|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
From: The Law and Politics Book Review
BOOK NOTICES: Vol 23 (12): 658-700
As a service to subscribers, the REVIEW provides this brief summary of the contents of recent reference works, anthologies of previously published materials, textbooks and collected readings designed for students, casebooks designed for undergraduate and law school use, later editions of books previously reviewed in this journal, and other specialized publications. Unless noted, the comments are taken from the book's jacket cover or the publisher's webpage.
******************
International Courts Association
The Kent State University Press
Norton & Company, Incorporated, W. W.
University of British Columbia Press
[*658]
______________________________________________________________________________
Cambridge
University
Press
_____________________________________________________________________________
******************
Arctic Security in an Age of Climate Change, by James Kraska. Cambridge University Press, 2011. 312 pp. $90.00 ISBN: 978-1-107-00660-7.
This is the first book to examine Arctic defense policy and military security from the perspective of all eight Arctic states. In light of climate change and melting ice in the Arctic Ocean, Canada, Russia, Denmark (Greenland), Norway, and the United States, as well as Iceland, Sweden, and Finland, are grappling with an emerging Arctic security paradigm. This volume brings together the world's most seasoned Arctic political-military experts from Europe and North America to analyze how Arctic nations are adapting their security postures to accommodate increased shipping, expanding naval presence, and energy and mineral development in the polar region. The book analyzes the ascent of Russia as the first "Arctic superpower," the growing importance of polar security for NATO and the Nordic states, and the increasing role of Canada and the United States in the region.
*****************
Congress and the Politics of Problem Solving, by Scot E. Adler and John D. Wilkerson. Cambridge University Press, 2012. 246pp. $29.99 ISBN:978-1-107-67031-0.
Congress and the Politics of Problem Solving shows how a simple premise – voters are willing to hold lawmakers accountable for their collective problem-solving abilities – can produce novel insights into legislative organization, behavior, and output. How do issues end up on the agenda? Why do lawmakers routinely invest in program oversight and broad policy development? What considerations drive legislative policy change? Knowing that their prospects for reelection are partly dependent on their collective problem-solving abilities, lawmakers support structures that enhance the legislature's capacity to address problems in society and encourage members to contribute to nonparticularistic policy-making activities. The resulting insights are innovative and substantial: incumbents of both parties have electoral incentives to be concerned about Congress's collective performance; the legislative issue agenda can often be predicted years in advance; nearly all important successful legislation originates in committee; many laws pass with bipartisan support;and electoral replacement, partisan or otherwise, is not the most robust predictor of policy change. The electoral imperative to address problems in society offers a compelling explanation for these findings and provides an important new perspective on the dynamics of lawmaking in legislatures.
[*659]
*****************
The Dynamic Constitution: An Introduction to American Constitutional Law and Practice, by Richard H. Fallon Jr. Cambridge University Press, 2013. 401 pp. $29.99 ISBN: 978-1-107-64257-7.
In this revised and updated second edition of The Dynamic Constitution, Richard H. Fallon, Jr provides an engaging, sophisticated introduction to American constitutional law. Suitable for lawyers and non-lawyers alike, this book discusses contemporary constitutional doctrine involving such issues as freedom of speech, freedom of religion, rights to privacy and sexual autonomy, the death penalty, and the powers of Congress. Through examples of Supreme Court cases and portraits of past and present Justices, this book dramatizes the historical and cultural factors that have shaped constitutional law. The Dynamic Constitution, Second Edition, combines detailed explication of current doctrine with insightful analysis of the political culture and theoretical debates in which constitutional practice is situated. Professor Fallon uses insights from political science to explain some aspects of constitutional evolution and emphasizes features of the judicial process that distinguish constitutional law from ordinary politics.
*****************
East Asian Challenge for Democracy, by Daniel A. Bell. Cambridge University Press, 2011. 392pp. Hardcover $90.00 ISBN: 978-1-107-62377-4. Paperback 36.99. ISBN 9781107623774.
The rise of China, along with problems of governance in democratic countries, has reinvigorated the theory of political meritocracy. But what is the theory of political meritocracy and how can it set standards for evaluating political progress (and regress)? Can meritocracy be reconciled with democracy and if so, how? What is the history of political meritocracy and what can it teach us today? How is political meritocracy practiced in contemporary societies – in China, Singapore, and elsewhere - and what are its advantages and disadvantages in terms of producing just outcomes and contributing to good governance? To help answer these questions, this volume gathers a series of commissioned research papers from an interdisciplinary group of leading philosophers, historians, and social scientists. The result is the first book in decades to examine the rise (or revival) of political meritocracy and what it will mean for political developments in China and the rest of the world. Despite its limitations, meritocracy has contributed much to human flourishing in East Asia and beyond and will continue to do so in the future. This book is essential reading for those who wish to further the debate and perhaps even help to implement desirable forms of political change.
*****************
[*660]
Public Services and International Trade Liberalization, by Barnali Chourdhury. Cambridge University Press, 2011. 349 pp. $115.00 ISBN: 978-1-107-02656-8.
Does public service liberalization pose a threat to gender and human rights? Traditionally considered essential services provided by a state to its citizens, public services are often viewed as public goods which embody social values. Subjecting them to market ideology thus raises concerns that the intrinsic social nature of these services will be negated. Moreover, as those most likely to be reliant on public services,public service liberalization may also further marginalize women. Nevertheless, states continue to increasingly liberalize public services. Barnali Choudhury explores the implications of public service liberalization. Using primarily a legal approach, but drawing from case studies, empirical research and gender theories, she examines whether liberalization under the General Agreement on Trade in Services and other liberalization vehicles such as preferential trade and investment agreements compromise human rights and gender objectives.
*****************
______________________________________________________________________________
Carolina
Academic
Press
______________________________________________________________________________
******************
Bix, Brian. Jurisprudence: Theory and Context, 6th Edition. Carolina Academic Press, 2011. 342 pp. $40.00 ISBN: 978-1-61163-311-5.
Jurisprudence is aimed at students new to the study of legal philosophy, also offering new ideas and perspectives that will be of interest to established scholars. Bix seeks to explain the often complex and difficult ideas in Jurisprudence clearly, but in a way that avoids distortion of the ideas through over-simplification. As well as introducing the reader to the fundamental themes in legal philosophy, it also describes and comments critically on the writing of the foremost legal theorists.
*****************
DuVivier, K.K. The Renewable Energy Reader. Carolina Academic Press, 2012. 425 pp. $50.00 ISBN: 978-1-59460-873-5.
The Renewable Energy Reader is a concise, reader-friendly source book for U.S. renewable energy law. Each chapter provides historical background as well as illustrations and technology [*661] charts to give readers context for better understanding renewable energy sources and related legal issues. Each chapter also includes closely-edited excerpts from some of the most prominent primary and secondary legal sources – articles, cases, statutes, and regulations – highlighting current and potential legal challenges to the advancement of renewable resources. This book provides an accessible reference for lawyers, law students, policy-makers, and the general public, providing an overview of the significant legal implications of renewable energy development.
*****************
Erez, Edna, Michael Kilching,and Jo-Anne Wemmers. Therapeutic Jurisprudence and Victim Participation in Justice. Carolina Academic Press, 2011. 294 pp. $50.00 ISBN: 978-1-59460-946-6.
This book employs
principles of therapeutic jurisprudence (TJ) to examine how various
countries approach victim participation in criminal justice proceedings.
It collects papers from a conference in Onati, Spain, that was supported
by a grant from the Transcoop Programme of the Alexander Von Humboldt
Foundation to study the potential impact of TJ approaches on victims.
The Onati conference broke important ground by addressing victim welfare
and well-being during and after participation in criminal justice
proceedings and brought scholars from different disciples and nations
together to share their ideas. The resulting collection brings these
ideas to a wider audience in the fields of law, legal studies,
sociology,psychology and criminology/ victimology. The contributors are
recognized researchers in their home countries and the collection
provides yet another critical and empirical research contribution from a
TJ perspective.
*****************
Fisher, Louis and Katy J. Harriger. Free Constitutional Structures: Separated Powers and Federalism. Carolina Academic Press, 2013. 1180 pp. $55.00 ISBN: 978-1-61163-353-5.
*****************
Fisher, Louis and Katy J Harriger. Constitutional Rights. Carolina Academic Press, 2013. 724 pp. $65.00 ISBN: 978-1-61163-354-2.
*****************
Head, John W. Global Business Law. Carolina Academic Press, 2012. 856 pp. $95.00 ISBN: 978-1-61163-151-7.
This text, completely updated from the Second Edition, provides students and practitioners of international business law with a clear “story line” that addresses key questions facing international lawyers as they advise clients on a broad range of business issues – especially those of a transactional character. The book's first two chapters are aimed at “orienteering”, to explain (1) where international business law fits within the larger context of international law, (2) what main legal traditions practitioners will face in working with clients and counsel from other cultures, and (3) what sources of assistance are available to facilitate that work (e.g., local counsel, translators, etc.). Chapters 3 to 6then march the reader through a variety of critical issues on contract drafting, standard terms (e.g., Incoterms), documentary sales transactions, electronic commerce, and more. Chapters 7 and 8 shift the focus away from sales of goods and toward two related forms of international business that stand partway between commerce and investment namely, licensing of production abroad and international franchising. Then, in Chapters 9, 10, and 11, the book turns to foreign direct investment. Again, the approach is heavily practice-oriented. The book then closes, in Chapters 12 and 13, with a series of “cross-cutting issues” that apply to all forms of international business – including dispute resolution, corrupt practices, wire transfers, anti-competition rules, and the like.
*****************
Kreml, William P. Congress The Bias of Temperament In American Politics. Carolina Academic Press, 2013. 170 pp. $22.00 ISBN: 978-1-61163-361-0.
Building on Prof. William Kreml's prior work on the cognitive balances between analytic and synthetic kinds of minds, particularly as they are revealed in the contrast between Kantian and Hegelian preferences for different knowledge forms, Kreml demonstrates how the American political and legal systems favor the analytic forms of thinking that serves the access to government of powerful interest groups and excludes the synthetic, aggregated forms of decision-making that advance the [*664] public good. The American system, in other words, cognitively shapes the very understanding of public issues in a way that results in an almost automatic preference for oligarchic, rule of the few, policy outcomes.
Kreml's cognitively based interpretations of the uniquely centrifugal American government, along with his reinterpretation of Supreme Court cases like Shelley v. Kraemer (1948), which initiated the sole cognitively alternating dialectical period in Supreme Court history, accompany his argument that the Bill of Rights was intended to be a synthetic, politically majoritarian document. Subsequent analytically-biased and English common law induced individual rights interpretations of the Bill of Rights have fostered damaging First Amendment rulings such as are found in the campaign finance case of Citizens United v. FEC (2010). Specific recommendations for constitutional reform, such as the abolition of the mid-term House of Representatives election and the concurrent running of the House term with the presidential term, along with the balancing of analytic, common law legal interpretations with more cognitively-balanced civil law-like interpretations, are included.
