The Nowhere Nation

The Nowhere Nation PDF Author: Ashok Mitra
Publisher: Penguin UK
ISBN: 818475292X
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 322

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Book Description
Questioning the image of India as a nascent superpower or putative economic powerhouse that has been the flavour of the decade, Ashok Mitra draws on his experience as India’s chief economic adviser and West Bengal’s finance minister to look at critical current issues that include the policies of liberalization, the Indo—US nuclear deal and the attempt to take away land from peasants for industrialization. His clear sighted analyses of the roots of such societal tendencies as communalism and corruption force us to re-examine our assumptions about contemporary Indian realities and, indeed, question if there is a single Indian reality at all. The Nowhere Nation argues that India embraces several historical ages at a single point of time. Three-quarters of Indian citizens are horrendously poor; of which at least a quarter is below the level of subsistence. The rest do well, some very well indeed. But how does this all work? India, writes Mitra, ‘simmers in its incongruities’. The classes, castes and communities live their parallel lives and sort out their own economics. Reforms will not pry open up the exclusive saloon the Indian superstructure is accustomed to claim; and the usual ‘trickle-down’ defence ignores the difficult truth that jobs do not grow in the short run; in fact they shrink. Furthermore, the West Bengal experiment has proved that even when the opportunities are available to attempt social and economic restructuring in a miniature frame, contamination seeps in. These forcefully argued, elegantly written reflections first appeared in The Telegraph

The Nowhere Nation

The Nowhere Nation PDF Author: Ashok Mitra
Publisher: Penguin UK
ISBN: 818475292X
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 322

Get Book Here

Book Description
Questioning the image of India as a nascent superpower or putative economic powerhouse that has been the flavour of the decade, Ashok Mitra draws on his experience as India’s chief economic adviser and West Bengal’s finance minister to look at critical current issues that include the policies of liberalization, the Indo—US nuclear deal and the attempt to take away land from peasants for industrialization. His clear sighted analyses of the roots of such societal tendencies as communalism and corruption force us to re-examine our assumptions about contemporary Indian realities and, indeed, question if there is a single Indian reality at all. The Nowhere Nation argues that India embraces several historical ages at a single point of time. Three-quarters of Indian citizens are horrendously poor; of which at least a quarter is below the level of subsistence. The rest do well, some very well indeed. But how does this all work? India, writes Mitra, ‘simmers in its incongruities’. The classes, castes and communities live their parallel lives and sort out their own economics. Reforms will not pry open up the exclusive saloon the Indian superstructure is accustomed to claim; and the usual ‘trickle-down’ defence ignores the difficult truth that jobs do not grow in the short run; in fact they shrink. Furthermore, the West Bengal experiment has proved that even when the opportunities are available to attempt social and economic restructuring in a miniature frame, contamination seeps in. These forcefully argued, elegantly written reflections first appeared in The Telegraph

Nation and Its Modes of Oppressions in South Asia

Nation and Its Modes of Oppressions in South Asia PDF Author: Sajal Nag
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 1000810445
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 306

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Book Description
This volume examines nationhood as a concept and how it became the basis of political discourse in South Asia. It studies the emergence of nationalism in modern states as a powerful, omnipotent, and omnipresent form of political identity in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. This book examines the idea of a nation, as it originated in medieval Europe, as an unending process of 'othering' individuals, groups, and communities to establish its hegemony, exclusivity, and absolute power within a political discourse. It sheds light on how these new political frameworks in the name of nationalism resulted in conflicts and bloodshed. It unleashed politics of retribution and facilitated majoritarianism, minority persecution, and collective authoritarianism which devastated individuals and collectivities. Further, the author also discusses various prominent ideas and contemporary theories on nationalism alongside pivotal socio-cultural factors which have significantly shaped the formation of modern nation states and their politics. Topical and nuanced, this book will be indispensable to researchers, scholars, and readers interested in nationalism, political science, modern history, political theory, political philosophy, political sociology, political history, post-colonial studies, and South Asia studies.

Additions to the National Wilderness Preservation System

Additions to the National Wilderness Preservation System PDF Author: United States. Congress. House. Committee on Interior and Insular Affairs. Subcommittee on National Parks and Public Lands
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : National parks and reserves
Languages : en
Pages : 470

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Book Description


Superpower Illusions

Superpower Illusions PDF Author: Jack F. Matlock
Publisher: Yale University Press
ISBN: 0300155964
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 453

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Book Description
“This persuasive, occasionally provocative book corrects a number of pervasive myths about the Cold War”—from the former U.S. ambassador to the USSR (Publishers Weekly). In Superpower Illusions, Jack F. Matlock refutes the enduring idea that the United States forced the collapse of the Soviet Union by applying military and economic pressure—with wide-ranging implications for U.S. foreign policy. Matlock argues that Gorbachev, not Reagan, undermined Communist Party rule in the Soviet Union and that the Cold War ended in a negotiated settlement that benefited both sides. He posits that the end of the Cold War diminished rather than enhanced American power; with the removal of the Soviet threat, allies were less willing to accept American protection and leadership that seemed increasingly to ignore their interests. Matlock shows how, during the Clinton and particularly the Bush-Cheney administrations, the belief that the United States had defeated the Soviet Union led to a conviction that it did not need allies, international organizations, or diplomacy, but could dominate and change the world by using its military power unilaterally. Superpower Illusions is “a truly remarkable book, both wise and provocative, telling a sad yet instructive story of how the United States failed to exploit a triumph in the Cold War to build a new international order reflecting U.S. interests and principles” (Dimitri Simes, President and CEO, The Center for the National Interest). “A well written, clearly reasoned and thoroughly informed tour of the past half century of American diplomacy—including the roots of its successes and failures—led by a superbly qualified participant. A brilliant book.”—Sidney Drell, Stanford University

