Bicycles are so much a part of everyday life nowadays, it can be surprising to realize that for the late Victorians these "velocipedes" were a novelty disparaged as being unhealthy and unsafe - and that indeed tricycles were for a time seen as the format more likely to succeed. Some people however adopted the newfangled devices with alacrity, embarking on adventurous tours throughout the countryside. One of them documented his 'rambles' around East Kent in such detail that it is still possible to follow his routes on modern cycles, and compare the fauna and flora (and pubs ) with those he vividly described. In addition to providing today's cyclists with new historical routes to explore, and both naturalists and social historians with plenty of material for research, this fascinating book contains a special chapter on Lady Cyclists in the era before female emancipation, and an unintentionally humorous section instructing young gentlemen how to make their cycle and then ride it. It features over 200 illustrations, and is complemented by a fully updated website.

The humorous anecdotes, refined poems, astounding newspaper articles and other materials that are gathered here in The Margate Tales present a vivid picture of this seaside town as it rose to become one of Britain's most popular resorts. Just as Chaucer's Canterbury Tales help us get a feel for how the people in England behaved and thought in the Middle Ages, Channing's Margate Tales provide us with a unique insight into the people of Thanet as they were described in the 18th and early to mid 19th centuries. The illuminating and entertaining accounts range from furious battles in the letters pages, to hilarious pastiches, witty verse and surprising discoveries, illustrated with numerous contemporary drawings. The end result is that as with Chaucer, one realizes how little has in fact changed.

Security has long been a central organizing concept of international relations. Until the 1980s, students of the discipline understood its simple essence in terms of arms races and balances of power. However, the issues have changed considerably in the 1990s, and this text aims to help students understand these changes. Many attempts have been made to redefine the concept, leading to a proliferation of terms such as true security, global security, common security and environmental security, but there has been little precision associated with the use of these terms which have often been used in confusing and contradictory ways. In attempting to help students deal with the confusion, this book seeks to outline the theoretical tools at the disposal of students for their own rethinking of security. These tools offer innovative ways of looking at a central concept of the discipline. It outlines some of these alternatives in the context of the third world, which, it is argued, has been neglected by the traditional conceptualization of security.

This book examines foreign direct investment in a changing world economy. It offers case-studies of this investment in different national and industrial contexts. Firms and countries have encountered mixed results in using this investment to further their foreign leverage. Conversely, potential host countries have faced different opportunities and constraints in attracting or utilizing foreign capital for their development. Although some countries have been relatively successful, most do not appear to be well positioned to take advantage of the ongoing processes of globalization of national economies.

This collection of essays examines the historical influence of states in East Asia's political economies, and considers their contributions to the ongoing social, economic and political transformation of the countries in this region. They show that the status of these so-called developmental states have evolved over time, and that their role and capacity have been significantly related to the social bases and cultural roots of the relevant countries.

This book covers not only the political situation in Zimbabwe, but its international context and those areas of privation, exclusion and silence within the country that are beneath the everyday face of politics. Written by either a Zimbabwean or an internationally acknowledged expert on aspects of Zimbabwe, all the authors agree that the silences in and surrounding the African state cannot continue. This volume utilizes the perspectives of diplomacy, health, law and literature written in both English and Shona, and of those deeply concerned with democratization in Zimbabwe and its surrounding region. Zimbabwe and the Space of Silence will be of interest to students and scholars of African studies, African and Third World politics and international law. This book was previously published as a special issue of The Round Table.

The book traces the end of hostilities and the often acrimonious, sometimes naive, but always laboured negotiations towards peace and elections in Mozambique. There is careful examination of the many international factors involved from the covert intervention of South Africa, the reaction of one African state, the role of the United Nations and that of humanitarian and religious groups. The lessons for conflict resolution and peacekeeping for Africa and beyond are discussed.

The Second International Workshop on Cooperative Internet Computing (CIC2002) has brought together researchers, academics, and industry practitioners who are involved and interested in the development of advanced and emerging cooperative computing technologies. Cooperative computing is an important computing paradigm to enable different parties to work together towards a pre defined non-trivial goal. It encompasses important technological areas like computer supported cooperative work, workflow, computer assisted design and concurrent programming. As technologies continue to advance and evolve, there is an increasing need to research and develop new classes of middlewares and applications to leverage on the combined benefits of Internet and web to provide users and programmers with highly interactive and robust cooperative computing environment. It is the aim of this forum to promote close interactions and exchange of ideas among researchers, academics and practitioners on the state-of-the art researches in all of these exciting areas. We have partnered with Kluwer Acedamic Press this year to bring to you a book compilation of the papers that were presented at the CIC2002 workshop. The importance of the research area is reflected both in the quality and quantity of the submitted papers, where each paper was reviewed by at least three PC members. As a result, we were able to only accept 14 papers for full presentation at the workshop, while having to reject several excellent papers due to the limitations of the program schedule."

