Transforming Global Governance with Middle Power Diplomacy

Transforming Global Governance with Middle Power Diplomacy: South Korea’s Role in the 21st Century
Palgrave Macmillan US | Diplomacy | July 2 2016 | ISBN-10: 1137596597 | 170 pages | pdf | 2 mb

Editors: Lee, Sook Jong (Ed.)

This book examines South Korea’s recent strategic turn to middle power diplomacy, evaluating its performance so far in key areas of security, maritime governance, trade, finance, development assistance, climate change, and cyber space. In particular, the authors pay special attention to how South Korea’s middle power diplomacy can contribute to making the U.S.-China competition in East Asia benefit Korea.

The contributors discuss the opportunities and limits of this middle power diplomacy role, exploring how Korea can serve as a middleman in Sino-Japanese relations, rather than as a US ally against China; use its rich trade networks to negotiate beneficial free trade agreements; and embracing its role as a leader in climate change policy, along with other topics. This book is a must read for foreign policy officials and experts who engage in the Asia-Pacific region, rekindling the academic study of middle powers whose influence is only augmenting in our increasingly networked twenty-first century world.

Topics

Diplomacy

Asian Politics

Globalization

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Hong Kong Architecture 1945-2015: From Colonial to Global

Hong Kong Architecture 1945-2015: From Colonial to Global
Springer | Architecture | July 15, 2016 | ISBN-10: 981101003X | 337 pages | pdf | 22.55 mb

Authors: Xue, Charlie Q. L.

The only English volume to comprehensively cover the 70 years’ trajectory of Hong Kong architecture after WWII
A reputable international author on modern Chinese architecture with a global view
Crystallization of the author’s twenty-six years’ observation and engagement with the topic

This book focuses on the transformation from colonial to global – the formation, mechanism, events, works and people related to urban architecture. The book reveals hardships the city encountered in the 1950s and the glamour enjoyed in the 1980s. It depicts the public and private developments, and especially the public housing which has sheltered millions of residents. The author identifies the architects practising in the formative years and the representatives of a rising generation after the 1980s. Suffering from land shortage and a dense environment, the urban development of Hong Kong has in the past 70 years met the changing demands of fluctuating economic activities and a rising population. Architecture on the island has been shaped by social demands, the economy and technology. The buildings have been forged by the government, clients, planners, architects, many contractors and end-users. The built environment nurtures our life and is visual evidence of the way the city has developed. Hong Kong is a key to East Asia in the Pacific Era. The book is a must-read for a thorough understanding the contemporary history and architecture of this oriental pearl.

Endorsement:

“Hong Kong sets an extreme example of hyper-density living. MTR’s Kowloon Station project offered my firm the unique opportunity to contribute to a new type of fully integrated three dimensional transport mega-structure, conceived as a well-connected place for people to live, work and play. Through Charlie Xue’s book, one can see how a compact city works and high density integrated development indicates a sustainable path for modern city making.”

Sir Terry Farrell, CBE, Principal, Farrells

“Well researched and refreshingly well structured, Charlie Xue’s latest book comprehensively shows how Hong Kong’s post-war urban architecture both tracks and symbolizes the former British colony’s rise to success – a must read for architecture and culture buffs alike.”

Peter G. Rowe, Raymond Garbe Professor of Architecture and Urban Design, Harvard University Distinguished Service Professor.

“An essential addition to the growing literature on Chinese architecture, the title of the book belies the full scope of Xue’s extensive history. Covering Hong Kong’s postwar transition from defeated colony to Pacific Age power house, Xue expertly traces the evolution of the city’s ambitious and innovative programs of integrated high density urban design and infrastructure, as well as changing architectural fashions. In a time when many Western governments have all but abandoned public housing programs, Xue’s book is a timely reminder of what can be achieved.”

Professor Chris Abel, author of Architecture and Identity, Architecture, technology and process and The Extended Self.<

Number of Illustrations and Tables

19 b/w illustrations, 192 illustrations in colour

Topics

Architectural History and Theory

Human Geography

Landscape, Regional and Urban Planning

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Microeconomics: Canada in the Global Environment (9th Edition)

Michael Parkin, Robin Bade, “Microeconomics: Canada in the Global Environment (9th Edition)”
2015 | ISBN-10: 0321931181, 0134136446 | 528 pages | PDF | 27 MB

Thoroughly updated, intuitive rather than technical, grounded in data and empirical evidence, extensively illustrated with well-chosen examples and photographs, enlivened with applications that focus on issues at play in today’s world, focused on learning-by- doing, and seamlessly integrated with MyEconLab. These are the hallmarks of this ninth edition of Economics: Canada in the Global Environment.