*****************
May, Randolph J. Communications Law and Policy in the Digital Age. Carolina Academic Press, 2012. 202pp. $25.00 Paper. ISBN: 978-1-61163-212-5.
The marketplace and technological changes that have occurred since the last major revision of the Communications Act in 1996 have rendered existing law and policy woefully outdated, if not obsolete. In the past fifteen years there has been a switch from analog to digital services, from narrow band to broadband networks, and, most importantly, from a mostly monopolistic to a generally competitive environment. In Communications Law and Policy in the Digital Age: The Next Five Years, some of the nation's most eminent scholars explain why communications law and policy should be changed in response to these profound marketplace transitions. And,as importantly, the contributors explain how law and policy should be changed.
There are many specific reform proposals offered in this collection of essays. Given the competition that has developed across most communications markets, the recommendations generally call for less government regulation and more marketplace freedom. With its forward-looking proposals, the book should be particularly valuable not only for academics and students, but for policymakers and law practitioners as well. Topics covered in the chapters include broadband and Internet policy, net neutrality regulation, spectrum policy and spectrum auctions, wireless regulation, universal service reform, public media reform, a new Digital Age Communications Act, and the political economy of communications reform.
Contributors include Representative Marsha Blackburn, Michelle Connolly, Seth Cooper, Ellen Goodman, Daniel Lyons, Randolph May, Bruce Owen, James Speta, and Christopher Yoo.
[*665]
*****************
Oppenheimer, David B., and Allan Brotsky. The Great Dissents of the "Lone Dissenter": Justice Jesse W. Carter's Twenty Tumultuous Years on the California Supreme Court. Carolina Academic Press, 2010. 282 pp. $40.00 ISBN: 978-1-594-60810-1.
Jesse W. Carter served as a justice on the California Supreme Court from 1939-1959, where he was known as “The Lone Dissenter” because he wrote so many solo dissents. Many of these opinions were in passionate defense of civil rights, civil liberties, and the rights of labor, criminal defendants, and personal injury victims. Several of the cases were reversed by the United States Supreme Court, or by later decisions of the California Supreme Court, adopting Justice Carter’s reasoning. This book combines essays on several of those dissents, written by faculty and friends of Golden Gate University School of Law, where Carter earned his law degree in 1913, as well as an essay on the role of dissenting opinions by another great dissenter, Justice William Brennan.
*****************
Shane, Peter M, and Jeffrey Hunker, eds. Cybersecurity: Shared Risks, Shared Responsibilities. 2013. 344pp. Paper $43.00 ISBN: 978-1-61163-159-3.
It is impossible to overstate the importance of America’s cyber infrastructure to our individual welfare and national security. Yet, cybercrime is rampant. Critical systems are vulnerable to malicious forms of electronic intrusion and interference. The U.S. is both the source and target of international cyber aggression. How the U.S. responds to these challenges depends partly on questions within the specialized domain of scientists and engineers. But questions of policy, well within the understanding of non-expert citizens, also loom large – and the public, by and large, is not discussing them. Cybersecurity: Shared Risks, Shared Responsibilities aims to make key issues accessible to a broad readership.
Experts in law, business, public policy, information and computer science, and national security have joined in this volume to stimulate an informed public dialogue that moves past political shibboleths and toward a nuanced understanding of the cybersecurity challenge and the tradeoffs entailed in formulating a sensible national response. Their work focuses on a variety of key issues largely missing from most cybersecurity discussions: Why is the formulation of coherent national cyber policy so difficult? Under what circumstances can public-private partnerships – the oft-touted institutional vehicle for promoting cybersecurity – actually be expected to work? What are the appropriate roles for legal regulation, whether at the state,national, and international level? Has our federal government conceptualized its role and organized its resources to counter cyber threats more effectively? Can the general public play a more meaningful role in shaping national cybersecurity policy?
[*666]
*****************
Walker, Clive and Russell L. Weaver. Free Speech in an Internet Era. Carolina Academic Press, 2013. 262 pp. $40.00 ISBN: 978-1-61163-407-5.
The Internet has impacted on the media in many crucial ways. Practices and laws have evolved, and the Internet has even exerted an existential influence over the format and viability of contemporary media outlets. In order to explore this important and on-going interaction, the Fifth Free Speech Discussion Forum assembled in London in 2012, involving a combination of leading scholars and practicing lawyers from North America and Europe. The papers in this collection therefore reflect a rich range of jurisdictions and experiences, with comparative approaches strongly to the fore. Some chapters deal directly with issues around the battles for survival of the established print and broadcast media in an Internet age. The Internet is also having profound effects on the delivery of mass free speech by forcing us to reconsider new approaches to legal designs and practices, especially within the jurisprudence of privacy, defamation, obscenity, and counter-terrorism. At the same time, the Internet must be equally acknowledged as offering considerable advantages for the production and publication of free speech by opening sources of information and channels of communication. Those who ignore the Internet’s transformative capacity in the development of media law invite the fate of early redundancy or easy evasion.Thus, the chapters in this book offer original and authoritative insights into core debates around the interactions between the Internet, media, and law.
*****************
Wolf, Ross, Charles Mesloh, and Robert H Wood. Constitutional Limitations of Interviewing and Interrogations in American Policing. Carolina Academic Press, 2013. 141 pp. $22.00 ISBN: 978-1-61163-193-7.
Interviews and interrogations of suspects, witnesses, and victims are still the most important evidence available to police officers today. Crime scene evidence, including DNA samples, blood samples, fingerprints, and shoe tracks may be instrumental in making a case in court, but often physical evidence cannot be located without a properly conducted, thorough preliminary investigation which may include both interviews of witnesses and victims and interrogations of suspects. It is difficult for the most seasoned criminal lawyer to keep up with the various interpretations of law; yet law enforcement officers are tasked with not only being able to comprehend decisions and how they impact their processes and the rules of criminal procedure, but to diligently and correctly interpret those rulings into rapidly-evolving situations on the street or in an interrogation room.
*****************
[*667]
______________________________________________________________________________
Hart
Publishing
______________________________________________________________________________
*****************
Badar, Mohamed E. The Concept of Mens Rea in International Criminal Law. Hart Publishing, 2013. 540 pp. £90.00 ISBN: 978-1-841-13760-5.
The purpose of this book is to find a unified approach to the doctrine of mens rea in the sphere of international criminal law, based on an in-depth comparative analysis of different legal systems and the jurisprudence of international criminal tribunals since Nuremberg. Part I examines the concept of mens rea in common and continental legal systems, as well as its counterpart in Islamic Shari'a law. Part II looks at the jurisprudence of the post-Second World War trials, the work of the International Law Commission and the concept of genocidal intent in light of the travaux préparatoires of the 1948 Genocide Convention. Further chapters are devoted to a discussion of the boundaries of mens rea in the jurisprudence of the International Criminal Tribunals for the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda. The final chapter examines the definition of the mental element as provided for in Article 30 of the Statute of the International Criminal Court in light of the recent decisions delivered by the International Criminal Court.
*****************
Bankes, Nigel and Timo Koivurova. Congress The Proposed Nordic Saami Convention. Hart Publishing, 2013. 417 pp. $124.95 ISBN: 978-1-84946-272-3.
In 2005, an expert group
representing the governments of Norway, Sweden, and Finland, as well as
the Saami parliaments of these countries (Saami are the Nordic
indigenous people), agreed upon a draft text of a Nordic Saami
Convention. Key parts of the text deal with the recognition of Saami
land and resource rights. More recently, the three governments have
embarked on negotiations to move from this draft text to final
convention that can be adopted and ratified by all three countries.
Negotiations commenced in the Spring of 2011 and should be completed
within five years. Divided into four parts, this collection of essays
explores the national and international dimensions of the Convention,
which recognizes the Saami as one people divided by international
boundaries. The first part of the book provides a global and theoretical
context for these developments in the Nordic countries with a series of
essays dealing with the moral and legal reasons for recognizing
indigenous property interests and different conceptualizations of the
relationship between indigenous peoples and settler societies, including
recognition, reconciliation, and pluralism. Part two of the book
examines some international legal issues associated with the Convention,
including the background to the Convention. Part three turns to examine
aspects of the recognition of Saami property interests in each of the
three Nordic states. [*668]
The fourth part provides some comparative experiences,examining the recognition of indigenous property rights in a number of jurisdictions, including Canada, Australia, and a number of South American countries. An additional essay considers gender issues in relation to indigenous property rights.
*****************
Burke, Ciarán. An Equitable Framework for Humanitarian Intervention. Hart Publishing, 2013. 389 pp. £60.00 ISBN: 978-1-84946-404-8.
This book aims to resolve
the dilemma regarding whether armed intervention as a response to gross
human rights violations is ever legally justified without Security
Council authorisation. Thus far, international lawyers have been caught
between giving a negative answer on the basis of the UN Charter's rules
('positivists'), and a 'turn to ethics', declaring intervention
legitimate on moral grounds, while eschewing legal analysis
('moralists'). In this volume, a third solution is proposed. The idea is
presented that many equitable principles may qualify as 'general
principles of law recognised by civilised nations' – one of the three
principal sources of international law (though a category that is often
overlooked) – a conclusion based upon detailed research of both national
legal systems and international law. These principles, having normative
force in international law, are then used to craft an equitable
framework for humanitarian intervention. It is argued that the dynamics
of their operation allow them to interact with the Charter and customary
law in order to fill gaps in the existing legal structure and soften the
rigours of strict law in certain circumstances. It is posited that many
of the moralists' arguments are justified, albeit based upon firm legal
principles rather than ethical theory.The equitable framework proposed
is designed to provide an answer to the question of how humanitarian
intervention may be integrated into the legal realm. Certainly, this
will not mean an end to controversies regarding concrete cases of
humanitarian intervention. However, it will enable the framing of such
controversies in legal terms, rather than as a choice between the law
and morality.
*****************
Dougan, Michael, and Niamh Nic Shuibhne and Eleanor Spaventa (eds). Empowerment and Disempowerment of the European Citizen. Hart Publishing, 2012. 330 pp. £55.00 ISBN: 978-1-84946-235-8.
