Author: Chih-yu Shih
Publisher: Hong Kong University Press
ISBN: 9888754041
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 141
Book Description
Eros of International Relations: Self-Feminizing and the Claiming of Postcolonial Chineseness is a distinctive work that explores the much-neglected Chinese perspective in broader international relations theory. Using the concept of “self-feminizing”—adoption of a feminine identity to oblige and achieve mutual caring as a relational strategy—this book argues that postcolonial actors have employed gendered identities in order to survive the squeezing pressure of globalization and nationalism in their own ways. Sovereign actors who have historically claimed to act on behalf of Chineseness have taken advantage of the images of femininity thrust upon them by transnational capitalism, the media, or intellectual thought. Shih illustrates the feminist potential for emancipation through a range of empirical examples, showing that women of various Chinese characteristics, acting on behalf of their nation, city, and corporations, reject the masculinization of their groups of belonging as remedy for inferiority or threat. Carried out effectively, Shih argues, actors who self-feminize have the potential to deconstruct the binaries of masculine competition and seek alternative strategies under the postcolonial global order. Eros of International Relations is a welcome contribution that ties together revisionist yet friendly reflections on the current studies of postcolonialism, international relations, relational theory, China studies, cultural studies, and feminism. “Chih-yu Shih is one of the pioneers doing gender and international relations in China. His critical renovation of postcolonial feminism demonstrates that self-romanticization, non-solution, and inconsistency are plausible strategies that help us transcend the boundaries internalized by hegemonic discourse.” —Yingtao Li, Beijing Foreign Studies University, China “Eros of International Relations develops the potent idea of self-feminizing as a relational, caring, and emancipatory strategy employed by postcolonial actors in a globalized world. This book is a fascinating reflection on feminist, postcolonial, and non-Western international relations scholarship.” —Arlene B. Tickner, Universidad del Rosario, Colombia “Drawing on postcolonial feminism, Shih explores the power of self-feminizing as a strategy in world politics, which he illustrates with case studies from Chinese history. A must-read for students of international relations and China alike.” —Pinar Bilgin, Bilkent University, Turkey
Eros of International Relations
Author: Chih-yu Shih
Publisher: Hong Kong University Press
ISBN: 9888754041
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 141
Book Description
Eros of International Relations: Self-Feminizing and the Claiming of Postcolonial Chineseness is a distinctive work that explores the much-neglected Chinese perspective in broader international relations theory. Using the concept of “self-feminizing”—adoption of a feminine identity to oblige and achieve mutual caring as a relational strategy—this book argues that postcolonial actors have employed gendered identities in order to survive the squeezing pressure of globalization and nationalism in their own ways. Sovereign actors who have historically claimed to act on behalf of Chineseness have taken advantage of the images of femininity thrust upon them by transnational capitalism, the media, or intellectual thought. Shih illustrates the feminist potential for emancipation through a range of empirical examples, showing that women of various Chinese characteristics, acting on behalf of their nation, city, and corporations, reject the masculinization of their groups of belonging as remedy for inferiority or threat. Carried out effectively, Shih argues, actors who self-feminize have the potential to deconstruct the binaries of masculine competition and seek alternative strategies under the postcolonial global order. Eros of International Relations is a welcome contribution that ties together revisionist yet friendly reflections on the current studies of postcolonialism, international relations, relational theory, China studies, cultural studies, and feminism. “Chih-yu Shih is one of the pioneers doing gender and international relations in China. His critical renovation of postcolonial feminism demonstrates that self-romanticization, non-solution, and inconsistency are plausible strategies that help us transcend the boundaries internalized by hegemonic discourse.” —Yingtao Li, Beijing Foreign Studies University, China “Eros of International Relations develops the potent idea of self-feminizing as a relational, caring, and emancipatory strategy employed by postcolonial actors in a globalized world. This book is a fascinating reflection on feminist, postcolonial, and non-Western international relations scholarship.” —Arlene B. Tickner, Universidad del Rosario, Colombia “Drawing on postcolonial feminism, Shih explores the power of self-feminizing as a strategy in world politics, which he illustrates with case studies from Chinese history. A must-read for students of international relations and China alike.” —Pinar Bilgin, Bilkent University, Turkey
Publisher: Hong Kong University Press
ISBN: 9888754041
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 141
Book Description