The Handbook of Global Communication and Media Ethics, 2 Volume Set

The Handbook of Global Communication and Media Ethics, 2 Volume Set by Robert S. Fortner and P. Mark Fackler
English | 2011 | ISBN: 140518812X, 1118721373 | 1040 pages | EPUB | 2 MB

This groundbreaking handbook provides a comprehensive picture of the ethical dimensions of communication in a global setting. Both theoretical and practical, this important volume will raise the ethical bar for both scholars and practitioners in the world of global communication and media.

Selected by Choice as an Outstanding Academic Title for 2011

Brings together leading international scholars to consider ethical issues raised by globalization, the practice of journalism, popular culture, and media activities

Examines important themes in communication ethics, including feminism, ideology, social responsibility, reporting, metanarratives, blasphemy, development, and “glocalism”, among many others

Contains case studies on reporting, censorship, responsibility, terrorism, disenfranchisement, and guilt throughout many countries and regions worldwide

Contributions by Islamic scholars discuss various facets of that religion’s engagement with the public sphere, and others who deal with some of the religious and cultural factors that bedevil efforts to understand our world

Global Gaming Business - June 2016

Global Gaming Business – May 2016
English | 72 pages | PDF | 19.15 Mb

Building Global Education with a Local Perspective: An Introduction to Glocal Higher Education

Emmanuel Jean Francois, “Building Global Education with a Local Perspective: An Introduction to Glocal Higher Education”
2014 | ISBN-10: 113739174X | 233 pages | PDF | 2 MB

“Glocal” education melds the economic advantages of globalizing higher education with the benefits of incorporating local perspectives. This book explores glocal education’s rationale; social, cultural, and economic foundations; key concepts; and implementation.

Antarctica: Global Science from a Frozen Continent (repost)

Antarctica: Global Science from a Frozen Continent by David W. H. Walton
English | 2013 | ISBN: 110700392X | 352 pages | PDF | 36,7 MB

Antarctica is the coldest and driest continent on Earth – a place for adventure and a key area for global science. Research conducted there has received increasing international attention due to concerns over destruction of the ozone layer and the problem of global warming and melting ice shelves. This dramatically illustrated new book brings together an international group of leading Antarctic scientists to explain why the Antarctic is so central to understanding the history and potential fate of our planet. It introduces the beauty of the world’s greatest wilderness, its remarkable attributes and the global importance of the international science done there. Spanning topics from marine biology to space science this book is an accessible overview for anyone interested in the Antarctic and its science and governance. It provides a valuable summary for those involved in polar management and is an inspiration for the next generation of Antarctic researchers.

The Oxford Handbook of the Macroeconomics of Global Warming (Oxford Handbooks) (Repost)

The Oxford Handbook of the Macroeconomics of Global Warming (Oxford Handbooks) By Willi Semmler, Lucas Bernard
2015 | 720 Pages | ISBN: 0199856974 | PDF | 7 MB

The first World Climate Conference, which was sponsored by the World Meteorological Organization in Genève in 1979, triggered an international dialogue on global warming. From the 1997 United Nations-sponsored conference-during which the Kyoto Protocol was signed-through meetings in Copenhagen, Cancún, Durban, and most recently Doha (2012) and Warsaw (2013), worldwide attention to the issue of global warming and its impact on the world’s economy has rapidly increased in intensity.
The consensus of these debates and discussions, however, is less than clear. Optimistically, many geoscience researchers and members of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) have supported CO2 emission reduction pledges while maintaining that a 2°C limit in increased temperature by the year 2100 is achievable through international coordination. Other observers postulate that established CO2 reduction commitments such as those agreed to at the Copenhagen United Nations Climate Change Conference (2009) are insufficient and cannot hold the global warming increase below 2°C. As experts theorize on precisely what impact global warming will have, developing nations have become particularly alarmed. The developed world will use energy to mitigate global warming effects, but developing countries are more exposed by geography and poverty to the most dangerous consequences of a global temperature rise and lack the economic means to adapt. The complex dynamics that result from this confluence of science and geopolitics gives rise to even more complicated issues for economists, financial planners, business leaders, and policy-makers.
The Oxford Handbook of the Macroeconomics of Global Warming analyzes the economic impact of issues related to and resulting from global warming, specifically the implications of possible preventative measures, various policy changes, and adaptation efforts as well as the different consequences climate change will have on both developing and developed nations. This multi-disciplinary approach, which touches on issues of growth, employment, and development, elucidates for readers state-of-the-art research on the complex and far-reaching problem of global warming.

