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Books > Social sciences > Politics & government > Political activism
The book series Rethinking Community Development offers a critical re-evaluation of community development in theory and practice, based on recognition of its dialectical and malleable potential. The first book in the series is entitled Politics, Power and Community Development. As such it highlights and critically examines key political issues, and the associated power relationships, that are shaping contemporary community development. In this edited collection, writers from diverse settings draw upon policy and practice issues from their own contexts to elaborate concepts, theories and critical questions that are more widely relevant.
Terrorism and terrorists have become a much talked about topic. Terrorism is often seen as a Middle Eastern problem and terrorists are often perceived as only having a Muslim background. It may surprise many to learn that Americans are and have been terrorists since the birth of the nation. This book investigates and discusses many instances in which Americans were themselves the terrorists and the victims.
What does our future hold? Will the ANC split within the next five years? Could the DA rule the country in 2024? Will the EFF form an alliance with the ANC? What should we do to make our economy grow at levels that will impact on poverty and inequality? Will we become a more tolerant or a more violent society? In Fate of the Nation scenario expert Jakkie Cilliers answers all these and many other questions. He has developed three detailed scenarios for our immediate future and beyond – Bafana Bafana, Nation Divided and Mandela Magic. According to Cilliers the ANC is in many ways paralysed by the power struggle between what he calls the Traditionalists (supporters of Jacob Zuma) and the Reformers (led by Cyril Ramaphosa and others). This power struggle leads to policy confusion, poor leadership and general ineptitude in the civil service. Key to which scenario will become our reality is who will be elected to the ANC’s top leadership at their national conference in December 2017. Whichever group wins will determine what our future holds. We could also see a compromise grouping being selected, Cilliers says, in which case the Bafana Bafana scenario – where we simply muddle along as a country – is the strongest possibility. A book for all concerned South Africans.
This book focuses on a key period in Latin American history, the transition from colonial status, via the revolutions for independence, to national organization. The essays provide in-depth studies of eighteenth-century society, the colonial state, and the roots of independence in Spanish America. The relation of Spanish America to the age of democratic revolution and the reaction of the Church to revolutionary change are newly defined, and leadership of Simon Bolivar is subject to particular scrutiny. National organization saw the emergence of new political leaders, the caudillos, and the marginalization of many people who sought relief in popular religion and millenarian movements.
A SPECTATOR and PROSPECT Book of the Year 'Ceaselessly interesting, knowledgeable and evocative' Spectator 'A fresh way to write history' Alan Johnson 'A quirky, amused, erudite homage to France . . . ambitious and original' The Times _____ France: An Adventure History is a profoundly original and endlessly entertaining history of France, from the first century BC to the present day, based on countless new discoveries and thirty years of exploring France on foot, by bicycle and in the library. Beginning with the Roman army's first recorded encounter with the Gauls and ending with the Gilets Jaunes protests in the era of Emmanuel Macron, each chapter is an adventure in its own right. Along the way, readers will find the usual faces, events and themes of French history - Louis XIV, the French Revolution, the French Resistance, the Tour de France - but all presented in a shining new light. Graham Robb does not offer a standard dry list of facts and dates, but instead a panorama of France, teeming with characters, full of stories, journeys and coincidences, giving readers a thrilling sense of discovery and enlightenment. France: An Adventure History is a vivid, living history of one of the world's most fascinating nations by a ceaselessly entertaining writer in complete command of subject and style. _____ 'A rich and vibrant narrative . . . clear-eyed but imaginative storytelling' Financial Times 'Full of life' Prospect
Questions of the extent to which social movements are capable of deepening democracy in India lie at the heart of this book. In particular, the authors ask how such movements can enhance the political capacities of subaltern groups and thereby enable them to contest and challenge marginality, stigma, and exploitation. The work addresses these questions through detailed empirical analyses of contemporary fields of protest in Indian society - ranging from gender and caste to class and rights-based legislation. Drawing on the original research of a variety of emerging and established international scholars, the volume contributes to an engaged dialogue on the prospects for democratizing Indian democracy in a context where neoliberal reforms fuel a contradictory process of uneven development.
