Search results for ""author peter j. taylor""

Elgar Advanced Introductions are stimulating and thoughtful introductions to major fields in the social sciences, business and law, expertly written by the world's leading scholars. Designed to be accessible yet rigorous, they offer concise and lucid surveys of the substantive and policy issues associated with discrete subject areas.This insightful Advanced Introduction explores the key attributes of cities, identifying their five basic characteristics; innate complexity, the agglomeration of activities, inter-city connectivities, the projection of power, and relations to states. Peter J. Taylor gives a broad and engaging overview of how these characteristics work and relate to each other, supplemented by ten short city insights which offer readers specific examples of cities and themes.Key features include: analysis of cities as the creative nodes of societies discussion of both contemporary and historical cities exploration of the different spaces created by cities and states identification of the demands of cities in relation to climate change. This Advanced Introduction will be a valuable guide for scholars and advanced students of urban studies, cities, urban geography, urban sociology, and social and cultural geography.

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Is it America s historic destiny to be the last of the hegemons ? Hegemonic states are very special countries that have simultaneously dominated the world both economically and politically and it seems increasingly likely that no country can follow the USA in this role. In this intellectual and creative tour de force, Peter Taylor, famous as the creator of world-systems political geography, examines hegemony as a concept in social practices and by using the experience of the three classic hegemonies, 17th-century Holland, 19th-century Britain and 20th-century America to provide a breathtaking new perspective on world history, political ideas and the nature of modernity. Professor Taylor weaves a rich tapestry of historical insight with arresting detail and innovative synthesis to show how for each hegemon political and economic dominance led to cultural power which shaped the entire world system. But in a fin de siecle world with little prospect of a new hegemonic order, are we perhaps facing the end of the world as we know it? In this constantly challenging, intriguing and original book the reader will find a compelling, disturbing yet exhilarating distillation of history, politics, economics, culture and ideology of the last four centuries. It will be the key book for students of politics, geography and history and for the general reader who wants to understand where today s world has come from and where it is going.

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Ambitiously identifying fresh issues in the study of complex systems, Peter J. Taylor, in a model of interdisciplinary exploration, makes these concerns accessible to scholars in the fields of ecology, environmental science, and science studies. Unruly Complexity explores concepts used to deal with complexity in three realms: ecology and socio-environmental change; the collective constitution of knowledge; and interpretations of science as they influence subsequent research. For each realm Taylor shows that unruly complexity - situations that lack definite boundaries, where what goes on "outside" continually restructures what is "inside," and where diverse processes come together to produce change - should not be suppressed by partitioning complexity into well-bounded systems that can be studied or managed from an outside vantage point. Using case studies from Australia, North America, and Africa, he encourages readers to be troubled by conventional boundaries - especially between science and the interpretation of science - and to reflect more self-consciously on the conceptual and practical choices researchers make.

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'Peter J. Taylor has produced a sweeping, empirically grounded, defense of cities as fundamental building blocks of long-term, large scale social structures; a way of freeing social science from state-centric bias; and indeed, mankind's hope. However, the single greatest strength of this complex, seductive, argument is the insistence on treating cities relationally, as process. Here the key to understanding the significance of cities is by studying them in terms of the dynamic networks they form and in their relations to states.'- Richard E. Lee, Binghamton University, USAccepting that cities are extraordinary, this book provides an original city-centred narrative of human creativity, past, present and future.In this innovative, ambitious and wide-ranging book, Peter Taylor demonstrates that cities are the epicenters of human advancement. In exploring cities as sites through which economies flourish, by harnessing the creative potential of myriad communication networks, the author considers cities from varying temporal and spatial perspectives. Four stories of cities are told: the origins of city networks; the domination of cities by world-empires; the genesis of a singular modern creative interval in which innovation culminates in today s globalised cities; and finally, the need for cities to act as centres for human creativity to produce a more resilient global society in the current crisis century.Providing a long-term view through which to consider the role of cities in attending to incipient crises of the twenty-first century, this closely argued thesis will prove essential for students and scholars of urban studies, geography and sociology, and all those with a professional interest in, or personal fascination for, cities.Contents: Preface Part I: Setting Down and Setting Up 1. A Cities' Perspective 2. Conceptual Toolkits Part II: Narrative I: Beginning Conjectures 3. City and State Beginnings: Western Asia's Great Creative Interlude 4. Geographies of Beginning Creative Interludes Part III: Narrative II: World-systems 5. Normal History 6. Making the Modern World-system: Western Europe's Great Creative Interlude Part IV: Narrative III: Prospective Conjectures - Where Are We and Where Are We Going? 7. Working in an Urban World 8. Towards Green Networks of Cities for the Twenty-first Century References Index