Crediting God: Sovereignty and Religion in the Age of Global Capitalism

Crediting God: Sovereignty and Religion in the Age of Global Capitalism by Miguel Vatter
English | 2010 | ISBN: 0823233197, 0823233200 | 374 pages | PDF | 6,8 MB

Tocqueville suggested that the people reign in the American political world like God over the universe.This intuition anticipates the crisis in the secularization paradigm that has brought theology back as a fundamental part of sociological and political analysis. It has become more difficult to believe that humanity’s progress necessarily leads to atheism, or that it is possible to translate all that is good about religion into reasonable terms acceptable in principle by all, believers as well as nonbelievers. And yet, the spread of Enlightenment values, of an independent public sphere, and of alternative projects of modernitycontinues unabated and is by no means the antithesis of the renewed vigor of religious beliefs.The essays in this book shed interdisciplinary and multicultural light on a hypothesis that helps to account for such an unexpected convergence of enlightenment and religion in our times: Religion has reentered the public sphere because it puts into question the relation between God and the concept of political sovereignty.In the first part, Religion and Polity-Building,new perspectives are brought to bear on the tension-ridden connection between theophany and state-building from the perspective of world religions. Globalized, neo-liberal capitalism has been another crucial factor in loosening the bond between God and the state, as the essays in the second part, The End of the Saeculum and Global Capitalism,show.The essays in the third part, Questioning Sovereignty: Law and Justice,are dedicated to a critique of the premises of political theology, starting from the possibility of a prior, perhaps deeper relation between democracy and theocracy. The book concludes with three innovative essays dedicated to examining Tocqueville in order to think the Religion of Democracy beyond the idea of civil religion.

Diana Francis - From Pacification to Peacebuilding: A Call to Global Transformation [Repost]

Diana Francis – From Pacification to Peacebuilding: A Call to Global Transformation
2010 | ISBN: 0745330266 | English | 208 pages | PDF | 2.4 MB

Does conflict transformation work? Diana Francis reviews the developments in the field over the past twenty years. She recognizes that it has helped those engulfed in violent conflict to respond constructively, but also warns that the real requirement for peace is a global retreat from militarism. In an original and radical analysis, Francis argues that the dominant culture of power resting on coercion and violence must be displaced by the principles of interdependence, kindness and nonviolent solidarity. This is the only way that pacification – efforts to dominate and control – will be replaced by genuine peacebuilding. She calls upon peacemakers worldwide to embrace and develop the practice of nonviolent power, rejecting the culture and institutions of war and working with movements around the world for global demilitarization and “positive peace.”

Unfinished Empire: The Global Expansion of Britain (Repost)

John Darwin, “Unfinished Empire: The Global Expansion of Britain”
2013 | pages: 360 | ISBN: 1620400375 | EPUB | 4,1 mb

John Darwin’s After Tamerlane, a sweeping six-hundred-year history of empires around the globe, marked him as a historian of “massive erudition” and narrative mastery. In Unfinished Empire, he marshals his gifts to deliver a monumental one-volume history of Britain’s imperium-a work that is sure to stand as the most authoritative, most compelling treatment of the subject for a generation.

Darwin unfurls the British Empire’s beginnings and decline and its extraordinary range of forms of rule, from settler colonies to island enclaves, from the princely states of India to ramshackle trading posts. His penetrating analysis offers a corrective to those who portray the empire as either naked exploitation or a grand “civilizing mission.” Far from ever having a “master plan,” the British Empire was controlled by a range of interests often at loggerheads with one another and was as much driven on by others’ weaknesses as by its own strength. It shows, too, that the empire was never stable: to govern was a violent process, inevitably creating wars and rebellions.

Unfinished Empire is a remarkable, nuanced history of the most complex polity the world has ever known, and a serious attempt to describe the diverse, contradictory ways-from the military to the cultural-in which empires really function. This is essential reading for any lover of sweeping history, or anyone wishing to understand how the modern world came into being.

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