Download or read book The Size of Nations written by Alberto Alesina and published by MIT Press. This book was released on 2005-01-14 with total page 286 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The authors of this timely and provocative book use the tools of economic analysis to examine the formation and change of political borders. They argue that while these issues have always been at the core of historical analysis, international economists have tended to regard the size of a country as "exogenous," or no more subject to explanation than the location of a mountain range or the course of a river. Alesina and Spolaore consider a country's borders to be subject to the same analysis as any other man-made institution. In The Size of Nations, they argue that the optimal size of a country is determined by a cost-benefit trade-off between the benefits of size and the costs of heterogeneity. In a large country, per capita costs may be low, but the heterogeneous preferences of a large population make it hard to deliver services and formulate policy. Smaller countries may find it easier to respond to citizen preferences in a democratic way. Alesina and Spolaore substantiate their analysis with simple analytical models that show how the patterns of globalization, international conflict, and democratization of the last two hundred years can explain patterns of state formation. Their aim is not only "normative" but also "positive"—that is, not only to compute the optimal size of a state in theory but also to explain the phenomenon of country size in reality. They argue that the complexity of real world conditions does not preclude a systematic analysis, and that such an analysis, synthesizing economics, political science, and history, can help us understand real world events.
Download or read book Blood and Debt written by Miguel Angel Centeno and published by Penn State Press. This book was released on 2015-08-26 with total page 203 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: What role does war play in political development? Our understanding of the rise of the nation-state is based heavily on the Western European experience of war. Challenging the dominance of this model, Blood and Debt looks at Latin America's much different experience as more relevant to politics today in regions as varied as the Balkans and sub-Saharan Africa. The book's illuminating review of the relatively peaceful history of Latin America from the late eighteenth through the early twentieth centuries reveals the lack of two critical prerequisites needed for war: a political and military culture oriented toward international violence, and the state institutional capacity to carry it out. Using innovative new data such as tax receipts, naming of streets and public monuments, and conscription records, the author carefully examines how war affected the fiscal development of the state, the creation of national identity, and claims to citizenship. Rather than building nation-states and fostering democratic citizenship, he shows, war in Latin America destroyed institutions, confirmed internal divisions, and killed many without purpose or glory.
Download or read book State of the Nation written by Sakhela Buhlungu and published by . This book was released on 2006 with total page 572 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Comprises a collection of essays on aspects of contemporary politics, economics, society and international relations in South Africa.
Download or read book Crafting State Nations written by Alfred Stepan and published by JHU Press. This book was released on 2011-03-31 with total page 331 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Empirically thorough and conceptually clear, Crafting State-Nations will have a substantial impact on the study of comparative political institutions and the conception and understanding of nationalism and democracy.
Download or read book States Nations and Borders written by Allen Buchanan and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2003-03-31 with total page 380 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This volume examines comparatively the views and principles of seven prominent ethical traditions on one of the most pressing issues of modern politics - the making and unmaking of state and national boundaries. The traditions represented are Judaism, Christianity, Islam, natural law, Confucianism, liberalism and international law. Each contributor, an expert within one of these traditions, shows how that tradition can handle the five dominant methods of altering state and national boundaries: conquest, settlement, purchase, inheritance and secession. Written by a distinguished group of international specialists this volume is unique in providing both in-depth normative and comparative perspectives on a troubling question that will offer readers real insight into inter-tradition conflict. Those readers will range from upper-level undergraduates to scholars in such fields as philosophy, political science, international relations and comparative religion.
Download or read book The Reconstruction of Nations written by Timothy Snyder and published by Yale University Press. This book was released on 2004-07-11 with total page 388 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Yet he begins with the principles of toleration that prevailed in much of early modern eastern Europe and concludes with the peaceful resolution of national tensions in the region since 1989.".
Download or read book The State of the World s Cities 2004 2005 written by and published by UN-HABITAT. This book was released on 2004 with total page 217 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: As towns and cities expand at unprecedented rates, sustainable urban development is one of the most pressing challenges facing the international community in the 21st century. This publication examines the realities faced by urban populations around the world, focusing on the impact of globalisation and the way cities are governed and planned, on the make-up and density of their population, and on their cultures and economies. Issues considered include: the impact of globalisation on urban culture; urban renewal and cultural strategies; the concept of metropolitanization; socio-economic and cultural impacts of international migration; urban poverty and homelessness, social inequality and exclusion; urban governance, safety and crime trends; contemporary planning strategies and the role of civil society; progress towards attainment of the Millennium Development Goals targets for sanitation and housing. The report highlights the need for a new culture of planning to establish multicultural and inclusive cities, involving civil society as well as public authorities.
