Search results for ""Agenda Publishing""

There has been a recent resurgence in interest in the theorization of labour regimes in various disciplines. This has taken the form of a concern to understand the role that labour regimes play in the structuring, organization and dynamics of global systems of production and reproduction. The concept has a long heritage that can be traced back to the 1970s and the contributions to this book seek to develop further this emerging field. The book traces the intellectual development of labour regime concepts across various disciplines, notably political economy, development studies, sociology and geography. Building on these foundations it considers conceptual debates around labour regimes and global production relating to issues of scale, informality, gender, race, social reproduction, ecology and migration, and offers new insights into the work conditions of global production chains from Amazon's warehouses in the United States, to industrial production networks in the Global South, and to the dormitory towns of migrant workers in Czechia. It also explores recent mobilizations of labour regime analysis in relation to methods, theory and research practice.

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Written by an expert team, the Dictionary of Corruption is a comprehensive resource for students, academics, practitioners and professionals. It establishes a common interpretation of the language and terminology in the field of corruption and anti-corruption studies. From bribery to Watergate, amakudari to zero tolerance and from anti-corruption agencies to whistleblowing, the Dictionary provides explanations of over 300 key terms, events and case studies.

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Economic policymakers use various macroeconomic models, but how reliable are they in real-world conditions? Starting from the premise that all models are wrong, but some are useful, Matteo Iannizzotto introduces and explains the workings of the key economic models available for policymaking. He shows that the inconsistencies and contradictions evident in the real world require the economist to make choices about which models to adopt in certain circumstances and when not to rigidly adhere to a single approach. The book uses a clear and critical step by step analysis to consider the strengths and weaknesses of each model, in a way that enables students to develop their own critical engagement with macroeconomic policymaking. In so doing, the book provides an understanding of the world economy’s fluctuations since the global financial crisis that embraces the uncomfortable fact that inconsistency and the need for a multiplicity of models is central to macroeconomic policy choices. For the many students bewildered by the disconnect between the models in their textbooks and the policy choices so hotly debated in the press, the book will be essential reading.

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The advent of new digital currencies has challenged our notions about money, its function and purpose, and our faith in the financial and banking structures that underpin its legitimacy. Oonagh McDonald charts the spectacular rise of cryptocurrencies over the past decade and considers the opportunities and threats that cryptocurrencies pose to existing fiat currencies. This revised edition includes a new chapter dealing with the high-profile bankruptcies of the recent “crypto winter”. The book considers how regulatory bodies have been slow to respond to a technology that is evading existing regulatory frameworks. Urgent and more robust protection is needed from fraudulent initial coin offerings, scams and hacks. Throughout her analysis, McDonald shows that trust is fundamental to the operation of finance and that this will ultimately protect commercial bank money from the threat of new digital currencies. The book offers readers an insightful appraisal of the future of money and the challenges facing regulatory bodies.

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We are the only species that uses fire. It has determined how we have made our home on this planet and it has propelled us to the role of the dominant species in the biosphere. But at the heart of contemporary climate change is the process of combustion. Simon Dalby explores what a life without burning things might look like, and how we might get there. Fires make the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere that is heating the planet, melting the ice sheets, changing weather patterns and making wildfires worse. Our civilization is burning things, especially fossil fuels, at prodigious rates. So much so that we are now heading towards a future “Hothouse Earth” with a climate that is very different from what humans have known so far. By focusing on fire and our partial control over one key physical force in the earth system, that of combustion, Simon Dalby is able to ask important and interesting questions about us as humans, including different ways of thinking about how we live, and how we might do so differently in the future. Simply put, there is now far too much “firepower” loose in the world and we need to think much harder about how to live together in ways that don’t require burning stuff to do so.

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A call to arms, How to Save the City invites the reader to engage with the challenges of living and working in cities at a time when several conflating emergencies have become more pressing and connected. While the climate crisis is the most urgent, we also face deep social crises in housing, gender and race inequalities, the breakdown of our natural world, our energy consumption, and the deep ripples resulting from the Covid-19 pandemic. These emergencies are playing out in acute ways in urban areas. Locked in to high-energy, high-resource use, cities are responsible for about three-quarters of global greenhouse gas emissions, have ecological and carbon footprints far bigger than their city limits, and are the beating heart of our pro-growth, unequal, consumer-saturated way of life. The city has to change, but how and by whom? Paul Chatterton engages, inspires and empowers the reader to take action to make cities more sustainable, liveable and safer places. He guides the reader through a sequence of challenges, strategies, players, moves and practical tactics of how to save their city.

