Legitimizing Authority places the American state apparatus back in the foreground to rethink the development of the country’s government in the context of its unfulfilled promise of equality. The book argues that the tensions between calls for equality and the simultaneous tolerance of inequality, have accompanied the rise of modern mass society, and, with it, of liberal democracy. Vormann and Lammert emphasize that government has played and continues to play a decisive role in calibrating the relationship between the interior and the exterior of the nation, moving between an extractive state, a taxation state, and a welfare state over time in order to expand social access and political participation inside the national community – while tolerating conditions that continue to belie the historical promise of equality. The authors draw on a range of literatures that transcend disciplinary boundaries to reveal how exploitative practices have been accepted. They conclude that the legitimization crises of the present must be comprehended through understanding how legitimation was always maintained by a state apparatus active at multiple scales and in multiple policy fields. This interdisciplinary book is addressed to a broad audience across disciplines, including political science, political economy, political history, comparative politics, international politics, international relations, American Political Development (APD), and cultural studies.

Bhikhu Parekh As creative and reflective agents, human beings seek meaning in their lives, and develop more or less coherent views of the world or cultures in terms of which to organize their personal and collective lives. When different groups of individuals within the same society subscribe to different ways of thought, they face the crucial question of how to deal with their cultural diversity and sustain a shared common life. Premodern societies took a relatively relaxed view of diversity and generally opted for a looser union. Modernity brought with it a very different approach to the subject. This is reflected in, among other things, the institution of the modern state, especially the liberal democracy which represents one way of constituting it. Liberal democracy has exercised a decisive influence on our political and moral imagination for the past three centuries. Unlike premodern societies which took the community as their starting point and defined the individual in terms of it, it takes the individual as the ultimate and irreducible unit of, and thus conc- tually and ontologically prior to society. The latter is taken to consist of in- viduals, and refers to the totality of its members and their formal and informal relationships. Individual are the sole and equal sources of moral claims, and social and political institutions are judged in terms of their ability to safeguard and promote individual interests.

The post-Cold War era was marked by the emergence of unprecedented new networks of international private trade, cooperation, and circulation of goods that promised to render the state nearly obsolete--at least in theory. The essays collected in this book dissect the notions of this so-called "smart economy," revealing the crucial role that government interventions still play in facilitating the production and the global flow of goods. The contributors focus particularly on the role played by the United States, often incorrectly assumed to be the most liberal and least interventionist in the global order. More than a mere market fixer, the United States has long assumed an outsized position in expediting the global circulation of goods through its supply chains and communication channels. Drawing from such diverse fields as political science, urban sociology, and cultural studies, Contours of the Illiberal State takes a broad interdisciplinary look at how nations became active market enablers.

Liberal democracies on both sides of the Atlantic find themselves approaching a state of emergency, beset by potent populist challenges of the right and left. But what exactly lies at the core of widespread dissatisfaction with the status quo? And how can the challenge be overcome? In Democracy in Crisis, Christian Lammert and Boris Vormann argue that the rise of populism in North Atlantic states is not the cause of a crisis of governance but its result. This crisis has been many decades in the making and is intricately linked to the rise of a certain type of political philosophy and practice in which economic rationality has hollowed out political values and led to an impoverishment of the political sphere more broadly. The process began in the 1980s, when the United States and Great Britain decided to unleash markets in the name of economic growth and democracy. After the fall of the Berlin Wall, several countries in Europe followed suit and marketized their educational, social, and healthcare systems, which in turn increased inequality and fragmentation. The result has been a collapse of social cohesion and trust that the populists promise to address but only make worse. Looking to the future, Lammert and Vormann conclude their analysis with concrete suggestions for ways politics can once again be placed in the foreground, with markets serving social relations rather than the reverse.

