Download or read book Realism Utopia and the Mushroom Cloud written by Michael Bess and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 1993-12 with total page 364 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Two world wars, concentration camps, the obliteration of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and continued preparations for nuclear war illustrate the modern world's propensity for mass destruction. . . . Yet there have been important signs of resistance to this trend. These have included not only the emergence of mass-based peace and disarmament movements but activist intellectuals grappling with the growing problem posed by mass violence among nation-states. . . . Bess examines the lives and ideas of four of these intellectuals: Leo Szilard of Hungary and (later) the United States, E. P. Thompson of England, Danilo Dolci of Italy, and Louise Weiss of France. . . . Realism, Utopia, and the Mushroom Cloud is a powerful, important scholarly work, casting new light upon some of the great issues of modern times. Readers will learn much from it."—Lawrence S. Wittner, Peace and Change "Bess seeks to understand the way in which the creation of the atomic bomb has changed the social and political situation of humankind. Are we to be held hostage by military forces or can we transform our situation? He describes the lives of four very different activists, each with different views on what causes conflict and how best to address conflict. . . . Overall, this book offers an interesting perspective on life after the atomic bomb. . . . In asking ourselves what the possibilities of our future are, we can turn to these lives for some guidance. . . . This book is informative, provocative, and encourages one to consider carefully how s/he chooses to live."—Erin McKenna, Utopian Studies "These four lives, researched and skillfully presented by historian Michael Bess, make fascinating stories in themselves. They also serve as useful vehicles for examining major cross-currents of Cold War resistance. . . . From Weiss the cynical pragmatist to Szilard the high-level fixer to hompson the social reformer to Dolce the spiritual street organizer, Michael Bess has woven an illuminating tapestry of human efforts to cope with life under the mushroom cloud."—Samuel H. Day Jr., The Progressive

Download or read book Realism Utopia and the Mushroom Cloud written by Michael Bess and published by . This book was released on 1993 with total page 322 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Nuclear Realism written by Rens van Munster and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2016-04-14 with total page 194 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: What is a realist response to nuclear weapons? This book is animated by the idea that contemporary attempts to confront the challenge of nuclear weapons and other global security problems would benefit from richer historical foundations. Returning to the decade of deep, thermonuclear anxiety inaugurated in the early 1950s, the authors focus on four creative intellectuals – Günther Anders, John H. Herz, Lewis Mumford and Bertrand Russell – whose work they reclaim under the label of ‘nuclear realism’. This book brings out an important, oppositional and resolutely global strand of political thought that combines realist insights about nuclear weapons with radical proposals for social and political transformation as the only escape from a profoundly endangered planet. Nuclear Realism is a highly original and provocative study that will be of great use to advanced undergraduates, graduates and scholars of political theory, International Relations and Cold War history.

Download or read book Dreams for a Decade written by Stephanie L. Freeman and published by University of Pennsylvania Press. This book was released on 2023-06-13 with total page 329 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: During the 1980s, millions of ordinary individuals around the world mobilized in support of nuclear disarmament. Although U.S. President Ronald Reagan and Soviet General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev were not part of these grassroots movements, they too wanted to eliminate nuclear weapons. Nuclear abolitionism was a diverse and global phenomenon. In Dreams for a Decade, Stephanie L. Freeman draws on newly declassified material from multiple continents to examine nuclear abolitionists' influence on the trajectory of the Cold War's last decade. Freeman reveals that nuclear abolitionism played a significant yet unappreciated role in ending the Cold War. Grassroots and government nuclear abolitionists shifted U.S. and Soviet nuclear arms control paradigms from arms limitation to arms reduction. This paved the way for the reversal of the U.S.-Soviet nuclear arms race, which began with the landmark 1987 Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty. European peace activists also influenced Gorbachev's "common European home" initiative and support for freedom of choice in Europe, which prevented the Soviet leader from intervening to stop the 1989 East European revolutions. These revolutions ripped the fabric of the Iron Curtain, which had divided Europe for more than four decades. Despite their inability to eliminate nuclear weapons, grassroots and government nuclear abolitionists deserve credit for playing a pivotal role in the Cold War's endgame. They also provide a model for enacting dramatic, positive change in a peaceful manner.