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*** WINNER OF THE 2023 UACES BEST BOOK PRIZE *** The UK's decision to leave the EU has opened up huge existential questions for Northern Ireland as it marks its centenary. Constitutional conflict in Northern Ireland had been regarded as largely resolved and settled, but Brexit has altered the wider constitutional framework within which the 1998 Good Friday Agreement is situated. With the question of Irish unity gaining renewed and sustained traction, and with trade, relationships and politics across "these islands" in a state of flux, Northern Ireland approaches a constitutional moment. Murphy and Evershed examine the factors, actors and dynamics that are most likely to be influential, and potentially transformative, in determining Northern Ireland’s constitutional future. This book offers an assessment of how Brexit and its fallout may lead to constitutional upheaval, and a cautionary warning about the need to prepare for it.

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Poverty in modern-day Britain looks different to the form it took in Beveridge’s day but it has not disappeared. For 14 million people across the UK the lack of access to the goods and services necessary to live a decent life and to participate fully in society remains a grim reality. Despite rising standards of living, social and economic structures continue to trap those at the bottom in constant job insecurity, ill-health, overcrowded housing and educational disadvantage. Helen Barnard considers what it might take to finally slay the giant of poverty in Britain. She examines how we might build a fairer, more equal society, and what a modern welfare state should aim to achieve, including an honest appraisal of the trade-offs and choices involved in creating it.

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There has been a recent resurgence in interest in the theorization of labour regimes in various disciplines. This has taken the form of a concern to understand the role that labour regimes play in the structuring, organization and dynamics of global systems of production and reproduction. The concept has a long heritage that can be traced back to the 1970s and the contributions to this book seek to develop further this emerging field. The book traces the intellectual development of labour regime concepts across various disciplines, notably political economy, development studies, sociology and geography. Building on these foundations it considers conceptual debates around labour regimes and global production relating to issues of scale, informality, gender, race, social reproduction, ecology and migration, and offers new insights into the work conditions of global production chains from Amazon's warehouses in the United States, to industrial production networks in the Global South, and to the dormitory towns of migrant workers in Czechia. It also explores recent mobilizations of labour regime analysis in relation to methods, theory and research practice.

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Well-designed industrial policies can improve a nation’s economic performance. Using a range of tools, such as subsidies, tax incentives, infrastructure development, protective regulations, and R&D support, governments are able to support specific industries or economic activities. Steve Coulter examines the patterns of industrial policymaking across late capitalist societies. Drawing on case studies from a range of countries, each with different growth models, national capabilities, policy traditions, and political/welfare state regimes, he is able to offer a nuanced comparative assessment of states’ responses to specific economic challenges. The book draws broad conclusions about the trajectories of industrial policy and highlights key technical and political drivers that policymakers consider when addressing whether best practice should centre on general or nationally-specific approaches. The book also focuses on fresh challenges and opportunities for industrial policy and questions the sustainability of current policy practice.

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Why are measures of stress and anxiety on the rise, when economists and politicians tell us we have never had it so good? While statistics tell us that the vast majority of people are getting steadily richer the world most of us experience day-in and day-out feels increasingly uncertain, unfair, and ever more expensive. In Angrynomics, Eric Lonergan and Mark Blyth explore the rising tide of anger, sometimes righteous and useful, sometimes destructive and ill-targeted, and propose radical new solutions for an increasingly polarized and confusing world. Angrynomics is for anyone wondering, where the hell do we go from here?

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Inflation, hyperinflation and deflation have all had profound effects on societies, especially during periods of war and crisis. Today’s approach to managing inflation has been shaped by these episodes and informed by debates between different schools of economic thought from Fisher and Hayek to Keynes and the monetarists. This accessible and authoritative overview explores the role of inflation in the modern economy, from its place in monetary policy and in money supply to its effects on everyday business. In a compelling analysis, the book shows that since the financial crisis in 2008–09, inflation rates have remained persistently higher than interest rates worldwide, which is the inverse of our basic understanding of how inflation normally affects markets. The result of this inversion has been that the effective real return on investment has become negative, and consequently, the investment rate has dropped across western economies. At a time when inflation once again challenges the world’s leading economies, the book offers valuable insight into the monetary policy of central banks.

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China’s transformation over the past four decades has been unprecedented. The vision of its leaders for the next three decades is unprecedented too, as China seeks to fashion an advanced economy without significant political and social liberalization. Stephen Morgan provides a wide-ranging examination of China’s remarkable economic history from the time of the great divergence to the present day. Alongside the familiar story of GDP growth, he considers a comprehensive range of issues, including business management, energy use, foreign direct investment, government, innovation and consumerism as well as social and demographic factors such as social networks, health, education and migration and their interlinked challenges for the Chinese state. The specifics of development are examined – capitalism from above and below and its regional variances – as well as notable consequences, including growing inequality and severe pollution. The book also assesses the challenges to China’s continued growth, including its ageing and shrinking workforce (and rising dependency ratio), the constraints on innovation and raising productivity, as well as its ambitious international plans. The book provides an accessible and authoritative survey of China’s recent economic history and the workings of its unique political economy suitable for courses in Asian business and economy, Chinese history and East Asian studies.