This collection of essays engages with a central theme in scholarship on EU citizenship – the emancipation of certain citizens, the alienation of others – and seeks to expand its horizons to interrogate whether similar debates and trends can be identified in other fields of European [*669] integration. The focus of the book is distinctly citizen focused. It delivers the potential for the opening out of analysis of the implications of European citizenship beyond the parameters of Articles 18-25 TFEU and beyond the disciplinary confines of legal analysis alone. The book construes 'EU citizenship' in its broadest sense, and explores the extent to which the European citizen is, or indeed is not, genuinely at the heart of EU law and policy-making. Within the broader theme of empowerment and disempowerment, the contributors reflect on a range of cross-cutting themes;for example, the extent to which channels of citizen participation (can) inform EU policy-making in a 'bottom-up' sense; or whether the EU is a catalyst for the construction of new spaces and new identities.
*****************
Durán, Gracia M., and Elisa Morgera. Environmental Integration in the EU's External Relations. Hart Publishing, 2012. 380 pp. £55.00 ISBN: 978-1-84946-187-0.
The book examines the
integration of environmental protection requirements into EU external
relations focusing on unilateral, bilateral and inter-regional
instruments, which have been less explored than the multilateral
dimension of EU environmental policy. The book also explores for the
first time the complex interplay and mutual influences between EU
environmental integration initiatives and environmental multilateralism.
On the one hand it identifies the legal and other instruments used by
the EU to support the implementation of multilateral environmental
agreements in third countries (particularly developing ones). On the
other hand, it singles out the legal and other tools employed by the EU
as a means to build partnerships with third countries in order to
influence ongoing multilateral negotiations concerning the environment
and sustainable development, or to contribute to the development of new
international environmental norms in the absence of such multilateral
negotiations.
Ultimately, the book traces the significant evolution of the various tools deployed by the EU to integrate environmental concerns in its external relations, with a view to identifying emerging challenges and future directions.
*****************
Geva, Benjamin. The Payment Order of Antiquity and the Middle Ages. Hart Publishing, 2011. 736 pp. £103.00 ISBN: 978-1-84946-052-1.
Examining the legal history
of the order to pay money initiating a funds transfer, the author tracks
basic principles of modern law to those that governed the payment order
of Antiquity and [*670] the Middle Ages. Exploring the legal nature of
the payment order and its underpinning in light of contemporary
institutions and payment mechanisms, the book traces the evolution of
money, payment mechanisms and the law that governs them, from
developments in Ancient Mesopotamia, Ancient Greece, Rome, and
Greco-Roman Egypt, through medieval Europe and post-medieval England.
Doctrine is examined in Jewish, Islamic, Roman, common and civil laws.
Investigating such diverse legal systems and doctrines at the
intersection of laws governing bank deposits, obligations, the
assignment of debts, and negotiable instruments, the author identifies
the common denominator for the evolving legal principles and speculates
on possible reciprocity. At the same time he challenges the idea of 'law
merchant' as a mercantile creation.
*****************
Gut, Till. Counsel Misconduct before the International Criminal Court. Hart Publishing, 2012. 372 pp. £82.00 ISBN: 978-1-84946-317-1.
This is the first comprehensive study of the law governing professional misconduct by defence lawyers before the International Criminal Court. The ICC's regulatory regime was introduced in response to instances of misconduct experienced by other international and domestic criminal courts. The book first turns to how the ICC's forerunners the International Criminal Tribunals – for the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda and the Special Court for Sierra Leone – coped with misconduct, often resulting in controversy. The book also looks at the approaches that have evolved in Germany and the United States, reflecting the different role of defence lawyers in the civil and common law criminal justice traditions.
The book offers a unique insight into the professional responsibilities
of defence lawyers within the various international and national
regimes. Offering practical guidance on disciplinary systems and other
sanctioning mechanisms, it also explores the inherent tension at the
heart of the defence lawyer's role: to ensure the human right to a fair
trial we want them to be zealous advocates for their clients; at the
same time we ask them to commit themselves as officers of the court.
*****************
Heremans, Tinne. Professional
Services
in the EU Internal Market: Quality Regulation and Self
Regulation. Hart Publishing, 2012. 366pp. $164.00 ISBN:
978-1-84946-240-2. [*671]
Professional services are a
key component of the EU internal market economy yet also significantly
challenge the legal framework governing this internal market. Indeed,
specific professional regulatory structures, which are often the result
of a blend of government and self-regulation, hold clear potential for
conflict with EU free movement and competition law rules. Hence this
book looks at the manner in which both free movement and competition
laws might apply to such self- and co-regulatory set-ups, and at the
leeway given to quality considerations (apparently) conflicting with
free movement or competition objectives. In addition, since court action
will seldom suffice to genuinely integrate a market, the book also
explores those instruments of EU secondary legislation that are likely
to impact the most on the provision of professional services.
However, the book goes beyond a mere inventory to ask how EU Internal
Market policy could contribute to the optimal legal environment for
professional services. A law and economics analysis is employed to
investigate the need for specific professional rules, the preferred type
of regulator (self-, co- or government regulation), and the level
national and/or European at which regulation should be adopted.
As becomes clear, the story of the market for professional services is
one of market and government failure; the author is thus left to compare
imperfect situations where market failures compete with rent-seeking
efforts, the tendency towards over-centralisation and national
protectionism.
*****************
Kentridge, Sydney Q.C. Free Country: Selected Lectures and Talks. Hart Publishing, 2012. 180pp. $42.00 ISBN: 978-1-84946-467-3.
This book offers an up-to-date, scholarly overview of the law of foreign investment, incorporating a thorough and succinct analysis of the principles and standards of treatment available to foreign investors in international law. It is authoritative and multi-layered, offering an analysis of the key issues and an insightful assessment of recent trends in the case-law, from both developed and developing country perspectives. A major feature of the book is that it deals with the tension between the law of foreign investment and other competing principles of international law. In doing so, it proposes ways of achieving a balance between these principles and the need to protect the legitimate rights and expectations of foreign investors on the one hand, and the need not to unduly restrict the right of host governments to implement their public policy, including the protection of the environment and human rights, and the promotion of social and economic justice within the host country, on the other.
*****************
[*672]
La Chimia, Annamaria. Tied Aid and Development Aid Procurement in the Framework of EU and WTO Law. Hart Publishing, 2013. 1524pp. Cloth $170.00 ISBN: 978-1-84946-115-3
This book is the first legal treatment of tied aid and examines in detail the compatibility of tied aid with EU and WTO law. The workings of the aid projects and aid procurement systems of donor countries granting bilateral aid are fully examined through case studies from the UK, Italy, the EU and the US. Tied aid refers to aid granted to developing countries on condition that goods and services for the aid-financed projects are purchased from the donor country only. The recipient country, in order to receive the grant or the loan, has no other choice but to fulfill the condition imposed by the donor. Economists have shown that tying aid undermines the effectiveness of aid. It leads to higher costs paid for the goods and services purchased and the distortion of the nature of the aid. Further, tying frustrates the potential of aid to foster trade between developing countries -in many of these countries public bodies and, in particular, aid-financed projects are major potential outlets for trade between neighbouring states. The importance of tied aid has been pointed out in economic literature but there is surprisingly little written on the legal aspects of tied aid practices and this book seeks to fill this major gap in the literature.
*****************
Ligeti, Katalin (ed.). Toward a Prosecutor for the European Union Volume 1. Hart Publishing, 2013. 1096pp. Cloth $220.00 ISBN: 978-1-849-46314-0.
In an era in which the EU's
influence in criminal law matters has expanded rapidly, attention has
recently turned to the possible creation of a European Public
Prosecutor's Office. This two volume work presents the results of a
study carried out by a group of European criminal law experts in
2010-2012, with the financial support of the EU Commission, whose aims
were to examine in detail current public prosecution systems in the
Member States and to scrutinise proposals for a new European office.
Volume 1 begins with thorough descriptions of 20 different national legal systems of investigation and prosecution, addressing a range of evidential and procedural safeguards. These will serve as a point of reference for all future research on public prosecutors. Volume 1 also contains a series of cross-cutting studies of the key issues that will inform debates about the creation of a European Public Prosecutor's Office, including studies of vertical cooperation in administrative investigations in subsidy and competition cases, the accession of the EU to the ECHR, judicial control in cooperation in criminal matters, mutual recognition and decentralised enforcement of European competition law.
*****************
[*673]
Maupain, Francis. The
Future of the International Labour Organization in the Global Economy.
Hart Publishing, 2013. 320pp. $100 Hardcover. ISBN 9781849465021.
The International Labour
Organization was created in 1919, as part of the Treaty of Versailles
that ended the First World War, to reflect the belief that universal and
lasting peace can be accomplished only if it is based on social justice.
As the oldest organisation in the UN system, approaching its 100th
anniversary in 2019, the ILO faces unprecedented strains and challenges.
Since before the financial crisis, the global economy has tested the
limits of a regulatory regime which was conceived in 1919. The
organisation's founders only entrusted it with balancing social progress
with the constraints of an interconnected open economy, but gambled
almost entirely on tools of persuasion to ensure that this would happen.
Whether that gamble is still capable of paying-off is the subject of
this book, by a former ILO insider with an unrivaled knowledge of its
work.
The book forms part of a broader inquiry into the relevance of founding
institutional principles to today's context, and strives to show that
the bet made on persuasion may yet pay off. In part, the text argues
that there may be little alternative anyway, showing that the pathways
to more binding solutions are fraught with difficulty. It also shows the
ILO's considerable future potential for promoting effective, universal
regulations by extending its tools of persuasion in as yet
insufficiently explored directions. Starting with an examination of how
the organisation's institutional context differs from 93years ago, the
author goes on to evaluate the prospects of numerous proposals put
forward today, including the trade/ labour linkage, but going beyond
this.
As a case study in how strategic choices can be made under legal, social
and institutional constraints, the book should be valuable not only to
those with an interest in the ILO, but to anyone who studies
international organisation, labour law, law and society or political
economy.
Maupin holds a PhD in law from the Sorbonne, an LLM and an MPA from Harvard, and served as ILO Counsel and Special Adviser
*****************
Murphy, Cian C., and Penny
Green, eds. Law and Outsiders: Norms, Processes and 'Othering' in
the 21st Century. Hart Publishing, 2011. 304pp. $88.00 Paperback
ISBN 9781841139845.
Law and Outsiders is a collection of 13 essays from leading young scholars covering five important areas of legal scholarship: adjudication, European law and politics, migration, vulnerable minorities and legal values. The recurring theme in the volume is the way in which rules and processes are contributing to the creation of twenty-first-century 'others' in areas such as domestic constitutional systems, international security and migration, and global human rights [*674] discourses. The essays are drawn from the second International Graduate Legal Research Conference, held at King's College London in June 2008.
The book is organized into
five parts: Adjudication; European Law and Politics; Migration;
Minorities, Identities, and Right,; and The Limits of Law.