Eros of International Relations: Self-Feminizing and the Claiming of Postcolonial Chineseness is a distinctive work that explores the much-neglected Chinese perspective in broader international relations theory. Using the concept of “self-feminizing”—adoption of a feminine identity to oblige and achieve mutual caring as a relational strategy—this book argues that postcolonial actors have employed gendered identities in order to survive the squeezing pressure of globalization and nationalism in their own ways. Sovereign actors who have historically claimed to act on behalf of Chineseness have taken advantage of the images of femininity thrust upon them by transnational capitalism, the media, or intellectual thought. Shih illustrates the feminist potential for emancipation through a range of empirical examples, showing that women of various Chinese characteristics, acting on behalf of their nation, city, and corporations, reject the masculinization of their groups of belonging as remedy for inferiority or threat. Carried out effectively, Shih argues, actors who self-feminize have the potential to deconstruct the binaries of masculine competition and seek alternative strategies under the postcolonial global order. Eros of International Relations is a welcome contribution that ties together revisionist yet friendly reflections on the current studies of postcolonialism, international relations, relational theory, China studies, cultural studies, and feminism. “Chih-yu Shih is one of the pioneers doing gender and international relations in China. His critical renovation of postcolonial feminism demonstrates that self-romanticization, non-solution, and inconsistency are plausible strategies that help us transcend the boundaries internalized by hegemonic discourse.” —Yingtao Li, Beijing Foreign Studies University, China “Eros of International Relations develops the potent idea of self-feminizing as a relational, caring, and emancipatory strategy employed by postcolonial actors in a globalized world. This book is a fascinating reflection on feminist, postcolonial, and non-Western international relations scholarship.” —Arlene B. Tickner, Universidad del Rosario, Colombia “Drawing on postcolonial feminism, Shih explores the power of self-feminizing as a strategy in world politics, which he illustrates with case studies from Chinese history. A must-read for students of international relations and China alike.” —Pinar Bilgin, Bilkent University, Turkey
Post-Chineseness
Author: Chih-yu Shih
Publisher: State University of New York Press
ISBN: 143848772X
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 452
Book Description
There have been few efforts to overcome the binary of China versus the West. The recent global political environment, with a deepening confrontation between China and the West, strengthens this binary image. Post-Chineseness boldly challenges the essentialized notion of Chineseness in existing scholarship through the revelation of the multiplicity and complexity of the uses of Chineseness by strategically conceived insiders, outsiders, and those in-between. Combining the fields of international relations, cultural politics, and intellectual history, Chih-yu Shih investigates how the global audience perceives (and essentializes) Chineseness. Shih engages with major Chinese international relations theories, investigates the works of sinologists in Hong Kong, Singapore, Pakistan, Taiwan, Vietnam, and other academics in East Asia, and explores individual scholars' life stories and academic careers to delineate how Chineseness is constantly negotiated and reproduced. Shih's theory of the "balance of relationships" expands the concept of Chineseness and effectively challenges existing theories of realism, liberalism, and conventional constructivism in international relations. The highly original delineation of multiple layers and diverse dimensions of "Chineseness" opens an intellectual channel between the social sciences and humanities in China studies.
Publisher: State University of New York Press
ISBN: 143848772X
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 452
Book Description
There have been few efforts to overcome the binary of China versus the West. The recent global political environment, with a deepening confrontation between China and the West, strengthens this binary image. Post-Chineseness boldly challenges the essentialized notion of Chineseness in existing scholarship through the revelation of the multiplicity and complexity of the uses of Chineseness by strategically conceived insiders, outsiders, and those in-between. Combining the fields of international relations, cultural politics, and intellectual history, Chih-yu Shih investigates how the global audience perceives (and essentializes) Chineseness. Shih engages with major Chinese international relations theories, investigates the works of sinologists in Hong Kong, Singapore, Pakistan, Taiwan, Vietnam, and other academics in East Asia, and explores individual scholars' life stories and academic careers to delineate how Chineseness is constantly negotiated and reproduced. Shih's theory of the "balance of relationships" expands the concept of Chineseness and effectively challenges existing theories of realism, liberalism, and conventional constructivism in international relations. The highly original delineation of multiple layers and diverse dimensions of "Chineseness" opens an intellectual channel between the social sciences and humanities in China studies.