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Although still the world’s third largest economy, Japan continues to feel the effects of the collapse of a massive asset price bubble in the early 1990s. In recent years further setbacks, including both the Asian and global financial crises, and the 2011 Fukushima earthquake, have only added to the economy’s difficulties and made its prospects under Abenomics at best mixed. Hiroaki Richard Watanabe examines the ups and downs of Japan’s postwar economic history to offer an up-to-date and authoritative guide to the workings of Japan’s economy. The book highlights the country’s distinct business networks and its unique state–market relationship. It explores the characteristic institutional complementarity that exists among different sectors and business practices and gives particular attention to human factors, such as labour market dualism, gender discrimination and migration. Although often associated in western minds with futuristic automated efficiency, Japan’s economy, Watanabe shows, retains many inefficient and peculiar business practices that do not comply with global standards. The book provides readers with a concise survey of Japan’s recent economic history, the economy’s characteristic features and the challenges it faces.

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Populism has become a significant feature of mature democracies in the twenty-first century and the rise of populist parties is proving a powerful and disruptive force. Catherine Fieschi offers a comparative analysis of the rise of populist parties in France, Italy, the Netherlands and the UK in the context of major digital and political transformations. Populism is effective, Fieschi shows, because it originates from within the democratic tradition and has been able to turn some of democracy’s key strengths against it – what she calls Jiu-jitsu politics. Populism needs to be understood not simply as a response to globalization by the “disillusioned” or “left behind”, but as a consequence of the digital revolution on our political and democratic expectations. She demonstrates how new dynamics unleashed by social media – the fantasy of radical transparency, the demand for immediacy and the rejection of expert truth and facts – have been harnessed by populism, enabling it to make unprecedented inroads into our political landscapes.

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Drawing on over four decades of research and writing on the political economy of the UK and United States, David Coates offers a masterly account of the Anglo-American condition and the social and economic crisis besetting both countries. Charting the rise and fall of the social settlements that have shaped and defined the postwar years, Coates traces the history of the two economies through first their New Deal and then their Reaganite periods – ones labelled differently in the UK, but similarly marked by the development first of a Keynesian welfare state and then a Thatcherite neoliberal one. Coates exposes the failings and shortcomings of the Reagan/Thatcher years, showing how the underlying fragility of a settlement based on the weakening of organized labour and the extensive deregulation of business culminated in the financial crisis of 2008. The legacies of that crisis haunt us still – a squeezed middle class, further embedded poverty, deepened racial divisions, an adverse work–life balance for two-income families, and a growing crisis of housing and employment for the young. Flawed Capitalism deals with each in turn, and makes the case for the creation of a new transatlantic social settlement – a less flawed capitalism – one based on greater degrees of income equality and social justice. As members of the millennial generation come to their maturity on each side of the Atlantic, Flawed Capitalism offers the critical intellectual tools that they will need if they are ever to break decisively with the failed public policies of the past.

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In this deeply researched and wide-ranging intellectual history, Matthew Watson exposes the essential flaw in the claims of economics imperialists. Their market models reveal mathematical truths only about themselves, not social truths related to the world of directly lived experiences.

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Doreen Massey was a creative scholar, inspiring teacher and restless activist. Her path-breaking thinking about space, place, politics and economy changed not only geography but the critical social sciences, initiating new ways of seeing, understanding and indeed transforming the world. This collection of commissioned essays, including from Doreen Massey’s long-time interlocutors and collaborators, explores both the generative sources and the continuing potential of her remarkably wide-ranging and influential body of work. It provides an unparalleled assessment of the political and social context that gave rise to many of Massey’s key ideas and contributions – such as spatial divisions of labour, power-geometries and the global sense of place – and how they subsequently travelled, and were translated and transformed, both within and outside of academia. Looking forward, rather than merely backward, the collection also highlights the many ways in which Massey’s formulations and frameworks provide a basis for new interventions in contemporary debates over immigration, financialization, macroeconomic crises, political engagement beyond academia, and more. Doreen Massey: Critical Dialogues is a testament to the continuing relevance of Doreen Massey’s work across a wide range of fields, serving as an invaluable companion to the new collection of Massey's own writings, The Doreen Massey Reader published simultaneously and also compiled by the editors.