*****************
Siems, Mathias and David Cabrelli (eds). Comparative Company Law: A Case Based Approach. Hart Publishing, 2012. 412pp. $70.00 ISBN: 978-1-841-13891-6.
As attention moves rapidly
towards comparative approaches, the research and teaching of company law
has somehow lagged behind. The overall purpose of this book is therefore
to fill a gap in the literature by identifying whether conceptual
differences between countries exist. Rather than concentrate on whether
the institutional structure of the corporation varies across
jurisdictions, the objective of this book will be pursued by focusing on
specific cases and how different countries might treat each of these
cases. The book also has a public policy dimension, because the
existence or absence of differences may lead to the question of whether
formal harmonisation of company law is necessary.
The book covers 10 legal systems. With respect to countries of the European Union, it focuses on the most populous countries (Germany, France, the UK, Spain, Italy and Poland) as well as two smaller Member States (Finland and Latvia). In addition, the laws of two of the world's largest economies (the US and Japan) are included for the purposes of wider comparison. All of these jurisdictions are subjected to scrutiny by deploying a comparative case-based study. On the basis of these case solutions, various conclusions are reached, some of which challenge established orthodoxies in the field of comparative company law.
*****************
Subedi, Surya P. International Investment Law: Reconciling Policy and Principle, Second edition. Hart Publishing, 2012. 232pp. Paper $76..00 ISBN: 978-1-84946-245-7.
This book offers an up-to-date, scholarly overview of the law of foreign investment, incorporating a thorough and succinct analysis of the principles and standards of treatment available to foreign investors in international law. It is authoritative and multi-layered, offering an analysis of the key issues and an insightful assessment of recent trends in the case-law, from both developed and developing country perspectives. A major feature of the book is that it deals [*675] with the tension between the law of foreign investment and other competing principles of international law. In doing so, it proposes ways of achieving a balance between these principles and the need to protect the legitimate rights and expectations of foreign investors on the one hand, and the need not to unduly restrict the right of host governments to implement their public policy, including the protection of the environment and human rights, and the promotion of social and economic justice within the host country, on the other.
*****************
Talmon, Stefan. The Occupation of Iraq: The Official Documents of the Coalition Provisional Authority and the Iraqi Governing Council, Vol. 2. Hart Publishing, 2013. 1524pp. Cloth $160.00 ISBN: 978-1-84113-642-4.
The invasion and occupation of Iraq rank among the most controversial and complex issues in international law in recent history. This volume of documents covers the occupation of Iraq from the planning stages of the invasion of Iraq in early 2002 to the transfer of governing authority to the Iraqi Interim Government on 28 June 2004. The book presents 595 selected documents including the first complete set of all Regulations, Orders, Memoranda and Public Notices issued by the US-led occupation administration of Iraq, the Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA),several of which were never published on the CPA`s website or promulgated in Alwaqai Aliraqiya, the Official Gazette of Iraq. Some of these legal acts have shaped the economic and political system of present day Iraq and will be part of the country`s legal order for years to come. The book also includes some 120other CPA and CPA-related documents selected from more than 5000 unclassified CPA documents and received under freedom of information requests lodged in the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia and Switzerland. These documents include instructions and proclamations to the Iraqi people in the early stages of the occupation, organizational charts, internal legal opinions, diplomatic notes, international agreements concluded by the CPA with other States, and numerous internal memoranda for the head of the CPA, Ambassador Paul L Bremer, on legal, diplomatic and political issues. The book also presents for the first time all 235 resolutions passed by the Iraqi Governing Council (IGC) between July 2003 and June 2004. The resolutions as well as many of the 25 other important IGC documents (including various political statements, press releases and decrees of the Council`s Higher National De-Ba`athification Commission)have been translated from Arabic and are presented here for the first time in English. These documents are complemented by the relevant United Nations documents on the occupation of Iraq as well as some 50 policy documents of the United States, the United Kingdom and the Iraqi opposition movement as well as all relevant fatwas (religious rulings) of Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani which shaped the internal Iraqi political process during the occupation.
*****************
[*676]
Tams, Christian J. The Settlements of International Disputes. Hart Publishing, 2012. 830pp. Paper $96.00 ISBN: 978-1-849-46303-4.
This collection of documents brings together a large number of primary sources on the peaceful settlement of disputes in a usable and affordable format. The documents included reflect the diverse techniques of international dispute settlement, as recognised in Articles 2(3) and 33 of the UN Charter, such as negotiation, mediation, arbitration and adjudication. The book comprises the most relevant multilateral treaties establishing dispute settlement regimes, as well as examples of special agreements, compromissory clauses, optional clause declarations and relevant resolutions of international organisations. It covers both diplomatic and adjudicative methods of dispute settlement and follows a basic division between general dispute settlement mechanisms, and sectoral regimes in fields such as human rights, WTO law, investment, law of the sea, environmental law and arms control. The book is the first widely-available collection of key documents on dispute settlement. It is aimed at teachers, students and practitioners of international law and related disciplines.
*****************
Verones, Cristina and Sebastien Rosselet. The Public International Law Study Guide for Students. Hart Publishing, 2013. 462 pp. $40.00 ISBN: 978-1-8494-6454-3.
A sound understanding of public international law is indispensable for any lawyer, whether working in an international or domestic context. It is therefore important that students have a thorough theoretical understanding of international law issues, and are able to apply the relevant international legal rules to a given set of facts, so as to arrive at a legally coherent conclusion. This practical aspect of learning international law is often neglected in favour of more theoretical aspects, which is where this book comes in. The book offers a series of hypothetical practical cases in public international law, including some of its specialised branches, such as international human rights law and international criminal law. It challenges students to practise and familiarise themselves with the methodology and to write solutions to practical international legal questions.The book is in two parts: part one contains practical (exam-like) questions, while part two contains the solutions. The practical questions in part one are organised by subject, such as treaty law or state responsibility. One chapter is dedicated to more complex 'interconnected' cases, where students are asked to tackle problems which span multiple potential cases and topics.
*****************
Vries, Karin D. Integration at the Border. Hart Publishing, 2013. 440 pp. $120.00 ISBN: 978-1-84946-410-9.
[*677]
A recent development in the
immigration policies of several European states is to make the admission
of foreign nationals dependent upon criteria relating to their
integration. As the practice of 'integration testing abroad' becomes
more widespread, this book endeavours to clarify the legal implications
which have hitherto remained poorly understood and studied.
The book begins by looking at the situation in the Netherlands, which
was the first EU Member State to introduce pre-entry integration
requirements. It explores the historical and political origins of the
Dutch Act on Integration Abroad and explains how, in this national
context, integration has become a criterion for the selection of
immigrants. It then examines how integration requirements must be
evaluated from the point of view of European and international law,
including human rights treaties, EU migration directives and association
agreements and the law on non-discrimination. The book identifies the
legal standards set by these instruments with regard to integration
testing abroad and draws conclusions as to the lawfulness of the Dutch
approach.
*****************
______________________________________________________________________________
Harvard
University
Press
______________________________________________________________________________
*****************
Fox, Robin. The Tribal Imagination: Civilization and the Savage Mind. Harvard University Press, 2013. 317 pp. $29.95 ISBN: 978-0-674-05901-6.
We began as savages, and savagery has served us well it got us where we are. But how do our tribal impulses, still in place and in play, fit in the highly complex, civilized world we inhabit today? This question, raised by thinkers from Freud to Lévi-Strauss, is fully explored in this book by the acclaimed anthropologist Robin Fox. It takes up what he sees as the main and urgent task of evolutionary science: not so much to explain what we do, as to explain what we do at our peril.
Ranging from incest and arranged marriage to poetry and myth to human rights and pop icons, Fox sets out to show how a variety of human behaviors reveal traces of their tribal roots, and how this evolutionary past limits our capacity for action. Among the questions he raises: How real is our notion of time? Is there a human "right" to vengeance? Are we democratic by nature? Are cultural studies and fascism cousins under the skin? Is evolutionary history coming to an end – or just getting more interesting? In his famously informative and entertaining fashion, drawing links from Volkswagens to Bartok to Woody Guthrie, from Swinburne to Seinfeld, Fox traces our ongoing struggle to maintain open societies in the face of profoundly tribal human needs – needs which, paradoxically, hold the key to our survival.
*****************
[*678]
Moore, Mark H. Recognizing Public Value. Harvard University Press, 2013. 496 pp. $59.95 ISBN: 978-0-674-06695-3.
Blending case studies with theory, Moore argues that private sector models built on customer satisfaction and the bottom line cannot be transferred to government agencies. The Public Value Account (PVA), which Moore develops as an alternative, outlines the values that citizens want to see produced by, and reflected in, agency operations. These include the achievement of collectively defined missions, the fairness with which agencies operate, and the satisfaction of clients and other stake-holders. But strategic public managers also have to imagine and execute strategies that sustain or increase the value they create into the future. To help public managers with that task, Moore offers a Public Value Scorecard that focuses on the actions necessary to build legitimacy and support for the envisioned value, and on the innovations that have to be made in existing operational capacity. Using his scorecard, Moore evaluates the real-world management strategies of such former public managers as D.C. Mayor Anthony Williams, NYPD Commissioner William Bratton, and Commissioner of the Minnesota Department of Revenue John James.
*****************
______________________________________________________________________________
The
Independent
Institute
______________________________________________________________________________
*****************
Higgs, Robert. Delusions of Power: New Explorations of the State, War, and Economy. The Independent Institute, 2012. 336 pp. $21.95 ISBN: 978-1-59813-045-4.
In Delusions
of Power, economic historian Robert Higgs calls into question
our ingrained notions concerning the nature of the state and democracy.
Higgs uproots the foundation stone upon which the state’s powers have
rested and grown unchecked by the public.
Beginning with the Founding Fathers and moving forward, Higgs reassesses the world wars, the Great Depression and the New Deal, and the financial debacle that began in 2008 with the view of demonstrating Americans' loss of liberties. He brings together the crisis in policy making; key political actors and events; and the impact of war on the economy and civil liberties. For Higgs, war and its costs have had a major impact on American life and freedom. Through reading Higgs's work, one will gain a new understanding of the state's power, democracy, and the issues threatening the pursuit of liberty.
[*679]
*****************
______________________________________________________________________________
International
Courts
Association
______________________________________________________________________________
*****************
Wolf, W. Van Der. Genocide on Trial. International Courts Association, 2011. 444 pp. $80.00 ISBN: 978-9058-87088-9.