Sinicizing International Relations
Author: C. Shih
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 1137289457
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 331
Book Description
The book brings civilizational politics back to the studies of international relations and foreign policy through a study of the multiple meanings of international relations and related terms in East Asia and the intrinsic relation of international relations to individual choices of scholarly identity.
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 1137289457
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 331
Book Description
The book brings civilizational politics back to the studies of international relations and foreign policy through a study of the multiple meanings of international relations and related terms in East Asia and the intrinsic relation of international relations to individual choices of scholarly identity.
Love and Politics
Author: Jeffery L. Nicholas
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1000391922
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 227
Book Description
In, Love and Politics Jeffery L. Nicholas argues that Eros is the final rejection of an alienated life, in which humans are prevented from developing their human powers; Eros, in contrast, is an overflowing of acting into new realities and new beauties, a world in which human beings extend their powers and senses. Nicholas uniquely interprets Alasdair MacIntyre’s Revolutionary Aristotelianism as a response to alienation defined as the divorce of fact from value. However, this account cannot address alienation in the form of the oppression of women or people of color. Importantly, it fails to acknowledge the domination of nature that blackens the heart of alienated life. Alienation must be seen as a separation of the human from nature. Nicholas turns to Aristotle, first, to uncover the way his philosophy embodies a divorce of human from nature, then to reconstruct the essential elements of Aristotle’s metaphysics to defend a philosophical anthropology based on Eros. Love and Politics: Persistent Human Desires as a Foundation for Liberation presents a critical theory that synthesizes MacIntyre’s Revolutionary Aristotelianism, Frankfurt School Critical Theory, and Social Reproduction Theory. It will be of great interest to political theorists and philosophers.
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1000391922
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 227
Book Description
In, Love and Politics Jeffery L. Nicholas argues that Eros is the final rejection of an alienated life, in which humans are prevented from developing their human powers; Eros, in contrast, is an overflowing of acting into new realities and new beauties, a world in which human beings extend their powers and senses. Nicholas uniquely interprets Alasdair MacIntyre’s Revolutionary Aristotelianism as a response to alienation defined as the divorce of fact from value. However, this account cannot address alienation in the form of the oppression of women or people of color. Importantly, it fails to acknowledge the domination of nature that blackens the heart of alienated life. Alienation must be seen as a separation of the human from nature. Nicholas turns to Aristotle, first, to uncover the way his philosophy embodies a divorce of human from nature, then to reconstruct the essential elements of Aristotle’s metaphysics to defend a philosophical anthropology based on Eros. Love and Politics: Persistent Human Desires as a Foundation for Liberation presents a critical theory that synthesizes MacIntyre’s Revolutionary Aristotelianism, Frankfurt School Critical Theory, and Social Reproduction Theory. It will be of great interest to political theorists and philosophers.
Foucault's Strange Eros
Author: Lynne Huffer
Publisher: Columbia University Press
ISBN: 0231552017
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 134
Book Description
What is the strange eros that haunts Foucault’s writing? In this deeply original consideration of Foucault’s erotic ethics, Lynne Huffer provocatively rewrites Foucault as a Sapphic poet. She uncovers eros as a mode of thought that erodes the interiority of the thinking subject. Focusing on the ethical implications of this mode of thought, Huffer shows how Foucault’s poetic archival method offers a way to counter the disciplining of speech. At the heart of this method is a conception of the archive as Sapphic: the past’s remains are, like Sappho’s verses, hole-ridden, scattered, and dissolved by time. Listening for eros across fragmented texts, Huffer stages a series of encounters within an archive of literary and theoretical readings: the eroticization of violence in works by Freud and Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick, the historicity of madness in the Foucault-Derrida debate, the afterlives of Foucault’s antiprison activism, and Monique Wittig’s Sapphic materialism. Through these encounters, Foucault’s Strange Eros conceives of ethics as experiments in living that work poetically to make the present strange. Crafting fragments that dissolve into Sapphic brackets, Huffer performs the ethics she describes in her own practice of experimental writing. Foucault’s Strange Eros hints at the self-hollowing speech of an eros that opens a space for the strange.