Download or read book Race and Nation in Modern Latin America written by Nancy P. Appelbaum and published by Univ of North Carolina Press. This book was released on 2003-11-20 with total page 358 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This collection brings together innovative historical work on race and national identity in Latin America and the Caribbean and places this scholarship in the context of interdisciplinary and transnational discussions regarding race and nation in the Americas. Moving beyond debates about whether ideologies of racial democracy have actually served to obscure discrimination, the book shows how notions of race and nationhood have varied over time across Latin America's political landscapes. Framing the themes and questions explored in the volume, the editors' introduction also provides an overview of the current state of the interdisciplinary literature on race and nation-state formation. Essays on the postindependence period in Belize, Brazil, Colombia, Cuba, Mexico, Panama, and Peru consider how popular and elite racial constructs have developed in relation to one another and to processes of nation building. Contributors also examine how ideas regarding racial and national identities have been gendered and ask how racialized constructions of nationhood have shaped and limited the citizenship rights of subordinated groups. The contributors are Sueann Caulfield, Sarah C. Chambers, Lillian Guerra, Anne S. Macpherson, Aims McGuinness, Gerardo Renique, James Sanders, Alexandra Minna Stern, and Barbara Weinstein.
Download or read book Travelling Concepts written by Christian Lammert and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2009-12-03 with total page 305 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 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.
Download or read book Pedagogies of the Global written by Arif Dirlik and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2015-12-03 with total page 450 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The essays in this collection address questions raised by a modernity that has become global with the victory of capitalism over its competitors in the late twentieth century. Rather than erase difference by converting all to European-American norms of modernity, capitalist modernity as it has gone global has empowered societies once condemned to imprisonment in premodernity or tradition to make their own claims on modernity, on the basis of those very traditions, as filtered through experiences of colonialism, neocolonialism, or simple marginalization by the forces of globalization. Global modernity appears presently not as global homogeneity, but as a site of conflict between forces of homogenization and heterogenization within and between nations. Prominent in this context are conflicts over different ways of knowing and organizing the world. The essays here, dealing for the most part with education in the United States, engage in critiques of hegemonic ways of knowing and critically evaluate counterhegemonic voices for change that are heard from a broad spectrum of social, ethnic, and indigenous perspectives. Crucial to the essays' critique of hegemony in contemporary pedagogy is an effort shared by the contributors, distinguished scholars in their various fields, to overcome area and/or disciplinary boundaries and take the wholeness of everyday life as their point of departure.
Download or read book The Cosmopolitan State written by H Patrick Glenn and published by OUP Oxford. This book was released on 2013-05-23 with total page 399 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The idea of the 'nation-state' has failed, Glenn argues, and a major shift in our understanding of the state is needed. He provides an original approach by situating cosmopolitanism in its historical context and demonstrating that the state is necessarily cosmopolitan in character, and has always been subject to transnational law-making.
Download or read book A People s History of the United States written by Howard Zinn and published by Harper Collins. This book was released on 2003-02-04 with total page 764 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Since its original landmark publication in 1980, A People's History of the United States has been chronicling American history from the bottom up, throwing out the official version of history taught in schools -- with its emphasis on great men in high places -- to focus on the street, the home, and the, workplace. Known for its lively, clear prose as well as its scholarly research, A People's History is the only volume to tell America's story from the point of view of -- and in the words of -- America's women, factory workers, African-Americans, Native Americans, the working poor, and immigrant laborers. As historian Howard Zinn shows, many of our country's greatest battles -- the fights for a fair wage, an eight-hour workday, child-labor laws, health and safety standards, universal suffrage, women's rights, racial equality -- were carried out at the grassroots level, against bloody resistance. Covering Christopher Columbus's arrival through President Clinton's first term, A People's History of the United States, which was nominated for the American Book Award in 1981, features insightful analysis of the most important events in our history. Revised, updated, and featuring a new after, word by the author, this special twentieth anniversary edition continues Zinn's important contribution to a complete and balanced understanding of American history.