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Taylor develops a geohistorical argument which focuses on the periods and places of modernities, offering a grounded analysis of what it is to be modern. He identifies three 'prime modernities' which have defined the development of our modern world: today's consumer modernity preceded by the industrial modernity of the nineteenth century which was itself preceded by mercantile modernity.

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Elgar Advanced Introductions are stimulating and thoughtful introductions to major fields in the social sciences, business and law, expertly written by the world's leading scholars. Designed to be accessible yet rigorous, they offer concise and lucid surveys of the substantive and policy issues associated with discrete subject areas.This insightful Advanced Introduction explores the key attributes of cities, identifying their five basic characteristics; innate complexity, the agglomeration of activities, inter-city connectivities, the projection of power, and relations to states. Peter J. Taylor gives a broad and engaging overview of how these characteristics work and relate to each other, supplemented by ten short city insights which offer readers specific examples of cities and themes.Key features include: analysis of cities as the creative nodes of societies discussion of both contemporary and historical cities exploration of the different spaces created by cities and states identification of the demands of cities in relation to climate change. This Advanced Introduction will be a valuable guide for scholars and advanced students of urban studies, cities, urban geography, urban sociology, and social and cultural geography.

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'Peter J. Taylor has produced a sweeping, empirically grounded, defense of cities as fundamental building blocks of long-term, large scale social structures; a way of freeing social science from state-centric bias; and indeed, mankind's hope. However, the single greatest strength of this complex, seductive, argument is the insistence on treating cities relationally, as process. Here the key to understanding the significance of cities is by studying them in terms of the dynamic networks they form and in their relations to states.'- Richard E. Lee, Binghamton University, USAccepting that cities are extraordinary, this book provides an original city-centred narrative of human creativity, past, present and future.In this innovative, ambitious and wide-ranging book, Peter Taylor demonstrates that cities are the epicenters of human advancement. In exploring cities as sites through which economies flourish, by harnessing the creative potential of myriad communication networks, the author considers cities from varying temporal and spatial perspectives. Four stories of cities are told: the origins of city networks; the domination of cities by world-empires; the genesis of a singular modern creative interval in which innovation culminates in today s globalised cities; and finally, the need for cities to act as centres for human creativity to produce a more resilient global society in the current crisis century.Providing a long-term view through which to consider the role of cities in attending to incipient crises of the twenty-first century, this closely argued thesis will prove essential for students and scholars of urban studies, geography and sociology, and all those with a professional interest in, or personal fascination for, cities.Contents: Preface Part I: Setting Down and Setting Up 1. A Cities' Perspective 2. Conceptual Toolkits Part II: Narrative I: Beginning Conjectures 3. City and State Beginnings: Western Asia's Great Creative Interlude 4. Geographies of Beginning Creative Interludes Part III: Narrative II: World-systems 5. Normal History 6. Making the Modern World-system: Western Europe's Great Creative Interlude Part IV: Narrative III: Prospective Conjectures - Where Are We and Where Are We Going? 7. Working in an Urban World 8. Towards Green Networks of Cities for the Twenty-first Century References Index

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The 1970's witnessed widespread recognition of the world as a single, interconnecting whole. The 1980's have shown that this whole is not operating as a self-sustaining system. In short we appear to live in a world in crisis- manifesting itself in hunger, poverty, debt, conflict, statelessness and war, as well as in the accelerating degradation of the natural environment. The geographical perspectives of World in Crisis? - in this completely revised and updated edition - show the interlinking nature of global, regional, and local problems and, further, that these are not uniquely economic, ecological, political or social, but all these and more.

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This book brings together studies of Americanization and American imperialism to assess how far the twentieth century can be seen as the "American Century".