Publisher: Columbia University Press
ISBN: 0231552017
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 134
Book Description
What is the strange eros that haunts Foucault’s writing? In this deeply original consideration of Foucault’s erotic ethics, Lynne Huffer provocatively rewrites Foucault as a Sapphic poet. She uncovers eros as a mode of thought that erodes the interiority of the thinking subject. Focusing on the ethical implications of this mode of thought, Huffer shows how Foucault’s poetic archival method offers a way to counter the disciplining of speech. At the heart of this method is a conception of the archive as Sapphic: the past’s remains are, like Sappho’s verses, hole-ridden, scattered, and dissolved by time. Listening for eros across fragmented texts, Huffer stages a series of encounters within an archive of literary and theoretical readings: the eroticization of violence in works by Freud and Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick, the historicity of madness in the Foucault-Derrida debate, the afterlives of Foucault’s antiprison activism, and Monique Wittig’s Sapphic materialism. Through these encounters, Foucault’s Strange Eros conceives of ethics as experiments in living that work poetically to make the present strange. Crafting fragments that dissolve into Sapphic brackets, Huffer performs the ethics she describes in her own practice of experimental writing. Foucault’s Strange Eros hints at the self-hollowing speech of an eros that opens a space for the strange.
The Agony of Eros
Author: Byung-Chul Han
Publisher: MIT Press
ISBN: 0262339250
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 76
Book Description
An argument that love requires the courage to accept self-negation for the sake of discovering the Other. Byung-Chul Han is one of the most widely read philosophers in Europe today, a member of the new generation of German thinkers that includes Markus Gabriel and Armen Avanessian. In The Agony of Eros, a bestseller in Germany, Han considers the threat to love and desire in today's society. For Han, love requires the courage to accept self-negation for the sake of discovering the Other. In a world of fetishized individualism and technologically mediated social interaction, it is the Other that is eradicated, not the self. In today's increasingly narcissistic society, we have come to look for love and desire within the “inferno of the same.” Han offers a survey of the threats to Eros, drawing on a wide range of sources—Lars von Trier's film Melancholia, Wagner's Tristan und Isolde, Fifty Shades of Grey, Michel Foucault (providing a scathing critique of Foucault's valorization of power), Martin Buber, Hegel, Baudrillard, Flaubert, Barthes, Plato, and others. Han considers the “pornographication” of society, and shows how pornography profanes eros; addresses capitalism's leveling of essential differences; and discusses the politics of eros in today's “burnout society.” To be dead to love, Han argues, is to be dead to thought itself. Concise in its expression but unsparing in its insight, The Agony of Eros is an important and provocative entry in Han's ongoing analysis of contemporary society. This remarkable essay, an intellectual experience of the first order, affords one of the best ways to gain full awareness of and join in one of the most pressing struggles of the day: the defense, that is to say—as Rimbaud desired it—the “reinvention” of love. —from the foreword by Alain Badiou
Publisher: MIT Press
ISBN: 0262339250
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 76
Book Description
An argument that love requires the courage to accept self-negation for the sake of discovering the Other. Byung-Chul Han is one of the most widely read philosophers in Europe today, a member of the new generation of German thinkers that includes Markus Gabriel and Armen Avanessian. In The Agony of Eros, a bestseller in Germany, Han considers the threat to love and desire in today's society. For Han, love requires the courage to accept self-negation for the sake of discovering the Other. In a world of fetishized individualism and technologically mediated social interaction, it is the Other that is eradicated, not the self. In today's increasingly narcissistic society, we have come to look for love and desire within the “inferno of the same.” Han offers a survey of the threats to Eros, drawing on a wide range of sources—Lars von Trier's film Melancholia, Wagner's Tristan und Isolde, Fifty Shades of Grey, Michel Foucault (providing a scathing critique of Foucault's valorization of power), Martin Buber, Hegel, Baudrillard, Flaubert, Barthes, Plato, and others. Han considers the “pornographication” of society, and shows how pornography profanes eros; addresses capitalism's leveling of essential differences; and discusses the politics of eros in today's “burnout society.” To be dead to love, Han argues, is to be dead to thought itself. Concise in its expression but unsparing in its insight, The Agony of Eros is an important and provocative entry in Han's ongoing analysis of contemporary society. This remarkable essay, an intellectual experience of the first order, affords one of the best ways to gain full awareness of and join in one of the most pressing struggles of the day: the defense, that is to say—as Rimbaud desired it—the “reinvention” of love. —from the foreword by Alain Badiou
Political Realism, Freud, and Human Nature in International Relations
Author: R. Schuett
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 023010908X
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 360
Book Description
This book provides an important reappraisal of the concept of human nature in contemporary realist international-political theory. Developing a Freudian philosophical anthropology for political realism, he argues for the careful resurrection of the concept of human nature in the wider study of international relations.
