Politics

The accumulated achievements of China since its revolution of 1949 are so great that they have now not only changed the world but must lead every socialist and progressive person to think about their relation to them. This is a situation only comparable to the way Russia''s 1917 revolution transformed the world.China, after its revolution, has achieved the greatest improvement in life of by far the largest proportion of humanity of any country in human history. China''s Great Road explains how China achieved this enormous step forward for humanity. The unequivocal answer the book gives is that socialism achieved this huge advance. It analyses this at numerous different levels. If the international left does not raise itself to understanding China''s successful socialist development then it is lagging in understanding one of the most enormous facts in human history. China''s Great Road both analyses China''s reality and shows how socialists in other countries can and should learn from China.

An analysis of the present political moment, and the anger that defines it, from bestselling author and acclaimed satirist P.J. O'Rourke.

A wide-ranging exploration of the present, and the future, of the Unconcious.

An urgent demand for a People's Green New Deal, foregrounding global agricultural transformation and climate justice for the Global South

Launched in New York City, in 1992, the Lesbian Avengers rejected the picket line and ordinary demo for media-savvy, nonviolent direct action. They were superheroes arriving "to make the world safe for baby dykes everywhere;" warriors with capes and shields doing a line dance; dykes "Lusting for Power," pushing a giant bed float down Sixth Avenue in New York (with lesbians on it); nationally-ambitious Avengers eating fire in front of a hostile White House; lovers reuniting a statue of Alice B. Toklas with Gertrude Stein, then waltzing in the snow in Bryant Park. And homos who shamelessly chanted, "Ten percent is not enough, recruit, recruit, recruit." It only took a few years for the Lesbian Avengers to grow into a global movement with sixty autonomous chapters worldwide all working for the visibility and survival of lesbians, and all sharing an irreverent direct action aesthetic, eagerly dipping into agitprop and advertising and theater, in ways that still feel ground-breaking today. Key to their success-the tools they developed to help lesbians understand and reproduce the Avenger action. One was the 1993 documentary video, Lesbian Avengers Eat Fire Too, which offered the why, the who, and the what, featuring interviews with Avengers, and sharing actions from their first year. Another was this book, The Lesbian Avenger Handbook: A Handy Guide to Homemade Revolution, which offers step-by-step instructions for everything from how to hold a meeting to how to envision an action and wrangle the press-expertise gleaned from Avengers working in journalism, advertising, art, and theater, as well as long-time activists who honed their skills protesting the Viet Nam war, the abuse of farmworkers, forced sterilization of women of color, and bans on abortion, and who'd already, in some cases, led civil disobedience in ACT-UP. This new edition of The Lesbian Avenger Handbook offers the bulk of this extraordinary resource unchanged, though it acknowledged advances in technology for activists still using it today. Important bonus material has also been included, including tips for demonstrating when civil rights are being trampled. Also featured, An Incomplete History of LACROP (the Lesbian Avenger Civil Rights Organizing Project), and excerpts from their Out Against the Right: An Organizing Handbook, important historical documents offering hard-won insights about dyke organizing and the importance of building community for long-term social change. With dozens of new pages of Avenger newsletters, Communiqués from the Frontlines, and the inclusion of the Dyke Manifesto, the Handbook also serves as a Lesbian Avenger history told in their own words. The 1993 edition of the Handbook was written by the novelist and essayist Sarah Schulman, and edited by Ana Simo, playwright and novelist, both among the co-founders of the group. The current edition is introduced and edited by journalist and founding member Kelly Cogswell.

Researchers in the social sciences and beyond are dealing more and more with massive quantities of text data requiring analysis, from historical letters to the constant stream of content in social media. Traditional texts on statistical analysis have focused on numbers, but this book will provide a practical introduction to the quantitative analysis of textual data. Using up-to-date R methods, this book will take readers through the text analysis process, from text mining and pre-processing the text to final analysis. It includes two major case studies using historical and more contemporary text data to demonstrate the practical applications of these methods. Currently, there is no introductory how-to book on textual data analysis with R that is up-to-date and applicable across the social sciences. Code and a variety of additional resources are available on an accompanying website for the book.

New edition of this popular undergraduate introduction to the growing field of environmental communication.

A dual biography of Malcolm X and Martin Luther King that transforms our understanding of the twentieth century's most iconic African American leaders

Drawing on dozens of exclusive interviews in Russia, where he worked for a time as a Kremlin insider advising Putin on press relations, as well as in the US and Europe, the author also argues that the West threw away chances to bring Russia in from the cold, by failing to understand its fears and aspirations following the collapse of communism.

An illustrated account of the intelligence services operating in Cold War Berlin.

African liberation is often seen in terms of heroism, but seldom in terms of thought. Even Sartre, in his preface to Frantz Fanon’s seminal The Wretched of the Earth, wrote of the ‘native’ with his coiled muscles about to explode into rebellion. The African and the black person are denied the condition of philosophy, apparently driven only by frustration and anger.Stephen Chan’s new book charts the long history of African political thought, from the years of North American slavery, through the development of modern African nationalism and the difficulties of governing new states, to Africa’s political philosophy today, taking on the world as an equal. He dwells at length on major figures from Marcus Garvey and Kwame Nkrumah’s postcolonial generation to Biko, Mandela and Ellen Johnson Sirleaf. He shows their leadership to be inseparable from their ideas, and from those of literary giants including Fanon, W.E.B. Du Bois and Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o.This is no hagiography: Chan critically examines his thinkers, who also include Mugabe and Mobutu, and expresses concern for the future of Pan-Africanism. But his fascinating account reveals a thoughtful continent that has made complex, significant contributions to the world’s intellectual commons–yet continues to seek freedom.

Presents the history of how two countries on the northern edge of Europe built societies in the twentieth century that became objects of inspiration and envy around the world. This title tells how Norway and Sweden achieved a rare feat by realizing grand visions of societies that combine stability, prosperity, and social welfare.

A rousing manifesto and memoir from a leading young Ugandan activist that will change the way we way we think about the impact of climate change and inspire readers to become activists themselves

A must-read for anyone who is keen to learn what we should know and do about this highly complex and ever-contested boundary line.

In To Catch a Spy: The Art of Counterintelligence, former Chief of CIA counterintelligence James M. Olson offers a wake-up call for the American public, showing how the US is losing the intelligence war and how our country can do a better job of protecting its national security and trade secrets.

As the ice around the Arctic landmass recedes, the territory is becoming a flashpoint in world affairs.

The deliciously sharp new novel from Ferdinand Mount, author of the Sunday Times Book of the Year Kiss Myself GoodbyeFerdinand Mount's stinging satire plunges into the dubious world of London PR firms, the back rooms of Westminster and the campaign trail in Africa and America. We follow the hapless Dickie Pentecost, redundant diplomatic correspondent for a foundering national newspaper, together with his stern oncologist wife Jane, and their daughters Flo, an aspiring ballerina, and the quizzical teenager Lucy. The whole family find themselves entangled in an ever more alarming series of events revolving around the elusive Ethel (full name Ethelbert), dynamic founder of the soaring public relations agency Making Nice.With echoes of Evelyn Waugh and The Thick of It, Making Nice is a masterly take on the madness of contemporary society and the limitless human capacity for self-deception.