In 1933, a proposal by Raphael Lemkin on the 'crime of barbarity' was brought before the Legal Council of the League of Nations, being the first formal attempt to create a law against genocide. In 1946, the United Nations adopted Resolution 96 confirming the crime of genocide, but it was not until 1948 that a definition of genocide came into being in the Genocide Convention. It has been through case law that the definition of genocide became more clear. In 2007, the European Court of Human Rights noted that the narrow view of 'intent to destroy' was the majority opinion among legal scholars. This narrow view included the necessity of biological-physical destruction of groups in order for the action to qualify as genocide. It concluded furthermore that both the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia and the International Court of Justice agreed to the narrow interpretation. Laying the foundation for the punishment of the crime of genocide, the precise definition of the term remained a topic of debate among legal scholars. This book examines all case law on genocide from the start of the 20th century to the cases brought before the Tribunals in more recent times. Genocide on Trial should be mandatory reading for anyone interested in the history of war crimes trials, as well as scholars wanting a collection of case law related to genocide.
*****************
Wolf, W. Van Der. Genocide. International Courts Association, 2011. 655 pp. $119.95 ISBN: 978-9058-87078-0.
This book provides an introduction to the several aspects of Genocide. In the first part of the book historical and more basic information in published. The second part explores the convention and in the third part the focus is on the development in case law of the ICTR and ICTY. Finally the document selection consists of the most relevant documents and case-law in the area of genocide and is relevant for those who start studying the topic, and as a reminder for those already advanced. Laying the foundation for the punishment of the crime of genocide, the precise definition of the term remained topic of debate among legal scholars. Not only does the [*680] Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide exclude political groups, many authors have criticized the narrow definition of the groups that are protected under the treaty. And the narrow view on the definition of genocide as such, leading to the conclusion of the ECHR that ethnic cleansing does not necessarily constitute genocide. Another point of criticism is the lack of protection against genocide, since articles 2 and 3 only allow for punishment after the fact when evidence (paper trail) could be brought to court. For that reason UN Security Council Resolution 1674 (2006) came into being that commits the Council to take action in order to protect civilians in armed conflict against genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing and other crimes against humanity.
*****************
______________________________________________________________________________
Kendall
Hunt
Publishing
______________________________________________________________________________
*****************
Melone, Albert P, and Marc G. Pufong. Researching Constitutional Law: Fourth Edition. Kendall Hunt Publishing, 2013. 373 pp. $75:00 ISBN: 978-1-46521-358-7.
A good education is one
that helps individuals acquire the skills necessary for living an
independent and fulfilling life . . .
Because it is their rights
and privileges that are fundamentally at stake, it behooves all persons
living in the United States to know how to find the law on the
Constitution.
Completely updated throughout, Researching Constitutional Law is designed for all law-related courses such as administrative law, business law,criminal justice, law and society, legal studies, and paralegal studies. The fourth edition of Researching Constitutional Law includes a new chapter dedicated to writing a legal brief. The chapter contains instructions on why and how to write such documents with a sample legal brief.
The NEW fourth edition of
Researching Constitutional Law:
*****************
[*681]_____________________________________________________________________________
The
Kent State University Press
______________________________________________________________________________
*****************
Kaplan, Lawrence S. NATO Before Korean War. The Kent State University Press, 2013. 216 pp. $38.95 ISBN: 978-1-60635-169-7.
U.S. commitment to rebuild, economically and militarily, a Western Europe devastated by World War II. In exchange for America’s abandonment of its customary abstention from Europe, the Western allies would take steps to end Europe's traditional divisions and integrate its resources on every level. The sheer magnitude of the mutual obligations received widespread attention on both sides of the Atlantic as well as within the Communist bloc. The Korean War's impact on the development of the organization marginalized the prewar history of NATO.
Kaplan asserts that the Korean War was not needed to convert the alliance into an organization, as it was already in place on June 25, 1950. The progress of NATO's development was often improvised and untidy, and "the first crude tools of the organization," as Dean Acheson noted, had been cast by the end of the London meeting of the North Atlantic Council in May 1950. The seeds of major changes took the form of the supreme allied commanders, and a civilian coordinating body could be found in negotiations conducted during the winter and spring of 1950. The origins of the "O" in NATO are found in the text of the North Atlantic Treaty, in Article 9, under whose auspices new responsibilities were justified.
*****************
Repousis, Angelo. Greek-American Relations from Monroe to Truman. The Kent State University Press, 2013. 255 pp. $65.00 ISBN: 978-1-60635-177-2.
Repousis chronicles American public attitudes and government policies toward modern Greece from its war for independence (1821-1829) to the Truman Doctrine (1947) when Washington intervened to keep Greece from coming under communist domination. Until then, although the U.S. government was not actively in support of Greek efforts, American philhellenes had supported the attempt to achieve and protect Greek independence. They saw modern Greece as the embodiment of the virtues of its classical counterpart (human dignity, freedom of thought, knowledge, love of beauty and the arts, republicanism, etc.) and worked diligently, albeit not [*682] always successfully, to push U.S. policymakers toward greater official interest in and concern for Greece.
Pre-Cold War American intervention in Greek affairs was motivated in part by a perceived association among American and Greek political cultures. Indebted to ancient Greece for their democratic institutions, philhellenes believed they had an obligation to impart the blessings of free and liberal institutions to Greece, a land where those ideals had first been conceived.
*****************
Woodroofe, Louise. Buried in the Sands of the Ogaden: The United States, the Horn of Africa, and the Demise of Detente. The Kent State University Press, 2013. 168 pp. $55.00 ISBN: 978-1-60635-184-0.
The Ogaden War between Ethiopia and Somalia involved a web of shifting loyalties, as the United States and Soviet Union alternately supported both sides at different points. Woodroofe explores how the war represented a larger debate over U.S. foreign policy, which led Carter to take a much harder line against the Soviet Union. In a crucial post-Vietnam test of U.S. power, the American foreign policy establishment was unable to move beyond the prism of competition with the Soviet Union.
The conflict and its superpower involvement turned out to be disasters for all involved, and many of the region's current difficulties trace their historic antecedents to this period. Soviet assistance propped up an Ethiopian regime that terrorized its people, reorganized its agricultural system to disastrous effects in the well-known famines of the 1980s, and kept it one of the poorest countries in the world. Somalia's defeat in the Ogaden War started its descent into a failed state. Eritrea, which had successfully fought Ethiopia prior to the introduction of Soviet and Cuban assistance, had to endure more than a decade more of repression.
*****************
______________________________________________________________________________
LFB
Scholarly
Publishing LLC
______________________________________________________________________________
*****************
Nunns, Stephen. Acting
Up: Free Speech, Pragmatism, and American Performance in the late 20th
Century. LFB Scholarly Publishing LLC., 2011. xviii + 292pp.
Hardcover $80.00. ISBN 978-1-59332-465-0.
[*683]
Nunns, an assistant
professor and director of the MFA Program in Theatre Arts at Towson
University, examines how free speech became a centerpiece of American
identity during the 20th century and how ideas of freedom of expression
came to a head during the "Culture Wars" in the 1980s and '90s. He
explores four case histories: performance artist Karen Finley and her
court case revolving around public funding for the arts; the lawsuits
involving the film I am Curious
(Yellow); the controversy surrounding a community's performance
of Angels in America; and the
racist songwriting of David Allen Coe.
Acting Up demonstrates that
free speech relies upon the cultural tides of the moment. The book
offers a pragmatic approach to law, politics, and culture, by also
investigating the founders of pragmatism (William James, Charles Sanders
Peirce, John Dewey, and Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.), and examining how
their ideas continue to shape the American intellectual landscape.
*****************
Weiler-Harwell, Nina. Discrimination Against Atheists: A New Legal Hierarchy Among Religious Beliefs. LFB Scholarly Publishing LLC., 2011. 194 pp. Hardcover. $65.00 ISBN:978-1-59332-441-4.
Weiler-Harwell examines continuing, legal, discrimination against atheists, as made clear in two cases: Boy Scouts of America v. Dale (2000) and Elk Grove Unified School District v. Newdow (2004). These rulings created a new, discriminatory level of distinction for believers versus non-believers that is ahistorical in light of previous Supreme Court precedent. Both cases created new standards for analyzing equality under the law for non-conformists such as atheists, shaping a new hierarchy of protected and unprotected forms of religious belief. The new judicial standards elevate monotheistic religious belief over the neutrality standard that had been heralded in prior Supreme Court decisions and create a kind of American Civil Religion.
*****************
______________________________________________________________________________
Liveright
Classics
______________________________________________________________________________
*****************
Ryan, Alan. On Aristotle: Saving Politics from Philosophy. Liveright Classics, 2013. 216 pp. $14.95 ISBN: 978-0-87140-706-1.
[*684]
In On Aristotle: Saving Politics from Philosophy, Alan Ryan examines Plato's most famous student and sharpest critic, whose writing has helped shape over two millennia of Western philosophy, science, and religion. The first thinker to posit that a society should be ruled by laws and not men, Aristotle was born in Stagira, Macedon, in 384 BCE. He would go on to join Plato's Academy and eventually become tutor to Alexander the Great. During his lifetime he would see the revival of Athens following its destruction in the Peloponnesian War, before the ultimate extinction of its radical form of democracy after the Macedonian conquest. Aristotle's strongly empirical cast of mind was brought to bear on a stunning range of subjects, from rhetoric to physics, from the history of political institutions and mathematics to zoology and botany. The resulting system dominated European thought from the thirteenth to seventeenth centuries.
*****************
Ryan, Alan. On Machiavelli: The Search for Glory. Liveright Classics, 2013. 204 pp. $14.95 ISBN: 978-0-87140-705-4.
In On Machiavelli: The Search for Glory, Alan Ryan illuminates the political and philosophical complexities of the often-reviled godfather of realpolitik. Thought by some to be the founder of Italian nationalism, regarded by others to be a reviver of the Roman Republic as a model for the modern Western world, Machiavelli remains a contentious figure. Often outraging popular opinion with his insistence on the amoral nature of power, Machiavelli eschewed the world as it ought to be in favor of a forthright appraisal of the one that is. Perhaps more than any other thinker, Machiavelli has suffered from being taken out of context, and Ryan places him squarely within his own time and the politics of a Renaissance Italy riven by near-constant warfare among rival city-states and the papacy.
*****************
______________________________________________________________________________
MIT
Press
______________________________________________________________________________
*****************
Band, Jonathon, and Masanobu Katoh. Congress Interfaces on Trial. MIT Press, 2011. 233 pp. $23.00 ISBN: 978-0-262-01500-4.
We live in an interoperable world. Computer hardware and software products from different manufacturers can exchange data within local networks and around the world using the Internet. [*685] The competition enabled by this compatibility between devices has led to fast-paced innovation and prices low enough to allow ordinary users to command extraordinary computing capacity.