The Lived International is a poetic account of Stephen Chan's personal engagement in International Relations. It speaks to the inadequacy of an abstract voyeurism while the problems of the world are death, devastation and underdevelopment. Drawn from a lifetime of travel and engagement, and from both published and hitherto unpublished poetry, forming a parallel list to the author's academic works, the book seeks to inject into debate the sense that language, spoken and written discourse alone, are not a sufficient claim to 'bearing witness', and that even activism from afar can often fail to understand a human condition that afflicts the majority of the world's population. Chan demonstrates that a life of praxis, living international relations, yields more insights than a life of theory alone.

The 2013 general elections in Zimbabwe were widely expected to mark a shift in the nation's political system, and a greater role for the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), led by Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai. However, the results, surprisingly, were overwhelmingly in favour of long-time President Robert Mugabe, who swept the presidential, parliamentary and senatorial polls under relatively credible and peaceful conditions. In this book, a valuable and accessible read for both students and scholars working in African politics, and those with a general interest in the politics of the region, Stephen Chan and Julia Gallagher explore the domestic and international context of these landmark elections. Drawing on extensive research among political elites, grassroots activists and ordinary voters, Chan and Gallagher examine the key personalities, dramatic events, and broader social and political context of Mugabe's success, and what this means as Zimbabwe moves towards a future without Mugabe.

Edited with authority by the influential and respected Stephen Chan, this unique collection of essays gathers together for the first time both African and Chinese perspectives on China's place in Africa. The book starts with an excellent introductory essay from Stephen Chan, written in his usual elegant prose and featuring some very fresh insights organised with great clarity. Featuring useful historical context, this brave book analyses the "moral" aspects of the policies and ensuing migration. The book completely undermines existing assumptions concerning Sino-African relations, such as that Africa is of critical importance for China; that China sees no risk in its largesse towards Africa; and that there is a single Chinese profile/agenda. The resulting collection touches the issue of racism but is equally about moments of pure idealism and 'romance' in Sino-African history.

Zimbabwe has moved from a condition of restricted expression to one of many contradictory expressions. Politics has lost none of its compromises and conflicts, but it has been amplified by an explosion of voices. For the first time, a genuine debate is possible among many actors, insiders and outsiders, and the question marks over Zimbabwe and its future are no longer in terms of a narrow choice between one party and another, one outlook or another. Compromise government has meant complexity of debate. This does not preclude disillusionment within debate, but it does include vigour and imagination in debate. This book includes essays from renowned scholars, governmental and diplomatic figures, and prioritises contributions by Zimbabweans themselves. The essays provide a blend of academic and practitioner observation and judgement which no other volume has done. This book was published as a special issue of The Round Table.

Zimbabwe has moved from a condition of restricted expression to one of many contradictory expressions. Politics has lost none of its compromises and conflicts, but it has been amplified by an explosion of voices. For the first time, a genuine debate is possible among many actors, insiders and outsiders, and the question marks over Zimbabwe and its future are no longer in terms of a narrow choice between one party and another, one outlook or another. Compromise government has meant complexity of debate. This does not preclude disillusionment within debate, but it does include vigour and imagination in debate. This book includes essays from renowned scholars, governmental and diplomatic figures, and prioritises contributions by Zimbabweans themselves. The essays provide a blend of academic and practitioner observation and judgement which no other volume has done. This book was published as a special issue of The Round Table.

The post-1959 Cuban government's engagement with Africa, which was led by its charismatic and revolutionary leader, Fidel Castro, had two connecting dimensions: military internationalism and humanitarian internationalism. While African states and societies benefited immensely from these engagements, it was Fidel Castro's military assistance towards the decolonization of and the pushback of Apartheid South Africa that received the loudest attention and ovation in the developing world. Fidel Castro, this book argues, was never motivated by economic, selfish, or geopolitical considerations; but rather, by the altruism and the certainty of his worldview and by the historical connection between the peoples of Cuba and Africa. The principle of international solidary, socialism, and the emancipation of Africa was a much-desired aspiration and attainment. Beginning covertly in Algeria in 1961 and the Congo and Guinea-Bissau in 1964; and more conspicuously in Angola in 1975, Fidel Castro and his socialist government was at the forefront supporting liberation movements in their struggle against colonialism. Defining Castro's engagement with Africa was his support for the People's Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA) against the United States-backed Apartheid South Africa, which supported the National Liberation Front of Angola (FNLA) and the National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA).