Throwaway Nation

Throwaway Nation PDF Author: Jeff Dondero
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
ISBN: 1538110334
Category : Self-Help
Languages : en
Pages : 297

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Book Description
Americans are burying ourselves in our own waste. It’s befouling our air, land, waters, food, and bodies. The US tosses out enough foodstuff to feed the rest of the world. America is the largest buyer of fashion and cosmetics, the second dirtiest industry in the world. We lead the planet in transportation usage and waste, and we’re now polluting outer space. Throwaway Nation takes a look at the pileup of waste in the US, including the problem of plastic, the industry of overmedication, e-waste products, everyday garbage, fast fashion trash, space waste, and other forms of profligacy that serve to make our nation the biggest waster on the planet. Looking at the environmental impact of so much garbage, Dondero explores not just how we got here and where we’re headed, but ways in which we might be able to curb the tide. From what you do and don’t eat, what and how your products are packaged, the rampant production of clothes, the space and waste in which you work, live, what you breath, eat, drink, the tools you use to work and play, the energy overproduced and ill-used for a pleasant lifestyle, the waste you generate, and how humans are beginning to clutter the cosmos—all and more are profiled in the Throwaway Nation—and what we ought to do to prohibit and mitigate the flow of our garbage and to use it productively.

Ukraine and Russia

Ukraine and Russia PDF Author: Roman Solchanyk
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
ISBN: 9780742510180
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 260

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Book Description
This timely study provides a clear analysis of both the domestic and foreign policies and security issues confronting RussiaOs largest and most important neighbor during its first decade as an independent state. Roman Solchanyk emphasizes throughout the book, the complex, centuries-old Ukrainian-Russian relationship, which is so central that the ORussian questionO plays the determining role in UkraineOs foreign and domestic politics. In turn, the policy choices of UkraineOs leaders influence the direction of RussiaOs own transformation. The book opens with a conceptual framework that addresses the key issues of the Ukrainian-Russian relationship. The initial chapters illustrate how relations between Kyiv and Moscow changed_in the final analysis, dramatically_under the conditions of a crumbling and ultimately collapsing Soviet state. This is followed by a discussion of how the ORussian questionO influences UkraineOs internal developments_political, social, and economic_as well as its behavior in the international arena. The concluding chapters focus specifically on Crimea, a microcosm of the Ukrainian-Russian relationship. Basing his argument on a wealth of primary source material, the author argues that the success of both UkraineOs and RussiaOs nation- and state-building projects will be largely determined by the normalization of their historically conditioned relationship. Indeed, success or failure will profoundly influence the direction of regional and European foreign policy and security.

The Anatomy of National Fantasy

The Anatomy of National Fantasy PDF Author: Lauren Berlant
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 0226043770
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 277

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Book Description
Examining the complex relationships between the political, popular, sexual, and textual interests of Nathaniel Hawthorne's work, Lauren Berlant argues that Hawthorne mounted a sophisticated challenge to America's collective fantasy of national unity. She shows how Hawthorne's idea of citizenship emerged from an attempt to adjudicate among the official and the popular, the national and the local, the collective and the individual, utopia and history. At the core of Berlant's work is a three-part study of The Scarlet Letter, analyzing the modes and effects of national identity that characterize the narrator's representation of Puritan culture and his construction of the novel's political present tense. This analysis emerges from an introductory chapter on American citizenship in the 1850s and a following chapter on national fantasy, ranging from Hawthorne's early work "Alice Doane's Appeal" to the Statue of Liberty. In her conclusion, Berlant suggests that Hawthorne views everyday life and local political identities as alternate routes to the revitalization of the political and utopian promises of modern national life.

Violence in South Asia

Violence in South Asia PDF Author: Pavan Kumar Malreddy
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 1000733408
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 357

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Book Description
This volume explores new perspectives on contemporary forms of violence in South Asia. Drawing on extensive fieldwork and case studies, it examines the infiltration of violence at the societal level and affords a comparative regional analysis of its historical, cultural and geopolitical origins in South Asia. Featuring essays from Sri Lanka to Nepal, and from Afghanistan to Burma, it sheds light on issues as wide-ranging as lynching and mob justice, hate speech, caste violence, gender-based violence and the plight of the Rohingyas, among others. Lucid and engaging, this book will be an invaluable source of reference as well as scholarship to students and researchers of postcolonial studies, anthropology, sociology, cultural geography, minority studies, politics and gender studies.

Globalization: The nation-state and international relations

Globalization: The nation-state and international relations PDF Author: Roland Robertson
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 9780415236898
Category : Civilization
Languages : en
Pages : 408

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Book Description


Numbers from Nowhere

Numbers from Nowhere PDF Author: David P. Henige
Publisher: University of Oklahoma Press
ISBN: 9780806130446
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 556

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Book Description
In the past forty years an entirely new paradigm has developed regarding the contact population of the New World. Proponents of this new theory argue that the American Indian population in 1492 was ten, even twenty, times greater than previous estimates. In Numbers From Nowhere David Henige argues that the data on which these high counts are based are meager and often demonstrably wrong. Drawing on a wide variety of primary and secondary sources, Henige illustrates the use and abuse of numerical data throughout history. He shows that extrapolation of numbers is entirely subjective, however masked it may be by arithmetic, and he questions what constitutes valid evidence in historical and scientific scholarship.