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Repeated corruption scandals and the efforts of the international political community to find ways to counteract them have compelled economists, anthropologists and political scientists to confront corruption as a subject for serious academic research. This textbook introduces students to the field of corruption analysis and the challenges facing its researchers. The book explores the definitional challenges, the problems of measurement and the methodologies that underpin the standard corruption indices. The key drivers of corrupt practice are identified and the arguments used to understand the causes of corruption are outlined. The book looks at what works in the fight against corruption, including international conventions and organizations, and policy initiatives at the national level. The role of third sector organizations, the so-called “anti-corruption industry” and the work of citizen activists and “armchair auditors” are also explored. Analysing Corruption provides an authoritative and engaging introduction to a subject that is the largest public policy challenge that the state faces in many parts of the world. It is suitable for courses in politics, public policy, public administration, development studies and anthropology. It will also be of value to those working in NGOs and charities helping to shape anti-corruption thinking.

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What is the future for progressive politics in advanced capitalism? With its political fortunes so low, how might the Left move forward? These essays from leading left intellectuals – Dean Baker, Fred Block, David Coates, Hilary Wainwright, Colin Crouch, Wolfgang Streeck, Leo Panitch, Sam Gindin and Matthew Watson – reflect on the scale and nature of the task that the Left now faces and consider the following questions: • What in modern capitalism has brought the Left to this impasse?• What role has the Left played in its own failings?• What lessons can be learnt for progressive politics going forward?• What are the immediate options and how can they best be pursued? The views and opinions expressed vary, but all offer searching insights into the task the Left now faces. All point to the intellectual and practical experience on which the Left now needs to draw as it deals with its contemporary challenges. These essays represent a major statement on the future for centre-left politics and offer a frank appraisal of the Left’s current capacity to keep conservatism at bay and to strengthen radical politics again.

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The rise of behavioural approaches in economics has been one of most significant developments in the study of economic decision-making in recent years. The increasingly acknowledged failings of standard models of choice to explain economic decisions has prompted economists to incorporate into their analysis psychological insights into individual behaviour, such as social cognitive and emotional biases. This book introduces the topic of behavioural economics to a beginning readership, explaining its approach and methodology and assessing its successes and weaknesses. The book begins by tracing the evolution of the field from its origins in Adam Smith’s moral sentiments through the work of Herbert Simon to Daniel Kahneman and Richard Thaler today. The book explores how behavioural economics has advanced our understanding of human preferences including notions of fairness, reciprocity and inequality aversion, and the mental processes involved in decision making, which vary with the complexity of the decision and the ability of the decision-maker to process the information. The decision-making of individuals within social and economic groups is explored, including financial practitioners and what this can mean for financial markets. Finally the book looks at the ways in which findings from behavioural economics have been used to alter the decisions people make, such as the nudge approach, and the ethics of such persuasion.

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This book investigates the communicative turn in planning practice, and its potential for insurgent forms of civic engagement and democracy-building, drawing on interviews with urban planners who challenge technocratic spatial planning by incorporating notions of participation, spatial justice and the right to the city into their daily practices.

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We are the only species that uses fire. It has determined how we have made our home on this planet and it has propelled us to the role of the dominant species in the biosphere. But at the heart of contemporary climate change is the process of combustion. Simon Dalby explores what a life without burning things might look like, and how we might get there. Fires make the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere that is heating the planet, melting the ice sheets, changing weather patterns and making wildfires worse. Our civilization is burning things, especially fossil fuels, at prodigious rates. So much so that we are now heading towards a future “Hothouse Earth” with a climate that is very different from what humans have known so far. By focusing on fire and our partial control over one key physical force in the earth system, that of combustion, Simon Dalby is able to ask important and interesting questions about us as humans, including different ways of thinking about how we live, and how we might do so differently in the future. Simply put, there is now far too much “firepower” loose in the world and we need to think much harder about how to live together in ways that don’t require burning stuff to do so.

Read more less

Economic policymakers use various macroeconomic models, but how reliable are they in real-world conditions? Starting from the premise that all models are wrong, but some are useful, Matteo Iannizzotto introduces and explains the workings of the key economic models available for policymaking. He shows that the inconsistencies and contradictions evident in the real world require the economist to make choices about which models to adopt in certain circumstances and when not to rigidly adhere to a single approach. The book uses a clear and critical step by step analysis to consider the strengths and weaknesses of each model, in a way that enables students to develop their own critical engagement with macroeconomic policymaking. In so doing, the book provides an understanding of the world economy’s fluctuations since the global financial crisis that embraces the uncomfortable fact that inconsistency and the need for a multiplicity of models is central to macroeconomic policy choices. For the many students bewildered by the disconnect between the models in their textbooks and the policy choices so hotly debated in the press, the book will be essential reading.

