Search results for ""Author Peter Taylor""

A striking consequence of contemporary globalization has been an increase in the importance and prestige of cities. Whereas only a generation or so ago cities were commonly viewed as problems', the sites of society's ills, today they are more readily seen as solutions', places where twenty-first century dilemmas can most successfully be resolved. Hence, argue the editors of this new four-volume collection from Routledge, while globalization is generally viewed as eroding the influence of states, cities have come to the fore as the new spatial frame of the future. The old modern international organization of states as a worldwide mosaic of borders is being challenged by transnational spaces of flows organized through city nodes in global networks.As serious work on and around the subject flourishes as never before, Global Cities answers the need for an authoritative reference work to map and make sense of a vast body of literature and a continuing explosion in researc

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Welcome to Weird War Two, a catalogue of the weird, the wonderful and the downright eccentric, from deep within IWM's Second World War archives. From wacky inventions to elusive secret agents, from bizarre propaganda posters to the dummy acting as a decoy for a daring escape, from inflatable tanks to painted cows, this is proof that, as ever, the truth is stranger than fiction.

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On the 25th anniversary of the Good Friday Agreement, Peter Taylor tells for the first time the gripping story of Operation Chiffon, the top-secret intelligence operation that helped bring peace to Ireland. ‘A gripping exploration of how MI5 and MI6 worked for a ceasefire with the IRA – and how one meeting changed everything’ Telegraph 'An extraordinary story . . . A true tale of espionage' The Times April 1998: the Good Friday Agreement is signed, ending decades of violence and bloodshed in Northern Ireland. The process of getting the IRA to end its so-called ‘armed struggle’ was always the prerequisite of the search for peace. It was Operation Chiffon that finally helped make it possible. Operation Chiffon takes us inside the top-secret intelligence operation whose roots go back to the bloodiest years of the conflict in the early 1970s, involving officers from MI6 and, later in the 1990s, MI5. The remarkable story, which has remained hidden for forty years, is now revealed by legendary BBC journalist Peter Taylor with unique access to the officers involved. Drawing on exclusive interviews and Taylor’s fifty years of covering the conflict, the book narrates in first-hand detail how those involved risked their careers – and their lives – to help secure the fragile peace that exists today. Taylor vividly brings this covert operation to life and in the process chronicles the history of Sinn Féin, rising from obscurity in the early days of the Troubles to becoming the largest political party in Ireland today. It is a story fraught with uncertainty and danger that, as Brexit risks destabilising what was achieved in the Good Friday Agreement twenty-five years ago, is more important than ever to remember.

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After decades of operating off-the-backfoot and protecting and conserving nature perceived as under threat, conservationists are becoming proactive and creative in the face of habitat loss, agricultural intensification and climate change. Beyond Conservation offers a revolutionary agenda for both managing existing wildlands in Britain and for expanding and connecting such lands. Central to this strategy is the imperative to 'rewild' or restore and repair damaged habitat and ecosystems, promote existing biodiversity and reintroduce vanished plant and animal species, while working to reconcile human needs and livelihoods and the needs of nature.

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On the 25th anniversary of the Good Friday Agreement, Peter Taylor tells for the first time the gripping story of Operation Chiffon, the top-secret intelligence operation that helped bring peace to Ireland.A gripping exploration of how MI5 and MI6 worked for a ceasefire with the IRA and how one meeting changed everything' Telegraph''An extraordinary story . . . A true tale of espionage'' The TimesApril 1998: the Good Friday Agreement is signed, ending decades of violence and bloodshed in Northern Ireland. The process of getting the IRA to end its so-called armed struggle' was always the prerequisite of the search for peace. It was Operation Chiffon that finally helped make it possible.Operation Chiffon takes us inside the top-secret intelligence operation whose roots go back to the bloodiest years of the conflict in the early 1970s, involving officers from MI6 and, later in the 1990s, MI5. The remarkable story, which has remained hidden for fo

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In the middle of the twentieth century, governments ignored the negative effects of large-scale infrastructure projects. In recent decades, many democratic countries have continued to use dams to promote growth, but have also introduced accompanying programs to alleviate these harmful consequences of dams for local people, to reduce poverty, and to promote participatory governance. This type of dam building undoubtedly represents a step forward in responsible governing. But have these policies really worked? Flooded provides insights into the little-known effects of these approaches through a close examination of Brazil’s Belo Monte hydroelectric facility. After three decades of controversy over damming the Xingu River, a tributary of the Amazon, the dam was completed in 2019 under the left-of-center Workers’ Party, becoming the world’s fourth largest. Billions of dollars for social welfare programs accompanied construction. Nonetheless, the dam brought extensive social, political, and environmental upheaval to the region. The population soared, cost of living skyrocketed, violence spiked, pollution increased, and already overextended education and healthcare systems were strained. Nearly 40,000 people were displaced and ecosystems were significantly disrupted. Klein tells the stories of dam-affected communities, including activists, social movements, non-governmental organizations, and public defenders and public prosecutors. He details how these groups, as well as government officials and representatives from private companies, negotiated the upheaval through protests, participating in public forums for deliberation, using legal mechanisms to push for protections for the most vulnerable, and engaging in myriad other civic spaces. Flooded provides a rich ethnographic account of democracy and development in the making. In the midst of today’s climate crisis, this book showcases the challenges and opportunities of meeting increasing demands for energy in equitable ways.