In Interfaces on Trial 2.0, Jonathan Band and Masanobu Katoh investigate an often overlooked factor in the development of today's interoperabilty: the evolution of copyright law. Because software is copyrightable, copyright law determines the rules for competition in the information technology industry. This book a follow-up to Band and Katoh's successful 1995 book Interfaces on Trial examines the debates surrounding the use of copyright law to prevent competition and interoperability in the global software industry in the last fifteen years.
*****************
Nuechterlein, Jonathon E. and Philip J. Weiser. Arctic Digital Crossroads. MIT Press, 2013. 576 pp. $35.00 ISBN: 978-0-262-51960-1.
In Digital Crossroads, two experts on telecommunications policy offer a comprehensive and accessible analysis of the regulation of competition in the U.S. telecommunications industry. The first edition of Digital Crossroads (MIT Press, 2005) became an essential and uniquely readable guide for policymakers, lawyers, scholars, and students in a fast-moving and complex policy field. In this second edition, the authors have revised every section of every chapter to reflect the evolution in industry structure, technology, and regulatory strategy since 2005.
The book features entirely new discussions of such topics as the explosive development of the mobile broadband ecosystem; incentive auctions and other recent spectrum policy initiatives; the FCC's net neutrality rules; the National Broadband Plan; the declining relevance of the traditional public switched telephone network; and the policy response to online video services and their potential to transform the way Americans watch television. Like its predecessor, this new edition of Digital Crossroads not only helps nonspecialists climb this field's formidable learning curve, but also makes substantive contributions to ongoing policy debates.
*****************
______________________________________________________________________________
Norton
&
Company, Incorporated, W. W.
______________________________________________________________________________
*****************
Scarry, Elaine. Thermonulcear Monarchy. Norton & Company, Incorporated, W. W., 2012. 303pp. $35.00 ISBN: 978-0-393-08008-7.
[*686]
According to the Constitution, the decision to go to war requires rigorous testing by both Congress and the citizenry; when a leader can single-handedly decide to deploy a nuclear weapon, we live in a state of "thermonuclear monarchy," not democracy. The danger of nuclear weapons comes from potential accidents or acquisition by terrorists, hackers, or rogue countries. But the gravest danger comes from the mistaken idea that there exists some case compatible with legitimate governance. There can be no such case. Thermonuclear Monarchy shows the deformation of governance that occurs when a country gains nuclear weapons. In bold and lucid prose, Thermonuclear Monarchy identifies the tools that will enable us to eliminate nuclear weapons and bring the decision for war back into the hands of Congress and the people. Only by doing so can we secure the safety of home populations, foreign populations, and the earth itself.
*****************
____________________________________________________________________________
Oxford
University
Press
______________________________________________________________________________
*****************
Biggar, Nigel. In
Defense of War. Oxford University Press, 2012. 349 pp. $55.00
ISBN: 978-0-199-67261-5.
Recovering the Christian tradition of reflection running from Augustine to Grotius, this book affirms aggressive war in punishment of grave injustice. Morally realistic in adhering to universal moral principles, it recognises that morality can trump legality, justifying military intervention even in transgression of positive international law, as in the case of Kosovo. Peace for some can leave others at peace to perpetrate mass atrocity. What was peace for the West in 1994 was not peace for the Tutsies of Rwanda. Therefore, against the virus of wishful thinking, anti-military caricature, and the domination of moral deliberation by rights-talk In Defence of War asserts that belligerency can be morally justified, even though tragic and morally flawed.
*****************
______________________________________________________________________________
Palgrave
Macmillan
______________________________________________________________________________
*****************
Archer, John M. Technically Alive: Shakespeare's Sonnets. Cambridge University Press, 2013. 207 pp. $85.00 ISBN: 978-1-137-28717-5.
[*687]
This insightful study treats William Shakespeare's Sonnets as philosophical poetry. Connecting contemporary debates about what counts as life and technology to their early modern roots, John Michael Archer considers these poems outside the conventional succession of periods that are alternately said to contain or convey them. Drawing on the later writings of Martin Heidegger and using the writings of Aristotle, Plato, Nietzsche, and Agamben as a vital counterpoint to Heidegger, the argument interweaves its readings of technology as philosophical concept in the Sonnets with the poetic cycle's depictions of life and living beings.
*****************
Kahan, Jeffery. Shakespiritualism: Shakespeare and the Occult, 1850-1950. Cambridge University Press, 2013. 270 pp. $76.50 ISBN: 978-1-137-28220-0.
Throughout the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, Shakespeare's ghost appeared again and again at seance tables in London, Paris, Melbourne, and Cape Town, as well as in smaller, rural settings. This study concerns itself with a now-forgotten religious group, Spiritualists, and their ensuing discussions of Shakespeare's meaning, his writing practices, his possible collaborations, and the supposed purity and/or corruption of his texts anticipated, accompanied, or silhouetted similar debates in Shakespeare studies.
*****************
______________________________________________________________________________
Polity
Press
______________________________________________________________________________
*****************
Axford, Barrie. Theories of Globalization. Polity Press, 2013. 240 pp. $26.95 ISBN: 978-0-7456-3474-6.
Theories of Globalization offers students and scholars a comprehensive and
critical introduction to the concept of globalization. Barrie Axford
expertly guides readers through the full range of perspectives on the
topic, from international political economy to geography, global
anthropology to cultural and communication studies. In so doing he draws
out the common threads between competing theories, as well as
pinpointing the problems that challenge our understanding of
globalization. Key terms such as 'globalism' and 'globality' are
carefully explained and central themes like capitalism, governance,
culture and history explored in full.[*688]
In assessing the contribution made by globalization theory, Axford's account also sheds new light on several crucial current issues. These range from the changing shape of democracy and citizen engagement with governance, to issues surrounding 'just war' and humane intervention, and problems relating to empire and post-colonialism. This wide-ranging and detailed new book will be essential reading for students and scholars of international politics, sociology and any area where the concept of globalization is discussed and disputed.
*****************
Bradshaw, Mike. Global Energy Dilemmas. Polity Press, 2013. 240pp. Hardcover $69.95 ISBN 978-0-7456-5064-7. Paperback $26.95 ISBN: 978-0-7456-5065-4.
Today's global energy
system faces two major challenges: how to secure the supply of reliable
and affordable energy; and how to rapidly transform to a low-carbon,
efficient and environmentally harmless energy supply. In this rigorous
and illuminating book, Michael Bradshaw explores the key aspects of the
current global energy dilemma and examines how it is playing out across
the major regions and countries of the world.
The book begins by charting the development of the current global energy
system exploring its key characteristics with a focus upon energy
security and the relationship between energy, economic development and
climate change. The next four chapters offer in-depth analyses of four
distinct global energy dilemmas in different parts of the world: the
challenge of sustaining affluence and decarbonising energy services in
the high-energy economies of the developed world; the legacies of the
centrally planned economy and the consequences of liberalisation in the
post-socialist world; growing energy demand and emissions growth
associated with the emerging regions; and finally, the quest to provide
universal access to modern energy services in the developing world in a
manner that is both economically and environmentally sustainable.
Identifying the governance structures and policy options available to
tackle the global energy dilemma, the book concludes that only an
integrated approach- sensitive to regional issues - can reconcile the
interests and needs of those facing differing energy challenges across
the world today.
*****************
Crouch, Colin. Making Capitalism Fit for Society. Polity Press, 2013. 216pp. Paperback $24.99 ISBN: 978-0-745-67223-6.
Capitalism is the only complex system known to us that can provide an efficient and innovative economy, but the financial crisis has brought out the pernicious side of capitalism and shown that it remains dependent on the state to rescue it from its own deficiencies. Can capitalism be reshaped so that it is fit for society, or must we acquiesce to the neoliberal view that society will [*689] be at its best when markets are given free rein in all areas of life? The aim of this book is to show that the acceptance of capitalism and the market does not require us to accept the full neoliberal agenda of unrestrained markets, insecurity in our working lives, and neglect of the environment and of public services. In particular, it should not mean supporting the growing dominance of public life by corporate wealth. The world's most successful mature economies are those that fully embrace both the discipline of the market and the need for protection against its negative outcomes. Indeed, a continuing, unresolved clash between these two forces is itself a major source of vitality and innovation for economy and society.
*****************
Danreuther, Roland. International Security: The Contemporary Agenda. Polity Press, 2013. 272 pp. $69.95 ISBN: 978-0-7456-5377-8.
International Security: The Contemporary Agenda is a cutting-edge introduction to key security challenges and developments in the post-Cold War world. Drawing on a wide range of contemporary examples, it is an essential guide for students seeking to understand the theoretical and empirical debates over the fast-changing nature of international security today. The book is clearly organized into four main sections. Section 1 provides an analytical framework for the book, identifying the most significant post-Cold War shifts in international security and recent theoretical developments in security studies. Section 2 looks at environmental security, including the threat of resource-based conflict, most notably over oil and water, and the perceived security challenges of international migration. Section 3 analyses the root causes of the so-called new wars, and the broader insecurity found in many regions of the South. Dilemmas and problems of intervention, including the controversial debate over humanitarian intervention, are examined in detail. Section 4 discusses new security challenges posed by international terrorism and the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction. It explores the strategies and policies adopted by the United States, particularly in the aftermath of 9/11. This book will be valuable reading for students of international relations, international security and strategic studies.
*****************
Gaskarth, Jamie. British Foreign Policy: Crises, Conflicts, and Future Challenges. Polity Press, 2013. 288 pp. $69.95 ISBN: 978-0-745-65115-6.
Britain has been a significant voice in global politics in the last two decades and its impact on world events far outweighs its material resources. But how does a small island on the edge of Europe continue to exercise this level of power on an international scale? What kind of actor is Britain internationally? And what future challenges will confront British foreign policymakers in a multi-polar world of emerging powers?
[*690]
In this comprehensive
introduction to British foreign policy today Jamie Gaskarth addresses
these and other key questions. Against a rich historical backdrop, he
examines the main actors and processes involved in British foreign
policy-making as well as the role played by identity in shaping such
choices. Later chapters focus on the relationship between economics and
foreign policy, what it means to be ethical in this policy sphere, and
the justification for and benefits of the UK's continued use of force to
achieve its foreign policy goals.
Combining interview research, theoretical insight and analysis of contemporary and historical trends, this book charts how British foreign policy has come to be understood and practised in the 21st Century. It will be an invaluable guide for students of British politics, foreign policy, international relations and related courses
*****************
Giddens, Anthony. Turbulent and Mighty Continent: What Future for Europe? Polity Press, 2013. 224pp. Hardcover $22.95 ISBN 978-0-7456-8096-5.
A "United States of
Europe", Winston Churchill proposed in 1946, could "as if by a miracle
transform" that "turbulent and mighty continent". "In this way only", he
continued, "will hundreds of millions of toilers be able to regain the
simple joys and hopes which make life worth living".