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Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022 was a war long in the making and is the latest in a series of military interventions that have showcased Vladimir Putin’s deadly imperial ambitions and the ruthless and bloody strategies that serve his vision of a greater Russia. Putin’s Russia wants its empire back and it has taken the events in Ukraine for the West to finally realize it. Alex Bellamy examines the road to Ukraine 2022 and charts the path from Chechnya, Putin’s first war which helped propel him to the presidency, through to conflict in Georgia, Crimea, the South Caucasus and Syria. He shows the central role war has played in Putin’s rule and how it has helped craft a new social contract between president and people grounded in a shared vision of Russian national identity. For anyone wanting to understand the hows and whys of the war in Ukraine, Alex Bellamy’s clear and insightful analysis is a must-read.

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Why has Europe’s centre-left failed to respond to the crisis of neoliberalism in Europe? Rather than opening up a moment in political time for the centre-left to puncture the dominance of neoliberalism, the multitude of crises in Europe since 2008 have consolidated its difficulties and contributed to the rise of radical and populist alternatives. Divided They Fell examines the failures of mainstream politics, and in particular the inability of the centre-left to respond to the global financial crisis more effectively. By exploring the cases of the UK Labour Party and France’s Parti Socialiste, the book investigates the role of, and interplay between, institutional intra-party dynamics, the parties’ ideational landscapes and the wider political economy in shaping their responses to the crisis. Important reputational, ideational and strategic path dependencies in both parties, it is shown, constrained the flow of fresh ideas and entrenched their internal organizational divisions, leaving them unable to offer an effective post-neoliberal economic alternative. Ultimately, this fractured the parties and sparked a crisis of centre-left identity that opened the door to emergent alternative parties and movements in both cases. Divided They Fell helps to diagnose what has gone wrong for the centre-left in Europe and forces us to consider whether such parties are, in the context of new and emerging crises, still fit for purpose.

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Women across the world experience gender-based violence and harassment in the workplace. In the context of globalization and neoliberalism, work plays an important role in constructing and maintaining the economic, social and cultural systems of oppression that women face. Women in insecure, precarious employment and women not protected by trade unions are the most at risk of violence and as the #MeToo movement has shown, it stretches across societies rich and poor. In June 2019, the International Labour Organization adopted a ground-breaking global Treaty on eliminating violence and harassment in the world of work. This historic vote was the result of more than a decade of campaigning and lobbying by women trade union leaders and their allies across the world. Chidi King, Robin Runge and Jane Pillinger played a key role in the campaign and the negotiation of the Convention. Combining both their activist and academic backgrounds, this book documents their unique insights into and experience of the campaign and its landmark achievement in international labour law, global policy and the cross-movement building of workers’ and women’s rights, which has reignited the role of trade unions, and particularly women in trade unions, in global advocacy.

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This clear and rigorous examination of the international efforts to combat the financing of terrorism is suitable for a range of courses in international relations, politics and global political economy. It provides a comprehensive examination of the post-9/11 efforts to counter financial support for terrorist actors, including the more recent challenges of non-cash payment technologies as well as how to combat the financing of terrorism in regimes where territories and populations are controlled, as in the case of Islamic State.

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Over the past decade the European Union has faced threats to its currency, borders and unity. Covid-19, which began its inexorable spread across Europe in February 2020, is the latest crisis to test the Union’s resilience. Luuk van Middelaar’s compelling analysis of the EU’s response to the pandemic details how events and decisions unfolded, how crisis solutions were improvised in a situation of deep uncertainty, and the lessons it must learn if it is to continue to protect its citizens. As member states shut their borders and scrambled for supplies, the European Union at first appeared irrelevant. But once shaken from its torpor by a public cry for help, the EU has coordinated a formidable response to the chaos, including an unprecedented level of financial assistance. This reaction, argues van Middelaar, demonstrates the Union’s enduring strength and how it has learnt to deal with real world events. Indeed, the EU’s response to the pandemic reveals how far it has come on its journey from regulatory body to geopolitical actor. The pandemic highlighted that Europe’s next challenge will most likely come from its uneasy position between a strategically assertive China and a more self-centred United States. Facing this will require a greater political will than that mustered in the health emergency. To become a true power among powers, Van Middelaar contends, Europe must give firmer political shape to its own historical and cultural identity. Pandemonium cements Luuk van Middelaar’s position as one of the most insightful commentators on EU politics. His powerful analysis will be welcomed by anyone seeking to understand Europe’s dynamics and changing geopolitical role.

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Regional issues are increasingly debated across the social sciences. In an age of globalization, the region has come to matter perhaps more than before. In business, companies orient themselves to engage in regional environments to build capabilities and create critical mass in their vicinity. In the world of policy, almost one-third of the EU budget is spent on regional policy. Yet in spite of this the differences between regions that do well and those that do not are increasing in both Europe and the United States. In recent years, evolutionary economic geography has done much to create a framework to inform regional policy and academic work. Using its insights, Martin Henning explores why economic growth and transformation is an essentially regionally based and spatially dependent process. The book offers an accessible introduction to the core ideas involved in understanding the dynamics of regional economies and draws on case studies to illuminate these ideas in practice.