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 023010908X
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 360
Book Description
This book provides an important reappraisal of the concept of human nature in contemporary realist international-political theory. Developing a Freudian philosophical anthropology for political realism, he argues for the careful resurrection of the concept of human nature in the wider study of international relations.
Posthumous Love
Author: Ramie Targoff
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 022611046X
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 258
Book Description
For Dante and Petrarch, posthumous love was a powerful conviction. Like many of their contemporaries, both poets envisioned their encounters with their beloved in heaven—Dante with Beatrice, Petrarch with Laura. But as Ramie Targoff reveals in this elegant study, English love poetry of the Renaissance brought a startling reversal of this tradition: human love became definitively mortal. Exploring the boundaries that Renaissance English poets drew between earthly and heavenly existence, Targoff seeks to understand this shift and its consequences for English poetry. Targoff shows that medieval notions of the somewhat flexible boundaries between love in this world and in the next were hardened by Protestant reformers, who envisioned a total break between the two. Tracing the narrative of this rupture, she focuses on central episodes in poetic history in which poets developed rich and compelling compensations for the lack of posthumous love—from Thomas Wyatt’s translations of Petrarch’s love sonnets and the Elizabethan sonnet series of Shakespeare and Spencer to the carpe diem poems of the seventeenth century. Targoff’s centerpiece is Romeo and Juliet, where she considers how Shakespeare’s reworking of the Italian story stripped away any expectation that the doomed teenagers would reunite in heaven. Casting new light on these familiar works of poetry and drama, this book ultimately demonstrates that the negation of posthumous love brought forth a new mode of poetics that derived its emotional and aesthetic power from its insistence upon love’s mortal limits.
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 022611046X
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 258
Book Description
For Dante and Petrarch, posthumous love was a powerful conviction. Like many of their contemporaries, both poets envisioned their encounters with their beloved in heaven—Dante with Beatrice, Petrarch with Laura. But as Ramie Targoff reveals in this elegant study, English love poetry of the Renaissance brought a startling reversal of this tradition: human love became definitively mortal. Exploring the boundaries that Renaissance English poets drew between earthly and heavenly existence, Targoff seeks to understand this shift and its consequences for English poetry. Targoff shows that medieval notions of the somewhat flexible boundaries between love in this world and in the next were hardened by Protestant reformers, who envisioned a total break between the two. Tracing the narrative of this rupture, she focuses on central episodes in poetic history in which poets developed rich and compelling compensations for the lack of posthumous love—from Thomas Wyatt’s translations of Petrarch’s love sonnets and the Elizabethan sonnet series of Shakespeare and Spencer to the carpe diem poems of the seventeenth century. Targoff’s centerpiece is Romeo and Juliet, where she considers how Shakespeare’s reworking of the Italian story stripped away any expectation that the doomed teenagers would reunite in heaven. Casting new light on these familiar works of poetry and drama, this book ultimately demonstrates that the negation of posthumous love brought forth a new mode of poetics that derived its emotional and aesthetic power from its insistence upon love’s mortal limits.
Complexity Science and World Affairs
Author: Walter C. Clemens Jr.