Download or read book Eastern Europe 3 volumes written by Richard Frucht and published by Bloomsbury Publishing USA. This book was released on 2004-12-22 with total page 951 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A contemporary analysis of the people, cultures, and society within the regions that make up Eastern Europe. Eastern Europe: An Introduction to the People, Lands, and Culture sheds light on modern-day life in the 16 nations comprising Eastern Europe. Going beyond the history and politics already well documented in other works, this unique three-volume series explores the social and cultural aspects of a region often ignored in books and curricula on Western civilization. The volumes are organized by geographic proximity and commonality in historical development, allowing the countries to be both studied individually and juxtaposed against others in the region. The first volume covers the northern tier of states, the second looks at lands that were once part of the Hapsburg empire, and the third examines the Balkan states. Each chapter profiles a single country—its geography, history, political development, economy, and culture—and gives readers a glimpse of the challenges that lie ahead. Vignettes on various topics of interest illuminate the unique character of each country.
Download or read book Gender Governance and International Security written by Nicola Pratt and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2016-04-08 with total page 166 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The United Nations Security Council, in 2000, unanimously passed a resolution calling for women’s increased participation in conflict prevention and peacebuilding, as well as their protection during conflict. This marked the first time that the UN Security Council explicitly addressed gender issues in ‘conflict’ and ‘post-conflict’ situations. But what difference has this international agenda on ‘Women, Peace and Security’ made to women’s lives on the ground and to the governance of international peace and security? This volume provides a critical evaluation of the mainstreaming of gender issues in matters of international peace and security resulting from the passage of Resolution 1325 in 2000. It considers how this agenda actually plays out in different contexts, and with what implications for women’s activism and for peace and security. The picture that emerges is not uniform, obliging us to reconsider the links between gender, conflict, different visions of peace and, consequently, different projects of peacebuilding. Consequently, the book poses new questions for transnational feminist scholars and activists. This book was based on a special issue of the International Feminist Journal of Politics.
Download or read book State Nation Transnation written by Katie Willis and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2004-05-05 with total page 335 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This edited volume examines the relationship between the nation and the transnation, focusing on transnational communities in the Asia-Pacific region. Setting the book within a theoretical framework, the authors explore a range of themes such as migration, identity and citizenship in chapters on China, the Philippines, Malaysia, Vietnam, Japan, Indonesia, Australia, Singapore and Cambodia.
Download or read book Soldered states nation building in Germany and Vietnam written by Claire Sutherland and published by Manchester University Press. This book was released on 2018-04-30 with total page 209 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The book examines the power of nationalism to solder nation-states back together rather than break them apart. In this innovative, cross-continental comparison of nation-building in Germany and Vietnam, the focus is on their shared experience of division, communism and regional integration, offering original insights into how governments go about maintaining nation-state legitimacy in the twenty-first century. Neither German nor Vietnamese governments have succeeded in effacing national division, for a host of historical, economic, psychological, sociological and even climatic reasons. Yet their efforts tell us a great deal about how national identity is negotiated today. The study offers a fresh perspective on nationalist ideology which will be of interest to specialists and students in comparative politics, European and Southeast Asian studies as well as nationalism studies. For the general reader, it provides a fascinating introduction to contemporary nation-building in a unique combination of cases across two continents.
Download or read book Transnational Terrorism written by Steven M. Chermak and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2019-11-11 with total page 393 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The dramatic terrorist attacks of 9/11 highlighted significant gaps in research on the topic as governments, community groups, social service agencies and law enforcement agencies were forced to respond without any evidence-based guidance on best practices for tactics, strategies, and policy development. The essays selected for this volume demonstrate that transnational terrorism is now a thriving area of study and display the breadth and depth of scholarship that has recently been published. The research draws attention to global patterns of transnational terrorism; highlights various structural and cultural explanations; provides an overview of some of the ways that terrorism impacts society; and discusses strategies used to effectively respond to transnational terrorism. This volume, which is of interest to academics, policymakers and practitioners, provides a repository of some of the best contemporary research in this field.