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The European Central Bank administers monetary policy for the eurozone and is tasked with maintaining price stability by keeping inflation below 2 per cent. This brief mandate belies the complexity of managing the monetary policy for the 19 member states of the euro, not to mention the political implications thereof. This book sets out the history, development and day-to-day workings of this key institutional pillar of the European Union. It assesses its work, independence, the policies and instruments at its disposal and the evolution of its role during, and after, the eurozone crisis of 2010. Incomplete monetary union, Germany's hegemonic ambitions and different economic policies from individual member countries are shown to pose formidable challenges to the ECB's macroeconomic management.

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Why are British banks so risk averse when it comes to providing long-term loan finance to businesses? In Europe the dominance of bank lending in the financing of small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) is well-observed. Yet in the UK exactly the opposite is the case, where most SME funding is via bank overdrafts and credit cards. The roots of this significant difference lie partly in the historical, institutional, political and cultural structure of the British banking system, and in parallel explanatory factors in the UK SME population, but the real mystery is why, in the twentieth century, there appears to have been no significant change in the attitudes of British banks towards providing long-term loan finance to SMEs. Indeed, this risk aversion might have been expected to alter during the postwar period and the substantial expansion of consumer demand and expanded commodity production, but it did not. This book explores not only how the historical formation of British banking structures produced such a relatively risk-averse arrangement compared to other European countries and the United States, but also why this banking attitude has persisted to the present day. The book concludes with a suite of recommendations necessary for British banks to provide a more balanced mix of financial provision to SMEs.

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In 1969 a small group of US scholars began discussing the possibility of starting a consortium of Western European Studies programmes. Europe was increasingly becoming an object of study and it was felt that greater coordination of the intellectual effort would help avoid duplication and further the acceleration of research. So began the Council for European Studies. In commemoration of the founding of the Council fifty years ago, this volume brings together some of the most influential Europeanists writing today to take stock of the subject and to consider the most fruitful avenues for future research. With European democracy seemingly under threat from populism on the left and the right, the economies of countries still struggling to emerge from a decade of recession and stagnating growth, environmental concerns paramount and the quest for social cohesion a distant goal, the contributors to this volume bring their insight to bear on the fertile ground that the EU and the continent more broadly offer researchers. The contributors – drawn from 52 institutions across the globe – present a wide range of perspectives on Europe’s past and present, and the key challenges facing its future, such as immigration, multiculturalism, nationalism and integration. Although it remains to be seen whether Europeans will continue to promote the dream of union or whether they will retreat back into their nation states, these essays offer valuable insights into how Europe might respond and the changing nature of what it means to be a European.

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Running down “do-gooders” has become a popular pastime in recent years. Journalists and academics alike have lampooned and criticized philanthropists and big donors for their charitable activities, which are often characterized as a means of self-aggrandisement or tax evasion. Yet, it is widely acknowledged that philanthropy – from the establishment of Carnegie libraries in the nineteenth century to the recent global health interventions of the Gates Foundation – has played a critical role in both developed and developing societies. In an impassioned defence of the role of philanthropy in society, Beth Breeze tackles the main critiques levelled at philanthropy and questions the rationale for undermining and disparaging philanthropic acts. She contends that although it might be flawed, philanthropy is a sector that ought to be celebrated and championed so that an abundance of causes and interests can flourish.

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In Seeing Ourselves, philosopher and neuroscientist Raymond Tallis brings together the preoccupations of some fifty years of writing and thinking about the overwhelming mystery of ordinary human life, and goes in search of what kind of beings we are, and where we might find meaning in our lives. If, asks Tallis, we reject the supernatural belief that we are pure spirits temporarily lodged in bodies, handmade by God, and uniquely related to Him, what should we put in its place? How do we ensure, if we accept the death of God, that something within us does not also die? And if we are simply organisms shaped by the forces of evolution, with no reason to exist and with no objective value, as some scientists claim, where shall we find meaning sufficiently enduring and profound to withstand the knowledge of our own mortality and the certain loss of all that we love or value? How should we think of ourselves if we are neither fallen angels trying to enact the will of God, nor unrisen apes acting out a biological prescription? Tallis begins his quest by establishing what it is we know of our fundamental nature. Showcasing a remarkable detailed engagement with a huge range of disciplines, he examines our relationship to our own bodies, to time, our selfhood and our agency – all manifestations of the unique nature of human consciousness – and shows why human beings are like nothing else in the universe. Having revealed our nature in all its glory, Tallis then addresses what is unresolved in the human condition – our hunger for a coherent life, inwardly lit by a single sense of purpose and meaning – and the search for something that matches the profundity of religion, even to the point of accommodating the tragedy of our lives. He shows that it is the actuality of human transcendence and the needs it awakens that must be the bridge across the divide between believers and non-believers. The book is ultimately a celebration. Behind the philosophical arguments is a hunger for more wakefulness inspired by a feeling of wonder and gratitude for the mystery of the most commonplace manifestations of our humanity. Tallis’s endeavour in Seeing Ourselves is to turn up the wattage of the light in which we see our everyday world and to think more clearly about who we are. It is only when we have woken from religion and naturalism, that we will find ourselves at the threshold of an unfettered inquiry – into ourselves, the world we have built and the universe into which we have built it – and then there may be some hope for salvation.