With intensified threats to global security from international terrorism worldwide, education systems themselves face these same unprecedented security threats. Schools and universities have become marked loci of interest for the monitoring of extremism and counter-terrorism by security and intelligence agencies. The relationship between education systems and national security is nothing new though - it extends in surprising and unexpected ways into territory which is by turns open and covert, even secret. Acknowledging the genuine political and security concerns which have drawn educational systems ever closer to the intelligence community, this book shows how and why this has happened, and explains why the relationship between education and the security and intelligence communities extends beyond contemporary concerns with counter-terrorism. As the title of this book demonstrates, this is as much an intellectual challenge as a security struggle. Education, Security and Intelligence Studies thus critically engages with multi-disciplinary perspectives on a complex and contentious interface: between systems of often secret and covert national security and intelligence and open systems of national education. Delving into difficult to access and often closely guarded aspects of public life, the book provides the pathfinding groundwork and theoretical modelling for research into a complex of little explored institutional and epistemological interconnectedness between universities and the security and intelligence agencies. This book was originally published as a special issue of the British Journal of Educational Studies.
This is the first book to examine and compare how rebels govern civilians during civil wars in Latin America, Africa, Asia, and Europe. Drawing from a variety of disciplinary traditions, including political science, sociology, and anthropology, the book provides in-depth case studies of specific conflicts as well as comparative studies of multiple conflicts. Among other themes, the book examines why and how some rebels establish both structures and practices of rule, the role of ideology, cultural, and material factors affecting rebel governance strategies, the impact of governance on the rebel/civilian relationship, civilian responses to rebel rule, the comparison between modes of state and non-state governance to rebel attempts to establish political order, the political economy of rebel governance, and the decline and demise of rebel governance attempts.
Rwanda and Bosnia both experienced mass violence in the early 1990s. Less than ten years later, Rwandans surprisingly elected the world's highest level of women to parliament. In Bosnia, women launched thousands of community organizations that became spaces for informal political participation. The political mobilization of women in both countries complicates the popular image of women as merely the victims and spoils of war. Through a close examination of these cases, Marie E. Berry unpacks the puzzling relationship between war and women's political mobilization. Drawing from over 260 interviews with women in both countries, she argues that war can reconfigure gendered power relations by precipitating demographic, economic, and cultural shifts. In the aftermath, however, many of the gains women made were set back. This book offers an entirely new view of women and war, and includes concrete suggestions for policy makers, development organizations, and activists supporting women's rights.
This important work, edited by an expert on terrorism, focuses on the 21st-century struggle for strategic influence and ways in which states can neutralize the role of new media in spreading terrorist propaganda. In an era where anyone can have access to the Internet or other media forms that make widespread communication easy, terrorists and insurgents can spread their messages with complete freedom, creating challenges for national security. Influence Warfare: How Terrorists and Governments Fight to Shape Perceptions in a War of Ideas focuses on the core of the ongoing struggle for strategic influence and, particularly, how states can counter the role media and the Internet play in radicalizing new agents of terrorism. As the book makes clear, governments need to find ways to effectively confront non-state adversaries at all levels of the information domain and create an understanding of strategic communications within a broad range of technologies. The essays from the international group of authors who contributed to this work offer a deeper understanding of the ongoing struggle. Influence Warfare also provides a set of case studies that illustrate how the means and methods of strategic influence can impact a nation's security. Case studies
"A readable and tightly argued political and social biography that
provides numerous insights into Massachusetts' history on the eve
of the revolution." "A candid and readable biography . . . [Walmsley] gives a vivid
account of the descent of a controversial and sometimes
misunderstood figure of the period." "Usefully emphasizes the economic and personal influences on the
politics of Massachusetts." "A significant addition. Hutchinson definitely needed a more
complete treatment than he heretofore had received and Walmsley has
neatly provided it. A genuine pleasure to read." "Given the enduring fascination of the American Revolution, this
fine biography of Thomas Hutchinson should find a wide and
appreciative audience. Historian Stephen Walmsely's persuasive
study of the loyalist governor of Massachusetts Bay portrays an
honorable but unimaginative official who remains true to his
aristocratic conception of duty but helpless to arrest the forces
wrenching his native land away from Crown rule. Putting a human
face on an epic conflict, Walmsley finds hutchinson's radical
opponents motivated less by ideas and principles than by ambition,
greed, and personal animus. Indeed, Walmsley's graphic description
of the mob violence, deployed by the patriots to intimidate
Hutchinson and subvert the rule of law, will leave readers
pondering who were the villains and who the heroes in this superb
reconsideration of the nation's origins." Rarely in Americanhistory has a political figure been so pilloried and despised as Thomas Hutchinson, Governor of Massachusetts and an ardent loyalist of the Crown in the days leading up to the American revolution. In this narrative and analytic life of Hutchinson, the first since Bernard Bailyn's Pulitzer-Prize-winning biography a quarter century ago, Andrew Stephen Walmsley traces Hutchinson's decline from well- respected member of Boston's governing class to America's leading object of revolutionary animus. Walmsley argues that Hutchinson, rather than simply a victim of his inability to understand the passions associated with a revolutionary movement, was in fact defeated in a classic political and personal struggle for power. No mere sycophant for the British, Hutchinson was keenly aware of how much he had to lose if revolutionary forces prevailed, which partially explains his evolution from near- Whig to intransigent loyalist. His consequent vilification became a vehicle through which the growing patriot movement sought to achieve legitimacy. An entertaining and thought-provoking view of revolutionary events from the perspective of the losing side, Thomas Hutchinson and the Origins of the American Revolution tells the story of the American Revolution through the prism of one of its most famous detractors.