Publisher: SUNY Press
ISBN: 1438449011
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 292
Book Description
Applies complexity science to the study of international politics. Why did some countries transition peacefully from communist rule to political freedom and market economies, while others did not? Why did the United States enjoy a brief moment as the sole remaining superpower, and then lose power and influence across the board? What are the prospects for China, the main challenger to American hegemony? In Complexity Science and World Affairs, Walter C. Clemens Jr. demonstrates how the basic concepts of complexity science can broaden and deepen the insights gained by other approaches to the study of world affairs. He argues that societal fitnessthe ability of a social system to cope with complex challenges and opportunitieshinges heavily on the values and way of life of each society, and serves to explain why some societies gain and others lose. Applying theory to several rich case studies, including political developments across postSoviet Eurasia and the United States, Clemens shows that complexity science offers a powerful set of tools for advancing the study of international relations, comparative government, and, more broadly, the social sciences. Clemens has written an outstanding bookthe culmination of a half?centurys experience in and analysis of world affairs [It is] bound to interest not only political and other social scientists but all thoughtful persons concerned with understanding and perhaps improving the human condition. from the Foreword by Stuart A. Kauffman This breakthrough book provides a new, promising general paradigm exploring and explaining the complexity of world politics. For scholars and analysts pushing the boundaries of our field, this is a must-read volume. Jacek Kugler, Claremont Graduate University Complexity can be overwhelming and complexity science can be daunting, and, yet, in Walter Clemenss skilled hands both become accessible, understandable, and useful tools for both scholars and practitioners. Once again, Clemens has shown that sophisticated academic theorizing only benefits from clarity, elegance, and wit. The book is ideal for graduate and undergraduate students as a supplementary text in international relations or comparative politics. Alexander Motyl, Rutgers UniversityNewark Clemens offers a fresh, even startling, paradigm and process for analyzing the seemingly unpredictable relations within and among human societies. With impressive clarity he proposes that the capacity to cope with complexity has become a key determinant of success in our intricately interrelated world. Careful study of this capacity in specific contexts can lead to revealing analyses in comparative politics and international relations. A provocative and stimulating treatise! S. Frederick Starr, Johns Hopkins University Walt Clemenss provocative new book can be appreciated at several levels: as an analytical framework in international relationscomplexity sciencethat offers a compelling alternative to realism and neoliberalism; as an incisive critique of the fitness of the supposedly most developed societies to deal with our complex world; and as a humanistic value-set that provides better standards for assessing governments than do GDP, trade levels, or military spending. Clemens skillfully integrates theory and practice to explore US hyperpower, the two Koreas, China, and other states from new angles, and with consistent objectivity. IR specialists should find this book exciting, while IR and international studies students will be challenged by the new paradigm it presents. Mel Gurtov, Portland State University Clemens proposes a powerful new way of looking at international relations and politics, and offers a productive method for assessing the fitness of societies in the early twenty-first century. Guntis midchens, University of Washington, Seattle You dont have to be a political scientist to wonder why some states succeed and others do not, why some societies flourish while others suffer stagnation and conflict. Employing the relatively new tool of complexity science, Walter Clemens evaluates the fitness of states and societies, i.e. their ability to cope with complex challenges and opportunities. He does so in a way that is eruditehow many studies quote Walt Whitman and Karl Marx in the same chapter?yet clear and accessible. Clemens challenges both existing political science paradigms and policy perspectives. This is a stimulating, rich volume that can be read and re-read with profit and appreciation for its breadth and depth and most of all for its insistence that we see the world, and the states in it, in all their complexity. Ronald H. Linden, University of Pittsburgh
Publisher: SUNY Press
ISBN: 1438449011
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 292
Book Description
Applies complexity science to the study of international politics. Why did some countries transition peacefully from communist rule to political freedom and market economies, while others did not? Why did the United States enjoy a brief moment as the sole remaining superpower, and then lose power and influence across the board? What are the prospects for China, the main challenger to American hegemony? In Complexity Science and World Affairs, Walter C. Clemens Jr. demonstrates how the basic concepts of complexity science can broaden and deepen the insights gained by other approaches to the study of world affairs. He argues that societal fitnessthe ability of a social system to cope with complex challenges and opportunitieshinges heavily on the values and way of life of each society, and serves to explain why some societies gain and others lose. Applying theory to several rich case studies, including political developments across postSoviet Eurasia and the United States, Clemens shows that complexity science offers a powerful set of tools for advancing the study of international relations, comparative government, and, more broadly, the social sciences. Clemens has written an outstanding bookthe culmination of a half?centurys experience in and analysis of world affairs [It is] bound to interest not