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Social movements play a significant role in the political and social landscape of Latin America. They emanate from different sections of society and are motivated by many different concerns, including workers’ rights, agrarian and land reform, the rights of indigenous peoples, gender inequality and the fight against environmental degradation. Ronaldo Munck explores the mosaic of interlocking and connected issues that make up the complex map of social movements in Latin America and shows why, despite being a fragmented political force, these movements are at the centre of any future progressive politics in the region. As such they require careful understanding and, he suggests, a more nuanced theoretical approach than previous studies have offered. Combining insights from Latin American approaches to social movement theory and detailed empirical case studies, the book provides readers with an understanding of the vital role social activism plays in the region and offers students the methodological tools to develop their own research agendas.

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Germany’s public savings banks – Sparkassen – are a remarkable and puzzling phenomena. No other advanced industrial country relies as heavily on such small, public financial institutions to fuel its economy and how is it that such small institutions can drive one of the biggest and most successful economies in the world? In theory, their diminutive size should hinder their ability to function in an environment where they compete with the capital and muscle of major international banks. Yet at the height of the financial crisis, when other banks drastically reduced lending, new loans made by Sparkassen increased as they continued to provide liquidity and lend to start-up firms. How have they managed to survive the economic turmoil and global pressures of the last few decades? What has enabled them to stay at the heart of the German economy? In a period of neoliberal “too-big-to-fail” thinking, how have these relics of an ordoliberal past managed to flourish? Mark Cassell answers these and many other questions in his exploration of the unique entity that is Germany’s public savings bank system and the lessons it offers to banking systems worldwide.

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The 2016 Brexit referendum result has been portrayed as the consequence of various short-term phenomena: the financial crisis, austerity, migration and UKIP, to name a few. Overnight the political future of the UK took an unprecedented and unexpected turn against EU membership. Since then, the UK’s government has been charting unknown waters in its negotiations to disentangle the United Kingdom from its membership and obligations to the European Union. In this book, Martin Westlake argues that focus on the short-term, reflex action of the Brexit vote has overshadowed a series of longer-term trends that were inexorably leading, or pushing, the UK away from full membership of the European Union. He shows that the UK was an increasingly semi-detached member, requiring ever more elaborate and ingenious fixes with opt-outs and rebates to keep its involvement in the project. Rather than a sudden, impulsive act of rejection, Brexit should be seen as having taken place over a number of years at various levels: a gradual slipping of the ties that bound the country to the European Union.

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Health economics has become an established field of enquiry over recent years and is now an important contributor to normative health policy, and decisions concerning the allocation of resources and the quality of healthcare provision across the world. Medical Economics, written by two physicians who are also qualified economists, introduces readers to the core economic considerations in healthcare provision and management. Addressing concerns that are relevant to both the individual and to public health, the authors draw on a wider range of economic tools and analytical frameworks than typically offered by standard textbooks. Combining thought experiments with real-world examples they illustrate the healthcare challenges facing today’s policy-makers. The book is aimed specifically at courses in medicine, public health, and healthcare management and administration, but also at economists looking for a broader perspective on healthcare systems, including healthcare financing, markets, the role of the state and other macroeconomic considerations, evaluation methods, healthcare technology, paying for medical care, health insurance and ethical issues.

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Credit rating agencies (CRAs) assess the creditworthiness of debt issuers on financial markets. They are private companies and the ratings they issue are judgements about the prospect of repayment of debt by an issuer in time and in full. A rating is not an investment recommendation, but it is an opinion about the creditworthiness of a financial product or an issuing bank, government, supra- or sub-national institution. In recent years CRAs have gained an authority in bond markets that far surpasses their original design. The financial crisis of 2008 thrust the CRAs into the spotlight as their highly rated financial products turned out to be toxic assets. CRAs were blamed not only for their excessively optimistic ratings, but also for their complicity in creating them. This short book introduces and explores the complex world of the credit rating industry: how it works, how it has evolved, the role it played in the financial crisis, and how it is regulated. Giulia Mennillo shows, as constitutive actors of global financial capitalism, CRAs have a social and political relevance that reaches well beyond finance into areas of transport, infrastructure, education and health and their impact is emblematic of the increasing financialization of our world.

