Mayne provides an integrated analysis of contemporary and future politics and government. He first examines major problems and issues occurring worldwide, surveys different regimes, and assesses the wide variety of active and emerging political movements. Mayne then explores political paradigms and ideologies through a main political spectrum to various alternatives. He outlines some possible elements for a new political paradigm that would be holistic in several different ways. Finally, he outlines scenarios for three possible futures and presents conclusions that indicate what can be done to achieve a political transiton to maximize the prospects for a good human future in the 21st century.

Whatever profession one might be in today, the overriding priority is to anticipate future developments--political, economic, and social--in order to keep pace with this headlong, accelerating era. This book is designed with this priority explicitly in mind. It offers a one-stop source of extremely up-to-date information on books, journals, CD-ROMs, software, networks, organizations, foundations, and charities--indeed, on any activity which directly and predominantly is focussed on the improvement of global prospects for the next century. In the book section alone, over 1,200 books are described, with many extensive entries on books published within the past year. There are also extensive entries for earlier key books, together with occasional short but informative entries for early classics.

The traditionally separate Fixed, Mobile, and Internet sectors have been evolving recently toward a single sector, offering numerous implications for those involved in technology and business. It is therefore essential for telecommunication professionals to get a keen grasp of where the industry is heading. Providing a solid foundation in the industry, Introduction to Mobile Communications: Technology, Services, Markets explores the core requirements of modern mobile telecommunications-from markets to technology. It explains how wireless systems work, how mobility is supported, the underlying infrastructure, and what interactions are needed among the different functional components. The book also examines how mobile communications are evolving in order to meet the changing needs of users. The information provided in the book comes primarily from the four core modules of the Certificate in Mobile Communications Distance Learning program run by the Informa Telecoms Academy in London. Designed by a highly experienced training development team, the program examines the complex and fascinating world of mobile communications. Designed to give a broad picture of mobile communications, the book provides an excellent grounding for those involved in both business and engineering-leaving them much better equipped to fulfill roles within their current or prospective companies

This exciting collection on a new movement in urban archaeology investigates the historical archaeology of urban slums. The "stuff" that is dug up--broken dinner plates, nails and plaster samples--will not quickly find its way into museum collections. But, properly interpreted, it yields evidence of lives and communities that have left little in the way of written records. Twelve case studies define a new field, which will attract the attention of a range of students and scholars outside archaeology, in particular, historical sociologists and historians.

The traditionally separate Fixed, Mobile, and Internet sectors have been evolving recently toward a single sector, offering numerous implications for those involved in technology and business. It is therefore essential for telecommunication professionals to get a keen grasp of where the industry is heading. Providing a solid foundation in the industry, Introduction to Mobile Communications: Technology, Services, Markets explores the core requirements of modern mobile telecommunications-from markets to technology. It explains how wireless systems work, how mobility is supported, the underlying infrastructure, and what interactions are needed among the different functional components. The book also examines how mobile communications are evolving in order to meet the changing needs of users. The information provided in the book comes primarily from the four core modules of the Certificate in Mobile Communications Distance Learning program run by the Informa Telecoms Academy in London. Designed by a highly experienced training development team, the program examines the complex and fascinating world of mobile communications. Designed to give a broad picture of mobile communications, the book provides an excellent grounding for those involved in both business and engineering-leaving them much better equipped to fulfill roles within their current or prospective companies

The modern slum is as prevalent as its stereotypes. Today, a slum is often understood to be a place of extreme poverty in the developing world-a place disordered, lacking the basic amenities of life, traumatized by violence, and perpetuated by dysfunctional families and disaffected extremists. Yet the word “slum” was not coined in the twenty-first century's developing world or its recent past. The word emerged in early nineteenth-century London, and its use expanded as modernization created what is now the developed world and its client territories. The Oxford Handbook of the Modern Slum explores the history of the modern slum, connecting nineteenth-century iterations through multiple pathways to its contemporary existence. With chapters by more than twenty scholars, this Handbook brings an array of important and original perspectives and methodologies to bear on slums, real and imagined. Its analysis ranges across Europe, North America, Latin America, South Asia, Southeast Asia, Australia, and sub-Saharan Africa. The Handbook probes the impact of gender and race on urban social disadvantage and traces the development of private and state-sponsored intervention-as well as tourist interest-in urban poverty. It suggests that characterizations of slumland disequilibrium, dysfunctionality, and unsustainability should be offset by evidence of make-do enterprise, strategic determination, resilience, homeliness, and neighborliness. Drawing upon anthropology, archaeology, architecture, geography, history, politics, sociology and urban planning, the Handbook delves into households and communities whose existence has been hidden by stereotypes.

More than half of the world's population now lives in urban areas, but a billion of these people reside in neighbourhoods characterized by entrenched disadvantage. These neighbourhoods, known as 'slums', are often seen as a debilitating and even subversive presence within society. In reality, however, it is often the host societies and their public policies that are at fault. In this comprehensive global history, Alan Mayne explores the evolution and meaning of the word 'slum', from its origins in London in the early nineteenth century to its use to describe favela communities in the lead up to the Rio de Janeiro Olympic Games in 2016. The word 'slum' has been extensively used for two hundred years to condemn and disperse poor communities. Mounting a case for the word's elimination from the language of progressive urban social reform, Slums is a must-read book for all those interested in social history and the importance of these vibrant and vital neighbourhoods.