Today, nearly seventy years later, over 500 million people live in the
member states of the European Union, a greater number than in any
other political community save for China and India. The currency of the
Union, the euro, is used in economic transactions world-wide. Yet the EU
is mired in the greatest crisis of its history, one that threatens its
very existence as an entity able to have an impact upon world affairs.
Europe no longer seems so mighty, instead but faces the threat of
becoming an irrelevant backwater or, worse, once again the scene of
turbulent conflicts. Divisions are arising all over Europe, while the
popularity of the Union sinks. How can this situation be turned around?
It is a mistake, argues Anthony Giddens, former Director of the London
School of Economics, Life Fellow of King's College, Cambridge, and
Member of the House of Lords, UK, to see the misfortunes of the euro as
the sole source of Europe's malaise. The Union faces problems shared by
most or all of the developed states of the world. Reform in Europe must
go far beyond stabilizing the euro, formidable and fraught though that
task may be. Introducing an array of new ideas, Giddens suggests this is
the time for a far-reaching rethink of the European project as a whole.
*****************
[*691]
Held, David and Charles Roger. Global Governance at Risk. Polity Press, 2013. 272pp. $69.95 ISBN: 978-0-745-66525-2.
Since 2007 the world has lurched from one crisis to the next. The rise of new powers, the collapse of our global financial system, the proliferation of nuclear weapons and crisis in the Eurozone have led to a build up of risks that is likely to provoke a more general crisis in our system of global governance if it cannot be made fairer, more effective and accountable.
In this book, nine leading
scholars explore the fault lines and mounting challenges that are
putting pressure on existing institutions, the ways in which we are
currently attempting to manage them or failing to and the
prospects for global governance in the 21st century. In doing so, the
contributors offer a fresh look at one of the most important issues
confronting the world today and they suggest strategies for adapting
current institutions to better manage our mutual interdependence in the
future
*****************
Mengisteab, Kidane. The Horn of Africa. Polity Press, 2013. 240pp. Hardcover $69.95 ISBN 978-0-7456-5121-7. Paperback $22.95. ISBN 978-0-7456-5122-4.
The
Horn of Africa is a deeply troubled region engulfed in three
interlocking crises. The first is a security crisis characterized by a
range of devastating inter-state and inter-communal conflicts, including
civil wars. The second is an economic crisis, evidenced by widespread
debilitating poverty, chronic food insecurity, and frequent cycles of
famines. The effects of the third environmental crisis are
all too visible in the droughts, deforestation and desertification
ravaging the region. What is more, these three crises are mutually
reinforcing locking the region into a cycle of disaster. Conflicts
contribute to poverty, which in turn intensifies environmental
degradation, leading to scarcities which fuel further conflicts.
In this clear and authoritative guide, Kidane Mengisteab explores the
key drivers of instability in the Horn of Africa, suggesting structural
and institutional changes that if implemented could help
lift the region out of crisis. The Horn's complex crises must be tackled
in a comprehensive manner. But, he contends, this can only be achieved
if the causes of conflict are addressed head-on. Without peace, the
region cannot resolve its economic problems, and nor can it develop the
capabilities required to cope with environmental change.
The Horn of Africa will be
essential reading for students and scholars in conflict and security
studies, as well as anyone with an interest in learning more about the
dynamics of this troubled region
[*692]
*****************
Mumford, Andrew. Proxy Warfare: War and Conflict in the Modern World. Polity Press, 2013. 180pp. Hardcover $59.95 ISBN 978-0-7456-5118-7. Paper $19.95 ISBN 978-.0-7456-5119-4.
Proxy wars represent a
perennial strand in the history of conflict. The appeal of "warfare on
the cheap" has proved an irresistible strategic allure for nations
through the centuries. However, proxy wars remain a missing link in
contemporary war and security studies. In this timely book Andrew
Mumford sheds new light on the dynamics and lineage of proxy warfare
from the Cold War to the War on Terror, whilst developing a cogent
conceptual framework to explain their appeal.
Tracing the political and strategic development of proxy wars throughout
the last century, they emerge as a dominant characteristic of
contemporary conflict. The book ably shows how proxy interventions often
prolong existing conflicts given the perpetuity of arms, money and
sometimes proxy fighters sponsored by third party donors. Furthermore,
it emphasizes why, given the direction of the War on Terror, the rise of
China as a global power, and the prominence now achieved by non-state
actors in the "Arab Spring", the phenomenon of proxy warfare is
increasingly relevant to understandings of contemporary security.
Proxy Warfare is an indispensable guide for students and scholars
interested in the evolution and potential future direction of war and
conflict in the modern world.
This is one of several books in Polity Press's War and Conflict in the Modern World series.
*****************
Sisk, Timothy. Statebuilding: War and Conflict in the Modern World. Polity Press, 2013. 200pp. Hardcover $59.95 978-0-7456-6158-2. Paper $19.95 ISBN 978-0-7456-6159-9.
After civil wars end, what can sustain peace in the long-term? In particular, how can outsiders facilitate durable conflict-managing institutions through state building - a process that historically has been the outcome of bloody struggles to establish the state's authority over warlords, traditional authorities, and lawless territories?
In this book, Timothy Sisk
explores international efforts to help the world's most fragile
post-civil war countries today build viable states that can provide for
security and deliver the basic services essential for development.
Tracing the historical roots of state building to the present day, he
demonstrates how the United Nations, leading powers, and well-meaning
donors have engaged in state building as a strategic approach to peace
building after war. Their efforts are informed by three key objectives:
to enhance security by preventing war recurrence and fostering community
and human security; to promote development through state provision of
essential services such as water, sanitation, and education; to enhance
human rights and democracy, reflecting the liberal international order
that reaffirms the principles of democracy and human rights, .
Improving governance, alongside the state's ability to integrate social
differences and manage conflicts over resources, identity, and national
priorities, is essential for long-term peace. [*693] Whether the global
state building enterprise can succeed in creating a world of peaceful,
well-governed,development-focused states is unclear. But the book
concludes with a road map toward a better global regime to enable peace
building and development-oriented statebuilding into the 21st century.
This is one of several books in Polity Press's War and Conflict in the Modern World series.
****************
______________________________________________________________________________
Princeton
University
Press
______________________________________________________________________________
*****************
McGinnis, John O. Transforming Governance Through Technology. Princeton University Press, 2012. 224 pp. $26.95 ISBN: 978-0-691-15102-1.
Successful democracies throughout history from ancient Athens to Britain on the cusp of the industrial age have used the technology of their time to gather information for better governance. Our challenge is no different today, but it is more urgent because the accelerating pace of technological change creates potentially enormous dangers as well as benefits. Accelerating Democracy shows how to adapt democracy to new information technologies that can enhance political decision making and enable us to navigate the social rapids ahead. John O. McGinnis demonstrates how these new technologies combine to address a problem as old as democracy itself how to help citizens better evaluate the consequences of their political choices. As society became more complex in the nineteenth century, social planning became a top-down enterprise delegated to experts and bureaucrats. Today, technology increasingly permits information to bubble up from below and filter through more dispersed and competitive sources. McGinnis explains how to use fast-evolving information technologies to more effectively analyze past public policy, bring unprecedented intensity of scrutiny to current policy proposals, and more accurately predict the results of future policy. But he argues that we can do so only if government keeps pace with technological change. For instance, it must revive federalism to permit different jurisdictions to test different policies so that their results can be evaluated, and it must legalize information markets to permit people to bet on what the consequences of a policy will be even before that policy is implemented.
[*694]
*****************
Waterhouse, Benjamin C. Lobbying America. Princeton University Press, 2012. 344 pp. $39.50 ISBN: 978-0-691-14916-5.
"Lobbying America" tells the story of the political mobilization of American business in the 1970s and1980s. Benjamin Waterhouse traces the rise and ultimate fragmentation of a broad-based effort to unify the business community and promote a fiscally conservative, antiregulatory, and market-oriented policy agenda to Congress and the country at large. Arguing that business's political involvement was historically distinctive during this period, Waterhouse illustrates the changing power and goals of America's top corporate leaders. Examining the rise of the Business Roundtable and the revitalization of older business associations such as the National Association of Manufacturers and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, Waterhouse takes readers inside the mind-set of the powerful CEOs who responded to the crises of inflation, recession, and declining industrial productivity by organizing an effective and disciplined lobbying force. By the mid-1970s, that coalition transformed the economic power of the capitalist class into abroad-reaching political movement with real policy consequences. Ironically, the cohesion that characterized organized business failed to survive the ascent of conservative politics during the 1980s, and many of the coalition's top goals on regulatory and fiscal policies remained unfulfilled. The industrial CEOs who fancied themselves the "voice of business" found themselves one voice among many vying for influence in an increasingly turbulent and unsettled economic landscape.
*****************
______________________________________________________________________________
Quid
Pro Books
______________________________________________________________________________
*****************
Durkheim, Emile, Ernest Denis, Steven Alan Childress, A.M. Wilson-Garinei. Who Wanted War?: The Origins of War According to Diplomatic Documents. Quid Pro Books, 2012. 90 pp. $9.99 ISBN: 978-1-610-27148-6.
Two famed University of Paris professors document their "brief" on the diplomatic and historic causes of the Great War, and especially its spread throughout Europe (and eventually to the United States). Published early on in the conflict – reading almost as current events – the tract serves as a fascinating rebuttal to the usual assumptions about the causes of the jarring leap from the Balkans to a pan-European war; it undermines the simplistic but accepted litany of interlaced alliances and the murder of the Austrian heir to the throne, Archduke Franz Ferdinand.
*****************
[*695]
Scheiber, Harry N. The Wilson Administration and Civil Liberties. Quid Pro Books, 2013. 90 pp. $24.00 ISBN: 978-1-61027-176-9.
The Wilson Administration and Civil Liberties, 1917-1921, is a Digitally Remastered™ reprint of one of the classic works of legal and social history. Harry Scheiber’s much-cited study of Woodrow Wilson and his cabinet explores the suppression of speech and print publication during an era of world war, the Red Scare, anti-foreign fervor, and unionism. Wilson’s notable achievements in social leadership and the progressive movement are questioned in light of his failure to protect civil liberties amidst the tide of war fever, nationalism, racism, and a protection of corporate interests. Worse, his own administration, through the Justice Department and the Postmaster General, took ruthless and often spurious actions to repress liberties, as shown by prodigious research and through useful tables of prosecutions and dispositions of anti-speech legal actions.
*****************
______________________________________________________________________________
Stanford
University
Press
______________________________________________________________________________
*****************
Bayat, Asef. Life as Politics: How Ordinary People Change the Middle East. Stanford University Press, 2013. 392 pp. $22.95 ISBN: 978-0-8047-8327-9.