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The cultural industries and their products and services make a significant contribution to the global economy and are seen as strategic sectors for sustainable economic growth. However, industries such as art, design, film, music, performing arts, publishing, television and radio, present particular challenges for economic analysis. They can be goods or services that are both public and private, protected by copyright and freely available, consumed and created, as well as susceptible to fashion and technological development. In this fascinating introduction to the cultural economy, Christiane Hellmanzik examines the market for creative work and reveals the economic relationships between human creativity, intellectual property and technology. Through the careful use of case studies, the book explores the core economic considerations such as supply and demand, competition and pricing, alongside macro trends such as globalization, digitalization and the internet, which are changing the industry’s business models.

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Alongside New York and London, Paris is one of the world’s earliest megacities. Its growth and character have been fashioned by a distinctive mix of policies that separate it from other long-time megacities as well as the fast-growing urban centres of the Global South. Christian Lefèvre examines the social and economic forces that have shaped Paris and which have made it the city it is today. He charts the impact of global trends, such as the shift from industry to service and information sectors, as well as regional factors, especially those arising from Paris’s unique system of governance. The book examines the central role the national government has played in policies affecting the city and explores how the shift towards political decentralization and localism has contributed to a system increasingly incapable of taking collective action. This tension is shown to have impacted the city’s provision of services, particularly housing, and promoted inequalities within the city and its region. Paris’s unrivalled national dominance is also examined alongside its weaker position as a global city. The book is an authoritative analysis of the evolution of modern Paris and the challenges that face its governance and future development.

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Without access to mainstream financial services, people pay more for goods and services and have less choice. The impacts of exclusion are not just financial but also affect education, employment, health, housing, and overall well-being. Limited access to financial services also impedes economic development in impoverished communities, which has prompted policy-makers, private institutions and NGOs to develop strategies to address financial inclusion. Drawing on a series of illustrative case studies – from India’s micro-credit industry to mobile banking in South Africa – Samuel Kirwan examines the various types of policy implementation in developed and developing countries, and considers the social impact and efficacy of such economic intervention. While acknowledging the risks and pitfalls of government-backed and private financial inclusion practices, the book makes a strong case for the value of financial inclusion both as a conceptual term for clarifying the stakes of material poverty and as a policy tool that creates a space for meaningful changes in economic practices. The book provides valuable insight into the role of government policy in combatting inequality and is a welcome resource for researchers examining the socio-economic dimensions of poverty and attempts to address it.

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The work of Karl Polanyi has become a central reference point for scholars in a variety of traditions and disciplines within the social sciences, including international relations, international political economy, economic sociology and economic anthropology. This book offers a comprehensive introduction to Polanyi’s political and economic thought by examining the key themes that run throughout it: economic ideas, commodification, money, the gold standard, geopolitical economy, the state, class, fascism, democracy and knowledge. Each chapter introduces the relevant aspects of Polanyi’s writings, covering important terminology and the position of the theme in relation to his work more broadly. The contributions seek to engage critically with Polanyi’s ideas, analysing both the strengths and weaknesses, as well as highlighting continuing points of relevance to contemporary issues and debates. The book celebrates the diversity of Polanyi’s political and economic thought whilst encouraging the reader to see it as a whole and not as a set of fragmented concepts. It is an ideal introduction for students engaging with Polanyi’s work for the first time.

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Since the late-1990s Turkey has emerged as a significant economic power. Never colonized and straddling the continents of Europe and Asia, it plays a strategically important role in a region of increasing instability. Bülent Gökay examines Turkey’s remarkable domestic political and economic transformation over the past two decades within the context of broader regional and global changes. By situating the story of Turkey’s economic growth within an analysis of the structural changes and shifts in the world economy, the book provides new insights into the functioning of Turkey’s political economy and the successes and failures of its ruling party’s economic management.

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Conceived in an era of rapid post-Cold War economic liberalization, the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), signed in 1994, brought together Canada, Mexico and the United States with the aim of creating a regional trade bloc that eliminated the friction and costs of trade between the three nations. Without an overarching institutional framework, NAFTA never sought to attain the levels of integration achieved by the European Union – for many it was a missed opportunity – and never quite fulfilled its potential as a single market. And under Trump’s administration a trilateral trade agreement has become increasingly precarious. This book provides an overview of NAFTA and its successor the USCMA, explaining the theory behind the politics and economics of trade in North America. It offers an accessible and concise analysis of the key provisions, shortcomings and past revision efforts of the governments involved. At a time of increasing protectionism and heightened awareness of trading relationships, the book highlights the lessons to be learnt from the fraught history of one of the largest trade blocs in the world.

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