only political and other social scientists but all thoughtful persons concerned with understanding and perhaps improving the human condition. from the Foreword by Stuart A. Kauffman This breakthrough book provides a new, promising general paradigm exploring and explaining the complexity of world politics. For scholars and analysts pushing the boundaries of our field, this is a must-read volume. Jacek Kugler, Claremont Graduate University Complexity can be overwhelming and complexity science can be daunting, and, yet, in Walter Clemenss skilled hands both become accessible, understandable, and useful tools for both scholars and practitioners. Once again, Clemens has shown that sophisticated academic theorizing only benefits from clarity, elegance, and wit. The book is ideal for graduate and undergraduate students as a supplementary text in international relations or comparative politics. Alexander Motyl, Rutgers UniversityNewark Clemens offers a fresh, even startling, paradigm and process for analyzing the seemingly unpredictable relations within and among human societies. With impressive clarity he proposes that the capacity to cope with complexity has become a key determinant of success in our intricately interrelated world. Careful study of this capacity in specific contexts can lead to revealing analyses in comparative politics and international relations. A provocative and stimulating treatise! S. Frederick Starr, Johns Hopkins University Walt Clemenss provocative new book can be appreciated at several levels: as an analytical framework in international relationscomplexity sciencethat offers a compelling alternative to realism and neoliberalism; as an incisive critique of the fitness of the supposedly most developed societies to deal with our complex world; and as a humanistic value-set that provides better standards for assessing governments than do GDP, trade levels, or military spending. Clemens skillfully integrates theory and practice to explore US hyperpower, the two Koreas, China, and other states from new angles, and with consistent objectivity. IR specialists should find this book exciting, while IR and international studies students will be challenged by the new paradigm it presents. Mel Gurtov, Portland State University Clemens proposes a powerful new way of looking at international relations and politics, and offers a productive method for assessing the fitness of societies in the early twenty-first century. Guntis midchens, University of Washington, Seattle You dont have to be a political scientist to wonder why some states succeed and others do not, why some societies flourish while others suffer stagnation and conflict. Employing the relatively new tool of complexity science, Walter Clemens evaluates the fitness of states and societies, i.e. their ability to cope with complex challenges and opportunities. He does so in a way that is eruditehow many studies quote Walt Whitman and Karl Marx in the same chapter?yet clear and accessible. Clemens challenges both existing political science paradigms and policy perspectives. This is a stimulating, rich volume that can be read and re-read with profit and appreciation for its breadth and depth and most of all for its insistence that we see the world, and the states in it, in all their complexity. Ronald H. Linden, University of Pittsburgh
Sensuous Knowledge
Author: Minna Salami
Publisher: Zed Books Ltd.
ISBN: 178699528X
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 183
Book Description
In Sensuous Knowledge, Minna Salami draws on Africa-centric, feminist-first and artistic traditions to help us rediscover inclusive and invigorating ways of experiencing the world afresh. Combining the playfulness of a storyteller with the insight of a social critic, the book pries apart the systems of power and privilege that have dominated ways of thinking for centuries – and which have led to so much division, prejudice and damage. And it puts forward a new, sensuous, approach to knowledge: one grounded in a host of global perspectives – from Black Feminism to personal narrative, pop culture to high art, Western philosophy to African mythology – together comprising a vision of hope for a fragmented world riven by crisis. Through the prism of this new knowledge, Salami offers fresh insights into the key cultural issues that affect women’s lives. How are we to view Sisterhood, Motherhood or even Womanhood itself? What is Power and why do we conceive of Beauty? How does one achieve Liberation? She asks women to break free of the prison made by ingrained male-centric biases, and build a house themselves – a home that can nurture us all. Sensuous Knowledge confirms Minna Salami as one the most important spokespeople of today, and the arrival of a blistering new literary voice.
Publisher: Zed Books Ltd.
ISBN: 178699528X
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 183
Book Description
In Sensuous Knowledge, Minna Salami draws on Africa-centric, feminist-first and artistic traditions to help us rediscover inclusive and invigorating ways of experiencing the world afresh. Combining the playfulness of a storyteller with the insight of a social critic, the book pries apart the systems of power and privilege that have dominated ways of thinking for centuries – and which have led to so much division, prejudice and damage. And it puts forward a new, sensuous, approach to knowledge: one grounded in a host of global perspectives – from Black Feminism to personal narrative, pop culture to high art, Western philosophy to African mythology – together comprising a vision of hope for a fragmented world riven by crisis. Through the prism of this new knowledge, Salami offers fresh insights into the key cultural issues that affect women’s lives. How are we to view Sisterhood, Motherhood or even Womanhood itself? What is Power and why do we conceive of Beauty? How does one achieve Liberation? She asks women to break free of the prison made by ingrained male-centric biases, and build a house themselves – a home that can nurture us all. Sensuous Knowledge confirms Minna Salami as one the most important spokespeople of today, and the arrival of a blistering new literary voice.