Download or read book Planet in Peril Planetary Dangers Planetary Solutions written by Michael D. Bess and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2022-10-13 with total page 453 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Written by an award-winning historian of science and technology, Planet in Peril describes the top four mega-dangers facing humankind – climate change, nukes, pandemics, and artificial intelligence. It outlines the solutions that have been tried, and analyzes why they have thus far fallen short. These four existential dangers present a special kind of challenge that urgently requires planet-level responses, yet today's international institutions have so far failed to meet this need. The book lays out a realistic pathway for gradually modifying the United Nations over the coming century so that it can become more effective at coordinating global solutions to humanity's problems. Neither optimistic nor pessimistic, but pragmatic and constructive, the book explores how to move past ideological polarization and global political fragmentation. Unafraid to take intellectual risks, Planet in Peril sketches a plausible roadmap toward a safer, more democratic future for us all.

Download or read book Planet in Peril written by Michael D. Bess and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2022-10-13 with total page 453 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Exploration of the top four mega-dangers facing humankind and plots a hopeful path to dealing with them through global governance.

Download or read book Movement Genesis written by Steven Breyman and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2019-03-07 with total page 225 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: To make sense of the rise and fall, origins and nature, of the 1980s West German peace movement requires work that is part political sociology and part social movement theory building. An analysis of the peace movement's organizations, leadership, strategy, goals, tactics, and mobilization comprises the political sociology part of this study. To un

Download or read book Nuclear Scholars Initiative written by Sarah Weiner and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2014-01-27 with total page 279 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The 2013 class of Nuclear Scholars, selected from a very competitive applicant pool, contained some of the best and brightest young professionals in the nuclear field. Drawn from graduate programs, the national labs, the civil service, and the U.S. military, these Nuclear Scholars participated in six monthly workshops that focused on a wide range of nuclear topics. These topics included extended deterrence and assurance, stockpile stewardship, nuclear materials security, Iranian and North Korean proliferation, international nonproliferation norms and treaties, missile defense, and nuclear targeting. The program culminated in a final meeting at which the Nuclear Scholars presented their own research to a panel of senior experts. The papers resulting from these presentations are contained in this year’s volume.

Download or read book Toward Nuclear Abolition written by Lawrence S. Wittner and published by Stanford University Press. This book was released on 1993 with total page 692 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The final volume in the trilogy "The Struggle Against the Bomb", this book presents the inspiring and dramatic story of how citizen activists helped curb the arms race and prevent nuclear war.

Download or read book Being Nuclear written by Gabrielle Hecht and published by MIT Press. This book was released on 2012-03-02 with total page 475 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The hidden history of African uranium and what it means—for a state, an object, an industry, a workplace—to be “nuclear.” Uranium from Africa has long been a major source of fuel for nuclear power and atomic weapons, including the bomb dropped on Hiroshima. In 2003, after the infamous “yellow cake from Niger,” Africa suddenly became notorious as a source of uranium, a component of nuclear weapons. But did that admit Niger, or any of Africa's other uranium-producing countries, to the select society of nuclear states? Does uranium itself count as a nuclear thing? In this book, Gabrielle Hecht lucidly probes the question of what it means for something—a state, an object, an industry, a workplace—to be “nuclear.” Hecht shows that questions about being nuclear—a state that she calls “nuclearity”—lie at the heart of today's global nuclear order and the relationships between “developing nations” (often former colonies) and “nuclear powers” (often former colonizers). Hecht enters African nuclear worlds, focusing on miners and the occupational hazard of radiation exposure. Could a mine be a nuclear workplace if (as in some South African mines) its radiation levels went undetected and unmeasured? With this book, Hecht is the first to put Africa in the nuclear world, and the nuclear world in Africa. By doing so, she remakes our understanding of the nuclear age.

Download or read book Living with the Bomb American and Japanese Cultural Conflicts in the Nuclear Age written by Laura E. Hein and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2015-02-18 with total page 309 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The development and use of the atomic bombs at Hiroshima and Nagasaki number among the formative national experiences for both Japanese and Americans as well as for 20th-century Japan-US relations. This volume explores the way in which the bomb has shaped the self-image of both peoples.

Download or read book The Transnational Activist written by Stefan Berger and published by Springer. This book was released on 2017-11-28 with total page 364 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book provides the first historical and comparative study of the ‘transnational activist’. A range of important recent scholarship has considered the rise of global social movements, the presence of transnational networks, and the transfer or diffusion of political techniques. Much of this writing has registered the pivotal role of ‘transnational’ or ‘global’ activists. However, if the significance of the ‘transnational activist’ is now routinely acknowledged, then the history of this actor is still something of a mystery. Most commentators have associated the figure with contemporary history. Hence much of the debate around ‘transnational activism’ is ahistorical, and claims for novelty are not often based on developed historical comparison. As this volume argues, it is possible to identify the ‘transnational activist’ in earlier decades and even centuries. But when did this figure first appear? What are the historical conditions that nurtured its emergence? What are the principal moments in the development of the transnational activist? And do the transnational activists of the Internet age differ in number or nature from those of earlier years? These historical questions will be at the heart of this volume.