This work examines the conflict between movements and regimes using dynamic mathematical modeling methods. Most of the deaths from political violence in the world in this century have not been caused by war, but by conflict between governments and dissenters. It is hoped that scholars will improve their understanding of these conflicts, and thus help to reduce the costs.
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.
This book takes a novel look at the modern Middle East through the prisms of six cascading negative critical turning points. It identifies the seeds of a potential seventh in the collective dignity deficits generated by poor governance paradigms and exacerbated by geopolitical competition for the region's natural resources.
This work, together with Mickolus's "Literature of Terrorism: A Selectively Annotated Bibliography," published in 1980, provides the most comprehensive bibliography on terrorist violence available in print. "Terrorism, 1980-1987" concentrates on material written during the 1980s, a period which has seen an enormous outpouring of commentary and research on terrorism and terrorist attacks. In addition to surveying journalistic, social scientific, and traditional historical studies in some dozen languages, the book also includes the fictional literature of terrorism, offering a broad cross-section of research and opinion on the subject. The material is organized into sections based on region and functional categories, enabling the researcher to compare quickly developments in specific topics. Coverage ranges from general treatments of terrorism and tactics of terrorists to material that deals with the terrorist infrastructure, terrorism in specific geographic areas, and responses to terrorism. The compilers have made special efforts to include items from publications not often cited in terrorism studies, both to give the reader an indication of the breadth of material available and to offer insights into the pervasive effects of terrorism on all aspects of life.
Most philosophers and political scientists readily admit that Thomas Hobbes is a significant figure in the history of political thought. His theory was, arguably, one of the first to provide a justification for political legitimacy from the perspective of each individual subject. Many excellent books and articles have examined the justification and structure of Hobbes' commonwealth, ethical system, and interpretation of Christianity. What is troubling is that the Hobbesian project has been largely missing in the applied ethics and public policy literature. We often find applications of Kantian deontology, Bentham's or Mill's utilitarianism, Rawls's contractualism, the ethics of care, and various iterations of virtue ethics. Hobbesian accounts are routinely ignored and often derided. This is unfortunate because Hobbes's project offers a unique perspective. To ignore it, when such a perspective would be fruitful to apply to another set of theoretical questions, is a problem in need of a remedy. This volume seeks to eliminate (or, at the very least, partially fill) this gap in the literature. Not only will this volume appeal to those that are generally familiar with Hobbesian scholarship, it will also appeal to a variety of readers that are largely unfamiliar with Hobbes.
This ground-breaking book examines the political-economic characteristics of twentieth- and early twenty-first-century 'neo-jihadism'. Drawing on Bourdieusian and neo-Marxist ideas, it investigates how the neo-jihadist organisations Al Qaeda and Islamic State engage with the capitalist paradigm of neoliberalism in their anti-capitalist propaganda and quasi-capitalist financial practices. Richards reveals interactions between neoliberalism and neo-jihadism characterised by surface-level contradiction, and structural connections that are both dialectical and mutually reinforcing. Neoliberalism here constitutes an underlying 'status quo', while neo-jihadism, as an evolving form of political organisation, is perpetuated as part of this situation. Representing unique and exclusive examples of the (r)evolutionary phenomenon of neo-jihadism, Al Qaeda and Islamic State have reconstituted the dominant political-economic paradigm of neoliberalism they mobilised in response to. -- .
Who is entitled to be a citizen? What rights and duties does citizenship involve? These political questions are being asked today with a renewed urgency, both by practising politicians and by scholars. These essays by distinguished contributors examine the changing frontiers of modern citizenship. They look at the way citizenship is being reshaped within the nation state, in relations between women and the state, under the impact of economic crisis and recession, and in the face of new multinational political forces.