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This book brings together studies of Americanization and American imperialism to assess how far the twentieth century can be seen as the "American Century".

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This Handbook offers an unrivaled overview of current research into how globalization is affecting the external relations and internal structures of major cities in the world. By treating cities at a global scale, it focuses on the 'stretching' of urban functions beyond specific place locations, without losing sight of the multiple divisions in contemporary world cities. The book firmly bases city networks in their historical context, critically discusses contemporary concepts and key empirical measures, and analyzes major issues relating to world city infrastructures, economies, governance and divisions. The variety of urban outcomes in contemporary globalization is explored through detailed case studies. Edited by leading scholars of the Globalization and World Cities (GaWC) Research Network and written by over 60 experts in the field, the Handbook is a unique resource for students, researchers and academics in urban and globalization studies as well as for city professionals in planning and policy.Contributors: M. Acuto, A.S. Alderson, H. Ali, D. Bassens, H. Bathelt, J.V. Beaverstock, J. Beckfield, A. Boulton, S.D. Brunn, L.C.S. Budd, T. Bunnell, K. Datta, B. Derudder, A. De Vos, L. Devriendt, E. Engelen, Y. Evans, J. Faulconbridge, R. Grant, T.H. Grubesic, C. Grundy-Warr, S. Hall, C. Hamnett, J. Harrison, J. Herbert, M. Hoyler, P. Hubbard, R. Keil, A.D. King, R. Kloosterman, P. Knox, E. Korcelli-Olejniczak, K.P.Y. Lai, B. Lambregts, R.E. Lang, L. Lees, C. Lizieri, E.J. Malecki, T.C. Matisziw, J. May, C. McIlwaine, D. Murakami Wood, C. Nagel, P. Newman, C. Nicholas, J. Nijman, S. Oosterlynck, K. Pain, C. Parnreiter, A.C. Pratt, J. Rennie Short, J.D. Sidaway, D. Smith, R.G. Smith, M. Sparke, P.J. Taylor, A. Thornley, B. van der Knaap, H. van der Wusten, R. Wall, A. Watson, J. Wills, F. Witlox

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This volume provides students with a series of critical insights into the economic, political, social, cultural and ecological dimensions of change at every geographical scale from the global to the local.

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This Handbook offers an unrivaled overview of current research into how globalization is affecting the external relations and internal structures of major cities in the world. By treating cities at a global scale, it focuses on the 'stretching' of urban functions beyond specific place locations, without losing sight of the multiple divisions in contemporary world cities. The book firmly bases city networks in their historical context, critically discusses contemporary concepts and key empirical measures, and analyzes major issues relating to world city infrastructures, economies, governance and divisions. The variety of urban outcomes in contemporary globalization is explored through detailed case studies. Edited by leading scholars of the Globalization and World Cities (GaWC) Research Network and written by over 60 experts in the field, the Handbook is a unique resource for students, researchers and academics in urban and globalization studies as well as for city professionals in planning and policy.Contributors: M. Acuto, A.S. Alderson, H. Ali, D. Bassens, H. Bathelt, J.V. Beaverstock, J. Beckfield, A. Boulton, S.D. Brunn, L.C.S. Budd, T. Bunnell, K. Datta, B. Derudder, A. De Vos, L. Devriendt, E. Engelen, Y. Evans, J. Faulconbridge, R. Grant, T.H. Grubesic, C. Grundy-Warr, S. Hall, C. Hamnett, J. Harrison, J. Herbert, M. Hoyler, P. Hubbard, R. Keil, A.D. King, R. Kloosterman, P. Knox, E. Korcelli-Olejniczak, K.P.Y. Lai, B. Lambregts, R.E. Lang, L. Lees, C. Lizieri, E.J. Malecki, T.C. Matisziw, J. May, C. McIlwaine, D. Murakami Wood, C. Nagel, P. Newman, C. Nicholas, J. Nijman, S. Oosterlynck, K. Pain, C. Parnreiter, A.C. Pratt, J. Rennie Short, J.D. Sidaway, D. Smith, R.G. Smith, M. Sparke, P.J. Taylor, A. Thornley, B. van der Knaap, H. van der Wusten, R. Wall, A. Watson, J. Wills, F. Witlox

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