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The third part of the trilogy documenting modern-day Northern Ireland, by the author of Provos and Loyalists In the final part of his trilogy exploring ‘The Troubles' in Northern Ireland, Peter Taylor talks to undercover agents of the British state and reveals for the first time the hidden secrets of the war they waged against the IRA for thirty years. PROVOS and LOYALISTS told the story of the conflict from the point of view of the Republicans and Loyalists; now the story, with all its tragic twists and turns, is told from the British perspective. For the first time, undercover soldiers, Special Branch officers and a top MI6 agent step out of the shadows and, along with the Whitehall mandarins who helped shape policy from Westminster, tell their stories. *PRAISE FOR PETER TAYLOR* ‘Only a journalist of Peter Taylor’s standing could have persuaded people from all sides in the conflict to cooperate in such a manner. The result was a first-rate piece of journalism. It was also first-rate history’ Guardian

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The first part of the landmark trilogy documenting modern-day Northern Ireland, by the author of Loyalists and Brits This work examines the Provos, from 1969, when the IRA was effectively dead and buried, to within a few short years, when it had resurrected to become the most feared and sophisticated terrorist organization in the world. The book is based on in-depth interviews with key personalities in the Army, Police, British and Irish governments, giving first-hand accounts of the key events. It contains material not included in the television series being broadcast on BBC 1 in autumn 1997. Never before has an outsider had such access to record the remarkable history of the provisional IRA and Sinn Fein, from their dramatic beginnings to the critical juncture they have reached today - on the brink of becoming part of the cabinet in the new government of Northern Ireland. An astonishing story, told as only Peter Taylor could. There are no images in this edition *PRAISE FOR PETER TAYLOR* ‘Only a journalist of Peter Taylor’s standing could have persuaded people from all sides in the conflict to cooperate in such a manner. The result was a first-rate piece of journalism. It was also first-rate history’ Guardian

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Cities Within Us offers poems that are dense and deep with language that resonates at multiple levels and often startles with its juxtapositions and verbal explosions. From the intimately personal to the dramatically confessional, Peter Taylor's poems capture a purse seine of discordant voices, including a piece of type, a bee, an orang-outang, Franklin, the delusional and the abused in a universe that seems both unlimited and inevitable. Images and emotions move the reader from the disappearance of arctic explorers to the razing and rebirth of the Dresden Frauenkirche to the comic innocence of a child's visit to Mars in poems that explore the inner landscapes of imagination and reality, and the intimate capacity for joy and loss.

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Although the world's climate has undergone many cyclical changes, the phrase 'climate change' has taken on a sinister meaning, implying catastrophe for humanity, ecology and the environment. We are told that we are responsible for this threat, and that we should act immediately to prevent it. But the apparent scientific consensus over the causes and effects of climate change is not what it appears. "Chill" is a critical survey of the subject by a committed environmentalist and scientist. Based on extensive research, it reveals a disturbing collusion of interests responsible for creating a distorted understanding of changes in global climate. Scientific institutions, basing their work on critically flawed computer simulations and models, have gained influence and funding. In return they have allowed themselves to be directed by the needs of politicians and lobbyists for simple answers, slogans and targets. The resulting policy - a 60 percent reduction of greenhouse-gas emissions by 2050 - would have a huge, almost unimaginable, impact upon landscape, community and biodiversity. On the basis of his studies of satellite data, cloud cover, ocean and solar cycles, Peter Taylor concludes that the main driver of recent global warming has been an unprecedented combination of natural events. His investigations indicate that the current threat facing humanity is a period of cooling, as the cycle turns, comparable in severity to the Little Ice Age of 1400-1700 AD. The risks of such cooling are potentially greater than global warming and on a more immediate time scale, with the possibility of failing harvests leaving hundreds of millions vulnerable to famine. Drawing on his experience of energy policy and sustainability, Taylor suggests practical steps that should be taken now. He urges a shift away from mistaken policies that attempt to avert inevitable natural changes, to an adaptation to a climate that may turn significantly cooler.

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This urgent book brings our cities to the fore in understanding the human input into climate change. The demands we are making on nature by living in cities has reached a crisis point and unless we make significant changes to address it, the prognosis is terminal consumption. Providing a radical new argument that integrates global understandings of making nature and making cities, the authors move beyond current policies of mitigation and adaption and pose the challenge of urban stewardship to tackle the crisis. Their new way of thinking re-orients possibilities for environmental policy and calls for us to reinvent our cities as spaces for activism.

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This urgent book brings our cities to the fore in understanding the human input into climate change. The demands we are making on nature by living in cities has reached a crisis point and unless we make significant changes to address it, the prognosis is terminal consumption. Providing a radical new argument that integrates global understandings of making nature and making cities, the authors move beyond current policies of mitigation and adaption and pose the challenge of urban stewardship to tackle the crisis. Their new way of thinking re-orients possibilities for environmental policy and calls for us to reinvent our cities as spaces for activism.

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European Welfare Futures presents a clear and up-to-date analysis of developments in social policy in the main EU member states. It provides a systematic account of welfare retrenchment and assesses the competing explanations of this process. The authors provide convincing evidence for the view that an 'ever closer union' in social policy will require a much more difficult process than that which led to monetary union. The book makes a major contribution to understanding how welfare policy in Europe will develop over the next few years. It offers an original and wide-ranging account of the forces affecting the direction of policy, and stresses the role of social and political institutions in explaining why countries differ. European Welfare Futures will be essential reading for undergraduates, graduate students and scholars in social policy, sociology, political science, area studies and international relations courses. It will also be of great interest to policy-makers in the EU, especially in the areas of pensions, health, social care and unemployment.

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