The Second International Workshop on Cooperative Internet Computing (CIC2002) has brought together researchers, academics, and industry practitioners who are involved and interested in the development of advanced and emerging cooperative computing technologies. Cooperative computing is an important computing paradigm to enable different parties to work together towards a pre defined non-trivial goal. It encompasses important technological areas like computer supported cooperative work, workflow, computer assisted design and concurrent programming. As technologies continue to advance and evolve, there is an increasing need to research and develop new classes of middlewares and applications to leverage on the combined benefits of Internet and web to provide users and programmers with highly interactive and robust cooperative computing environment. It is the aim of this forum to promote close interactions and exchange of ideas among researchers, academics and practitioners on the state-of-the art researches in all of these exciting areas. We have partnered with Kluwer Acedamic Press this year to bring to you a book compilation of the papers that were presented at the CIC2002 workshop. The importance of the research area is reflected both in the quality and quantity of the submitted papers, where each paper was reviewed by at least three PC members. As a result, we were able to only accept 14 papers for full presentation at the workshop, while having to reject several excellent papers due to the limitations of the program schedule.

This is a magical realist book on world politics. Stephen Chan takes the reader on a rollercoaster ride through how we can establish a new kind of international relations and construct a common future for the planet.

The book's main argument is that international politics has failed because the certainties of singular traditions of philosophy fail to help us in understanding power shifts and struggles in an endlessly diverse world. Chan argues that fusing different strands of Western, Eastern, religious and philosophical thought, is far more likely to help us understand and move forward amidst uncertainty. In doing so, he takes us on a journey from the battlefields of Eritrea to the Twin Towers, via the Book of Job, Clausewitz, Fanon and Wahabism.

You'll never think about politics in quite the same way again.

The 2013 general elections in Zimbabwe were widely expected to mark a shift in the nation's political system, and a greater role for the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), led by Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai. However, the results, surprisingly, were overwhelmingly in favour of long-time President Robert Mugabe, who swept the presidential, parliamentary and senatorial polls under relatively credible and peaceful conditions. In this book, a valuable and accessible read for both students and scholars working in African politics, and those with a general interest in the politics of the region, Stephen Chan and Julia Gallagher explore the domestic and international context of these landmark elections. Drawing on extensive research among political elites, grassroots activists and ordinary voters, Chan and Gallagher examine the key personalities, dramatic events, and broader social and political context of Mugabe's success, and what this means as Zimbabwe moves towards a future without Mugabe.

The book traces the end of hostilities and the often acrimonious, sometimes naive, but always laboured negotiations towards peace and elections in Mozambique. There is careful examination of the many international factors involved from the covert intervention of South Africa, the reaction of one African state, the role of the United Nations and that of humanitarian and religious groups. The lessons for conflict resolution and peacekeeping for Africa and beyond are discussed.

This collection of essays examines the historical influence of states in East Asia's political economies, and considers their contributions to the ongoing social, economic and political transformation of the countries in this region. They show that the status of these so-called developmental states have evolved over time, and that their role and capacity have been significantly related to the social bases and cultural roots of the relevant countries.

This book examines foreign direct investment in a changing world economy. It offers case-studies of this investment in different national and industrial contexts. Firms and countries have encountered mixed results in using this investment to further their foreign leverage. Conversely, potential host countries have faced different opportunities and constraints in attracting or utilizing foreign capital for their development. Although some countries have been relatively successful, most do not appear to be well positioned to take advantage of the ongoing processes of globalization of national economies.

With the seeming defeat of ISIS, has jihadism disappeared from world politics? In this startling new book, Stephen Chan uncovers the ideological foundations that allow ISIS and other jihadi groups to survive, as they propagate terror by sophisticated means online and continue thrusting their spear at the West. Far from presenting simple-minded, black-clad fighters, Chan describes an elaborate process of online recruitment, which is, in its own terrible way, meaningful and thoughtful. He examines the foundations of this thought and the step-by-step methods of jihadi indoctrination, exposing the lack of IT knowledge among Western world leaders and urging the 'moderate' Islamic community in the West to challenge jihadi ideology with a courageous, non-violent ideology of its own. Without a counter-ideology, Chan argues, alienated Muslim youth are drawn not only to glamorised dreams of violence, but also to the pull of a totalising system of politics and theology. Spear to the West picks apart the fallacy of 'thoughtless' jihadi carnage, arguing that-dangerous and gruesome as it might be-there is more thought behind this phenomenon of destruction than meets the eye.