yes, Russia's aggression was reckless and, ultimately, indefensible. But the West's reneging on promises to halt eastward expansion of NATO in the wake of the collapse of the Soviet Union played a major part in prompting Putin to act. So did the U.S. involvement in the 2014 Ukraine coup and Ukraine's failure to implement the Minsk peace agreements. The result is a conflict that is increasingly difficult to resolve, one that could conceivably escalate into all-out war between the United States and Russia-the world's two leading nuclear powers. Skillfully bringing together the historical record and current analysis, War In Ukraine looks at the events leading up to the conflict, surveys the different parties involved, and weighs the risks of escalation and opportunities for peace. For anyone who wants to get beneath the heavily propagandized media coverage to an understanding of a war with consequences that could prove cataclysmic, reading this timely book will be an urgent necessity.
This handbook presents a comprehensive, concise and accessible overview of the field of Historical International Relations (HIR). It summarizes and synthesizes existing contributions to the field while presenting central themes, approaches and methodologies that have driven the development of HIR, providing the reader with a sense of the diversity and research dynamics that are at the heart of this field of study. The wide range of topics covered are grouped under the following headings: Traditions: Demonstrates the wide variety of approaches to HIR. Thinking International Relations Historically: Different ways of thinking IR historically share some common concerns and areas for further investigation. Actors, Processes and Institutions: Explores the processes, actors, practices, and institutions that constitute the core objects of study of many HIR scholars. Situating Historical International Relations: Critically reflects about the situatedness of our objects of study. Approaches: Examines how HIR scholars conduct and reflect about their research, often in dialogue with a variety of perspectives from cognate disciplines. Summarizing key contributions and trends while also sketching out challenges for future inquiry, this is an invaluable resource for students, academics and researchers from a range of disciplines, particularly International Relations, global history, political science, history, sociology, anthropology, peace studies, diplomatic studies, security studies, international political thought, political geography, international law.
Benazir Bhutto returned to Pakistan in October 2007, after eight years of exile, hopeful that she could be a catalyst for change. Upon a tumultuous reception, she survived a suicide-bomb attack that killed nearly two hundred of her compatriots. But she continued to forge ahead, with more courage and conviction than ever, since she knew that time was running out--for the future of her nation and for her life. In Reconciliation, Bhutto recounts in gripping detail her final months in Pakistan and offers a bold new agenda for how to stem the tide of Islamic radicalism and to rediscover the values of tolerance and justice that lie at the heart of her religion. She speaks out not just to the West but also to the Muslims across the globe. Bhutto presents an image of modern Islam that defies the negative caricatures often seen in the West. After reading this book, it will become even clearer what the world has lost by her assassination. |
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