"Popular struggles in the global south suggest the need for the development of new and politically enabling categories of analysis, and new ways of understanding contemporary social movements. This book shows how social movements in Africa, South Asia, Latin America, and the Middle East politicize development in an age of neoliberal hegemony"--
This study investigates the overlaps between political discourse and literary and cinematic fiction, arguing that both are informed by, and contribute to, the cultural imaginary of terrorism. Whenever mass-mediated acts of terrorism occur, they tend to trigger a proliferation of threat scenarios not only in the realm of literature and film but also in the statements of policymakers, security experts, and journalists. In the process, the discursive boundary between the factual and the speculative can become difficult to discern. To elucidate this phenomenon, this book proposes that terror is a halfway house between the real and the imaginary. For what characterizes terrorism is less the single act of violence than it is the fact that this act is perceived to be the beginning, or part, of a potential series, and that further acts are expected to occur. As turn-of-the-century writers such as Stevenson and Conrad were the first to point out, this gives terror a fantastical dimension, a fact reinforced by the clandestine nature of both terrorist and counter-terrorist operations. Supported by contextual readings of selected texts and films from The Dynamiter and The Secret Agent through late-Victorian science fiction to post-9/11 novels and cinema, this study explores the complex interplay between actual incidents of political violence, the surrounding discourse, and fictional engagement with the issue to show how terrorism becomes an object of fantasy. Drawing on research from a variety of disciplines, The Cultural Imaginary of Terrorism will be a valuable resource for those with interests in the areas of Literature and Film, Terrorism Studies, Peace and Conflict Studies, Trauma Studies, and Cultural Studies.
How does the Taliban wage war? How has its war changed over time? Firstly, the movement's extraordinary military operation relies on financial backing. This volume analyses such funding. The Taliban's external sources of support include foreign governments and non-state groups, both of which have affected the Taliban's military campaigns and internal politics. Secondly, this is the first full-length study of the Taliban to acknowledge and discuss in detail the movement's polycentric character. Here not only the Quetta Shura, but also the Haqqani Network and the Taliban's other centres of power, are afforded the attention they deserve. The Taliban at War is based on extensive field research, including hundreds of interviews with Taliban members at all levels of the organisation, community elders in Taliban-controlled areas, and other sources. It covers the Taliban insurgency from its first manifestations in 2002 up to the end of 2015. The five-month Battle of Kunduz epitomised the ongoing transition of the Taliban from an insurgent group to a more conventional military force, intent on fighting a protracted civil war. In this latest book, renowned Afghanistan expert Antonio Giustozzi rounds off his twenty years of studying the Taliban with an authoritative study detailing the evolution of its formidable military machine.
Ulrike Meinhof's entrance into the West German terrorist underground was both a footnote to the waning student movement of the late 1960s, and a preamble to the bloodiest period in Germany's post-war history. Meinhof fought to make herself heard as a high-profile journalist before becoming a founding member of the Red Army Faction (RAF) in 1970. She continued writing in the underground and from 1972, in prison, until she was found dead in her cell in 1976. Leith Passmore traces Meinhof's struggle to communicate from her time as a journalist, through her escape to the underground, her prison years, and the Stammheim trial. He examines for the first time the performativity of terrorist acts of language, imagery, and physical violence to reveal how Meinhof made and re-made RAF terrorism.
This book sheds new light on the security challenges for failed states posed by violent non-state armed actors (VNSAs). By focusing on the Syrian Civil War, it explores the characteristics, ideologies and strategies of the Islamic State (ISIS) and the People's Protection Units (YPG), as well as the regional and geopolitical impacts of these VNSAs. The contributors also cover topics such as the re-imagination of borders, the YPG's demands for national sovereignty, and the involvement of regional and global powers in the Syrian crisis. "This timely volume by regional scholars and experts examines various aspects of the emergence and expansion of violent non-state actors in the Syrian/Iraqi conflict. The wealth of detail and approaches enhance our understanding of the transformation and dynamics of contemporary conflicts within and beyond the region." Keith Krause, The Graduate Institute, Geneva "This book opens fascinating glimpses into contrasting forms of "state-like" governance established by non-state actors, ISIS and the Kurdish PYD. [...] It is an important source for students of the Syrian conflict, civil wars, failed states and hybrid governance."Raymond Hinnebusch, Director Centre for Syrian Studies, University of St. Andrews "This book is an excellent resource for those looking for an interdisciplinary account of VNSAs during the Syrian civil war. It makes a nice contribution to the study of violent non state actors and poses a set of new and pressing questions." Max Abrahms, Northeastern University.
In this timely book, Marranci critically surveys the available
theories on Islamic fundamentalism and extremism. Rejecting
essentialism and cultural reductionism, the book suggests that
identity and emotion play an essential role in the phenomenon that
has been called fundamentalism. |
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