How does armed conflict shape global politics? When states wage war on their neighbours while denying its existence, what chance do we have to regulate it, and how will we ever achieve a more peaceful world? This book examines how changes to social rules - such as interpretations of international law - reshape how states explain their military actions, and changes to technology and society transform the activities that constitute contemporary warfare. Analysing the role that war serves in global politics, it outlines the multiple ways that war affects the contemporary world, from international relations to our day-to-day lives. Focusing on two competing visions of war - that war can and should be eliminated, and that war is a permanent problem to be managed - it takes the second path as a necessary step towards the first, in the maybe vain hope that it is ever achievable.

This book examines the normative debates around the American use of targeted killings. It questions whether the Obama administration's defence of its use of targeted killings is cohesive or hypocritical. In doing so, the book departs from the disciplinary purpose of international law, constitutional law and the just war tradition and instead examines discipline-specific defences of targeted killings to identify their requisite normative principles in order to compare these norms across disciplines. The methodology used in this book means that it argues that targeted killings are only defensible as acts of war, but it also highlights the normative role of accountability and responsibility in this defence. In doing so, it offers an argument that the use of 'pattern of life' killings by the CIA falls outside the defence offered by the Obama administration, but that this same type of targeting could be used by the military due to differing standards/mechanisms of responsibility assignment in these organisations. The book thus provides a way of investigating contemporary wars where the conduct of war lacks the traditional hallmarks of conventional warfare. Furthermore, by drawing attention to differing normative concepts that underpin competing interpretations of law and morality, it provides a way of analysing contemporary political violence in an interdisciplinary fashion without seeking to displace single disciplinary study. This book will be of much interest to students of military studies, ethics of war, foreign policy, international security and IR.

This book examines the normative debates around the American use of targeted killings. It questions whether the Obama administration's defence of its use of targeted killings is cohesive or hypocritical. In doing so, the book departs from the disciplinary purpose of international law, constitutional law and the just war tradition and instead examines discipline-specific defences of targeted killings to identify their requisite normative principles in order to compare these norms across disciplines. The methodology used in this book means that it argues that targeted killings are only defensible as acts of war, but it also highlights the normative role of accountability and responsibility in this defence. In doing so, it offers an argument that the use of 'pattern of life' killings by the CIA falls outside the defence offered by the Obama administration, but that this same type of targeting could be used by the military due to differing standards/mechanisms of responsibility assignment in these organisations. The book thus provides a way of investigating contemporary wars where the conduct of war lacks the traditional hallmarks of conventional warfare. Furthermore, by drawing attention to differing normative concepts that underpin competing interpretations of law and morality, it provides a way of analysing contemporary political violence in an interdisciplinary fashion without seeking to displace single disciplinary study. This book will be of much interest to students of military studies, ethics of war, foreign policy, international security and IR.

President Obama was elected on an anti-war platform, yet targeted killings have increased under his command of the 'War on Terror'. The US thinks of itself as upholding the rule of international law and spreading democracy, yet such targeted killings have been widely decried as extra-judicial violations of human rights. This book examines these paradoxes, arguing that they are partially explained by the application of existing legal standards to transnational wars. Critics argue that the kind of war the US claims to be waging - transnational armed conflict - doesn't actually exist. McDonald analyses the concept of transnational war and the legalinterpretations that underpin it, and argues that the Obama administration's adherence to therule of law produces a status quo of violence that is in some ways more disturbing than the excessesof the Bush administration.America's interpretations of sovereignty and international law shape and constitute war itself, with lethal consequences for the named and anonymous persons that it unilaterally defines as participants.McDonald's analysis helps us understand the social and legal construction of legitimate violence in warfare, and the relationship between legal opinions formed in US government departments and acts of violence half a world away.

B. K. Valunar is back with a whole new Game. Well, maybe not a new Game. He does have a plan, though. Will that be enough for what The Shop has in store for him?

Deep Brain Stimulation for Parkinson's disease... Sound like science fiction? It's not When Sister and Brother are told their Grandfather is having BRAIN SURGERY for PARKINSON'S DISEASE they are at first shocked, then very frightened-and they have lots of questions. Although this book is written and illustrated for children, it is also an excellent primer for anyone wanting to learn the basics of Deep Brain Stimulation.

These stories are all about life, its daily nuances, its twists and its beauty. Thailand Tales are told by a guy sensitive to life's joys, and who hasn't let tragedy and disaster stop him from realizing its fullness. The author wonders why I like him? Read just a bit and you will clearly see that it is virtually impossible not to. The stories celebrate life after retirement, in a place halfway around the world from "home." They show life in all its many facets, life that should be embraced two-fisted (and preferably wrapped squarely around a tennis racket handle), life that "giveth," life that "taketh." Jack writes with an indomitable spirit, and with the ability to take and give back, in constant wonder, in an exotic land.

Questions of religious identity will be central to the way that the twenty-first century unfolds. Anglicanism: The Answer to Modernity is the boldest attempt in recent years to address the intellectual future of the Church of England in a confident, open and faithful way. The eight Cambridge deans who have contributed combine academic theological work with practical ministry to students in exploring the credibility, wisdom and coherence of Anglican answers to biblical, moral, philosophical and social issues. They also evaluate the presence of the Church at various levels in the life of the nation. They believe that the Church of England is not a dying and irrelevant anachronism. Rather, their vision is of a robust and inclusive Anglicanism, from which we may fashion the answers necessary for human life and growth. This book sets the conceptual tone for the Church of England at the start of Rowan Williams's term as Archbishop of Canterbury. Based on pastoral experience, the contributors map out a confident future for a Church that sympathetically and intelligently offers meaning and hope in times of uncertain direction. Contributors include: Duncan Dormor (St John's College, Cambridge) Jeremy Caddick (Emmanuel College, Cambridge) Jack McDonald (Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge) Maggi Dawn (King's College, Cambridge) Jeremy Morris (Trinity Hall, Cambridge) Timothy Jenkins (Jesus College, Cambridge) Jo Bailey Wells (Ridley Hall, Cambridge) Jonathan Ben Quash (Peterhouse, Cambridge)