Though not as visible on the world-stage as a mass protest or a full-scale revolution, millions of people across the Middle East are discovering or creating new social spaces within which to make their claims heard. The street vendor who sets up his business Anthe main square, squatters who take over public parks, Muslim youth who frequent public hangouts in blue jeans, and protestors who march in the streets, poor housewives who hang their wash in the alleyways, and educated women who pursue careers doing "men's work" – all these people challenge the state's control and implicitly question the established public order through their daily activities. Though not coordinated in their activities, these "non-movements" offer a political response, not of protest but of practice and direct daily action. Offering a window into the complex social processes in a too-often misunderstood part of the world, this unique book provides a much-needed Middle Eastern perspective on global debates over the meaning of social movements and the dynamics of social change.
*****************
______________________________________________________________________________
Texas
Tech University Press
______________________________________________________________________________
*****************
[*696]
Johnson, Tekla Agbala Ali. Free Radical: Ernest Chambers, Black Power, and the Politics of Race. Texas Tech University Press, 2012. 384 pp. $29.95 ISBN: 978-0-896-72729-8.
Amid the deadly racial violence of the 1960s, an unassuming student from a fundamentalist Christian home in Omaha emerged as a leader and nationally recognized black activist. Ernest Chambers, elected to the Nebraska State Legislature in 1970, eventually became one of the most powerful legislators the state has ever known. As Chambers bids for reelection in 2012 to the office he held for thirty-eight years, Omaha native Tekla Agbala Ali Johnson illuminates his embattled career as a fiercely independent defender of the downtrodden.Tracing the growth of the Black Power Movement in Nebraska and throughout the U.S., Johnson discovers its unprecedented emphasis on electoral politics. For the first time since Reconstruction, voters catapulted hundreds of African American community leaders into state and national political arenas. Special-interest groups and political machines would curb the success of aspiring African American politicians, just as urban renewal would erode their geographical and political bases, compelling the majority to join the Democratic or Republican parties. Chambers was one of few not to capitulate. In her revealing study of one man and those he represented, Johnson portrays one intellectual’s struggle alongside other African Americans to actualize their latent political power.
*****************
______________________________________________________________________________
University
of
Arizona Press
______________________________________________________________________________
*****************
Mckeown, C. Timothy. In the Smaller Scope of Conscience. University of Arizona Press, 2013. 288 pp. $26.95 ISBN: 978-0-8165-3085-4.
Few works are as detailed
as McKeown's account, which looks into bills that came prior to NMAIA
and NAGPRA and combs the legislative history for relevant reports and
correspondence. Testimonies, documents, and interviews from the primary
players of this legislative process are cited to offer insights into the
drafting and political processes that shaped NMAIA and NAGPRA.
Above all else, this landmark work distinguishes itself from earlier
legislative histories with the quality of its analysis. Invested and yet
evenhanded in his narrative, McKeown ensures that this journey through
history – through the strategies and struggles of different actors to
effect change through federal legislation – is not only accurate but
eminently intriguing.
*****************
[*697 ]
______________________________________________________________________________
University
of
British Columbia Press
______________________________________________________________________________
*****************
Bittle, Steven. Still Dying for a Living: Corporate Criminal Liability After the Westray Mine Disaster. University of British Columbia Press, 2012. 268pp. $95 Hardcover ISBN9780774823593 . $32.95 Paperback ISBN 9780774823609.
In 1992, an underground
explosion at the Westray Mine in Plymouth, Nova Scotia, killed
twenty-six miners. Although the owners of the mine were charged
criminally, no one was convicted, largely because it was deemed too
difficult to determine legal responsibility.
More than a decade after the Westray disaster, the federal government
introduced revisions to the Criminal Code aimed at strengthening
corporate criminal liability. Bill C-45, dubbed the Westray bill,
requires employers to ensure a safe workplace and attributes criminal
liability to organizations for seriously injuring or killing workers
and/or the public. Yet, while the federal government declared the
Westray bill an important step, the law has thus far failed to produce a
crackdown on corporate crime.
In Still Dying for a Living, Steven Bittle turns a critical eye
on Canada's corporate criminal liability law. Drawing theoretical
inspiration Foucault and neo-Marxist literatures (Zizek) and
interweaving in-depth interviews and parliamentary transcripts, Bittle
reveals how legal, economic, and cultural discourses surrounding the
Westray bill downplayed the seriousness of workplace injury and death,
effectively characterizing these crimes as regrettable but largely
unavoidable accidents. As long as the primary causes of workplace injury
and death are not properly scrutinized, Bittle argues, workers will
continue to die in the pursuit of earning a living.
*****************
DeVries, Laura. Conflict in Caledonia: Aboriginal Land Rights and the Rule of Law. University of British Columbia Press, 2011. 260pp. $94 Hardcover ISBN 9780774821841. $35.95Paperback ISBN 9780774821858.
This book won the Best Book Award in 2012 from the Canadian Law and Society Association.
In February 2006, First Nations protesters blocked workers from entering a housing development in southern Ontario. The protest highlighted the issue of land rights and sparked a series of ongoing events known as the "Caledonia Crisis." This powerful account of the dispute links the actions of police, officials, and locals to non-Aboriginal discourses about law, landscape, and identity. DeVries encourages non-Aboriginal Canadians to reconsider their assumptions, to view "facts" such as the rule of law as culturally specific notions that prevent truly equitable dialogue. She seeks out possible solutions in alternative conceptualizations of sovereignty over land and law embedded in the Constitution.
*****************
[*698]
Larsen, Mike and Kevin Walby, eds.. Brokering Access: Power, Politics, and Freedom of Information Process in Canada. University of British Columbia Press, 2013. 400 pp. $34.95 ISBN:978-0-7748-2323-4.
Access to information (ATI) is widely regarded as a fundamental democratic right. Yet in Canada there still exists a struggle between the public's quest for accountability and our government's culture of secrecy. Drawing together the perspectives of social scientists, journalists, and ATI advocates, Brokering Access explores the policies and practices surrounding access to information at the federal,provincial, and municipal levels. This groundbreaking volume is the first of its kind to promote the idea that ATI should be used as a critical research strategy. It is a vital resource for scholars, policy makers, journalists, and anyone who is concerned about access to information and its effect on all Canadians.
*****************
______________________________________________________________________________
University
of
Kansas Press
______________________________________________________________________________
*****************
Charles, Douglas M. The FBI's Obscene File: J. Edgar Hoover and the Bureau's Crusade against Smut. University of Kansas Press, 2012. 200 pp. $24.95 ISBN: 978-0-7006-1825-5.
Illuminating this largely neglected aspect of FBI history, Charles charts the evolution of the Bureau's efforts to combat the spread of obscenity and its perceived insidious effects. He contends that, especially during the five decades under J. Edgar Hoover, these efforts became a surprisingly high priority and at times were expressly wielded for political ends, even as Hoover hid the file from public view in order to preserve the Bureau's squeaky-clean image. Charles recounts how the "Obscene File" was conceived and organized by Hoover and describes its contents, which included magazines, films, and artwork in addition to dossiers on offenders. He examines the FBI's targeting of 1940s and '50s "race music" with its depictions of "lewd and licentious acts in obscene and foul language." He describes how the FBI collected photos of activities at gay bars and prosecuted businesses that published "obscene" pro-gay magazines, and how it participated in the "Lavender Scare" that targeted gays in the federal government. He also details the FBI's efforts to short-circuit the distribution of the film Deep Throat and disrupt the pornographic movie industry.
*****************
Stern, Seth and Stephen Wemiel. Justice Brennan: Liberal Champion. University of Kansas Press, 2010. 688 pp. $24.95 ISBN: 978-0-547-14925-7.
[*699]
This is a paperback version of a hardcover published in 2010. Before his death, William Brennan granted Stephen Wermiel access to volumes of personal and court materials that are sealed to the public until 2017. These are what Jeffrey Toobin has called "a coveted set of documents" that includes Brennan's case histories - in which he recorded strategies behind all the major battles of the past half century, including Roe v. Wade, affirmative action, the death penalty, obscenity law, and the constitutional right to privacy – as well as more personal documents that reveal some of Brennan's curious contradictions, like his refusal to hire female clerks even as he wrote groundbreaking women's rights decisions; his complex stance as a justice and a Catholic; and details on Brennan's unprecedented working relationship with Chief Justice Earl Warren. Wermiel distills decades of valuable information into a seamless, riveting portrait of the man behind the Court's most liberal era.
*****************
______________________________________________________________________________
Yale
University
Press
______________________________________________________________________________
*****************
Lobel, Orly. Talent Wants to Be Free: Why We Should Learn to Love Leaks, Raids, and Free Riding. Yale University Press, 2013. 288 pp. $35.00 ISBN: 978-0-300-16627-9.
In every industry and every market, battles to recruit, retain, train, energize, and motivate the best people are fierce. From Facebook to Google, Coca-Cola to Intel, JetBlue to Mattel, Lobel uncovers specific factors that produce winners or losers in the talent wars. Combining original behavioral experiments with sharp observations of contemporary battles over ideas, secrets, and skill, Lobel identifies motivation,relationships, and mobility as the most important ingredients for successful innovation. Yet many companies embrace a control mentality – relying more on patents, copyright, branding, espionage, and aggressive restrictions of their own talent and secrets than on creative energies that are waiting to be unleashed. Lobel presents a set of positive changes in corporate strategies, industry norms, regional policies, and national laws that will incentivize talent flow, creativity, and growth. This vital and exciting reading reveals why everyone wins when talent is set free.
*****************
Seiter, Bill, and Ellen Seiter. The Creative Artists Legal Guide. 2012. 256pp. $20.00 Paper ISBN 9780300161199.
In today's complex media environment, aspiring filmmakers and new media artists are as vulnerable as swimmers in shark-infested waters. This user-friendly guide supplies creative artists with the essential legal concepts needed to swim safely with lawyers,agents, executives, and other experts in intellectual property and business law.
[*700]
How do I copyright my
screenplay? How can I clear rights for my film project? What can I do to
avoid legal trouble when I produce my mockumentary? How do I ascertain
whether a vintage novel is in the public domain? Is the trademark I've
invented for my production company available? What about copyright and
trademark rights overseas? If I upload my film to YouTube, do I give up
any rights?
Bill Seiter and Ellen Seiter answer these questions and countless others while also demystifying the fundamental principles of intellectual property. Clear and thorough, this plain-spoken and practical guide is essential for anyone seeking to navigate the rapidly changing media environment of today. Bill Seiter is an attorney specializing in Intellectual Property. Ellen Seiter is a filmmaker and endowed chair in Critical Studies in the School of Cinematic Arts at USC.
*****************
______________________________________________________________________________
Back to Notices List