Aus europaischer Perspektive wachst die soziale Ungleichheit in den Vereinigten Staaten vor allem deswegen, weil der Wohlfahrtsstaat dort nur rudimentar ausgebildet ist. Tatsachlich investiert aber kaum ein anderes Land mehr Geld in die Altersabsicherung und Gesundheitsfursorge. Rechnet man bildungspolitische Ausgaben und betriebliche Sozialleistungen mit ein, fliessen etwa 60 Prozent des Gesamthaushalts der USA in den Bereich Soziales. Die vorliegende Einfuhrung raumt nicht nur mit einigen gangigen Vorurteilen auf. Sie bietet auch als einziges deutschsprachiges Uberblickswerk einen kritischen und gut strukturierten Einblick in die widerspruchliche und komplexe Realitat des amerikanischen Wohlfahrtsstaates von den theoretischen und empirischen Grundlagen der gegenwartigen Sozialpolitik uber die anhaltenden heftigen Kontroversen, die sie begleiten, bis hin zu einzelnen Politikfeldern. Ein Grundlagenwerk fur das Verstandnis der US-Gesellschaft und ihres Sozial- und Wirtschaftsmodells."

This is an EXACT reproduction of a book published before 1923. This IS NOT an OCR'd book with strange characters, introduced typographical errors, and jumbled words. This book may have occasional imperfections such as missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. that were either part of the original artifact, or were introduced by the scanning process. We believe this work is culturally important, and despite the imperfections, have elected to bring it back into print as part of our continuing commitment to the preservation of printed works worldwide. We appreciate your understanding of the imperfections in the preservation process, and hope you enjoy this valuable book.

Momente der Ergriffenheit erleben Frauen und Paare in der Zeit vom Kinderwunsch bis zum Wochenbett. Es sind Momente der Hoffnung, Gluckseligkeit, Krise, Entscheidung, Momente des Innehaltens oder des Abschiednehmens. Schwangerschaft, Geburt und Elternwerden sind sind mehr als nur physiologische ubergange, die eine medizinische Begleitung benoetigen. Der umfassende Lebensubergang kann eine spirituelle Dimension erreichen, nicht nur wenn unvorhergesehene Ereignisse existenzielle Krisen ausloesen. Das Buch richtet sich an alle Berufsgruppen, die in ihrer Arbeit Schwangere und werdende Eltern begleiten und in krisenhaften Situationen an ihre Grenzen stossen. Die Autorinnen und Autoren schoepfen dank ihrer Tatigkeiten, beispielsweise in der Aus- und Fortbildung von Hebammen und Beratenden, aus ihren vielfaltigen Erfahrungen. Sie bieten Anleitung zur spirituellen Begleitung bei Schwangerschaft und Geburt ebenso wie zum Erleben der eigenen spirituellen Kompetenz. Diese Kompetenz zum Einsatz zu bringen und Zugang zur eigenen Spiritualitat zu finden, ist Intention des Buches. Neben wissenschaftlichen Einfuhrungen und Erfahrungsberichten von Eltern und Begleitenden bieten neun Momente der Ergriffenheit Bildmeditationen sowie Impulse und Rituale als Inspirationen fur die eigene Praxis. Das Buch ist auf vielfaltige religioese sowie transreligioese Zugange hin angelegt.

The study of historical Buddhism in premodern and early modern Southeast Asia stands at an exciting and transformative juncture. Interdisciplinary scholarship is marked by a commitment to the careful examination of local and vernacular expressions of Buddhist culture as well as to reconsiderations of long-standing questions concerning the diffusion of and relationships among varied texts, forms of representation, and religious identities, ideas, and practices. The twelve essays in this collection, written by leading scholars in Buddhist Studies and Southeast Asian history, epigraphy, and archaeology, comprise the latest research in the field to deal with the dynamics of mainland and (pen)insular Buddhism between the sixth and nineteenth centuries C.E. Drawing on new manuscript sources, inscriptions, and archaeological data, they investigate the intellectual, ritual, institutional, sociopolitical, aesthetic, and literary diversity of local Buddhisms, and explore their connected histories and contributions to the production of intraregional and transregional Buddhist geographies.