Download or read book The UnGandhian Gandhi written by Claude Markovits and published by Anthem Press. This book was released on 2004 with total page 95 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Documentary about deceased photojournalist Tim Hetherington directed by Sebastian Junger. Together with his friend and long-term collaborator Sebastian, Tim travelled the world documenting conflicts in Afghanistan, Liberia and Libya, among other locations. Best known for their 2010 film 'Restrepo' which was nominated for an Academy Award, the two strived to capture the humanity within conflict situations and with their images they focused on the individuals involved and their experiences of the violence surrounding them. Unfortunately, in 2011 Tim was killed by a mortar blast and this film is a tribute and celebration of the legacy he has left behind and includes interviews with those who knew him best.

Download or read book American Educational History Journal written by J. Wesley Null and published by IAP. This book was released on 2009-11-01 with total page 489 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The American Educational History Journal is a peer?reviewed, national research journal devoted to the examination of educational topics using perspectives from a variety of disciplines. The editors of AEHJ encourage communication between scholars from numerous disciplines, nationalities, institutions, and backgrounds. Authors come from a variety of disciplines including political science, curriculum, history, philosophy, teacher education, and educational leadership. Acceptance for publication in AEHJ requires that each author present a well?articulated argument that deals substantively with questions of educational history.

Download or read book Cooperatives in New Orleans written by Anne Gessler and published by Univ. Press of Mississippi. This book was released on 2020-06-15 with total page 296 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Cooperatives have been central to the development of New Orleans. Anne Gessler asserts that local cooperatives have reshaped its built environment by changing where people interact and with whom, helping them collapse social hierarchies and envision new political systems. Gessler tracks many neighborhood cooperatives, spanning from the 1890s to the present, whose alliances with union, consumer, and social justice activists animated successive generations of regional networks and stimulated urban growth in New Orleans. Studying alternative forms of social organization within the city’s multiple integrated spaces, women, people of color, and laborers blended neighborhood-based African, Caribbean, and European communal activism with international cooperative principles to democratize exploitative systems of consumption, production, and exchange. From utopian socialist workers’ unions and Rochdale grocery stores to black liberationist theater collectives and community gardens, these cooperative entities integrated marginalized residents into democratic governance while equally distributing profits among members. Besides economic development, neighborhood cooperatives participated in heady debates over urban land use, applying egalitarian cooperative principles to modernize New Orleans’s crumbling infrastructure, monopolistic food distribution systems, and spotty welfare programs. As Gessler indicates, cooperative activists deployed street-level subsistence tactics to mobilize continual waves of ordinary people seizing control over mainstream economic and political institutions.

Download or read book Realpolitik written by John Bew and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2016 with total page 409 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Now most often associated with the conduct of foreign policy, Realpolitik has traditionally had pejorative connotations in the English-speaking world and sits uneasily alongside notions of "enlightenment," "morality" and "virtue." But it has also had its defenders, admirers and exponents, who regard it as the best tool for the successful wielding of political power and the preservation of global order. As such, Realpolitik has both successes and failures to its name, as Bew's comprehensive and even-handed overview displays. Bew begins by charting the evolution of the idea through the work of important thinkers or statesmen from Machiavelli, Cardinal de Richelieu, and Thomas Hobbes up through Carl Schmitt, Kissinger, and Dennis Ross.

Download or read book Three Mile Island written by Grace Halden and published by Taylor & Francis. This book was released on 2017-06-27 with total page 230 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Three Mile Island explains the far-reaching consequences of the partial meltdown of Pennsylvania’s Three Mile Island power plant on March 28, 1979. Though the disaster was ultimately contained, the fears it triggered had an immediate and lasting impact on public attitudes towards nuclear energy in the United States. In this volume, Grace Halden contextualizes the events at Three Mile Island and the ensuing media coverage, offering a gripping portrait of a nation coming to terms with technological advances that inspired both awe and terror. Including a selection of key primary documents, this book offers a fascinating resource for students of the history of science, technology, the environment, and Cold War culture.