Books published by Stanford University Press

This title explores the seemingly unorthodox alliance of the arts, management and marketing. Using case studies of successful art managers, the author illustrates the creative role - so central to value-making in contemporary economies - performed by aesthetic play in art firms.

This ethnographic study of a Chinese Catholic village reveals how the rapid penetration of transnational processes into the People's Republic of China during the post-Mao period has redefined and created new social and cultural structures in rural communities. In examining the resurfacing of a Catholic community, the book shows what it means to be part of a global and modern rural village.

This is a poineering study of the 19th centruy Hasidic movement as shown through the life of one of its most controversial and influential leaders, Rabbi Israel Friedman of Ruzhin (1796-1850). The dramatic episodes of his life are echoed by the contradictory and highly critical opinions of his personal charachter and leadership.

Lawyers in the US are frequently described as "hired guns," willing to fight for any client or advance any interest. But there are others, those the authors call cause lawyers, who refuse to put aside their own convictions while they do their legal work. This book explores their work and the role of moral and political commitment in their practice

The author examines the work of key figures in the early history of Jewish literature through the prism of their allusions to classical Jewish texts, focusing on the highly complex strategies the maskilim employed to achieve their potential and ideological goals.

Jeremy Bentham, the founder of utilitarianism, made a powerful impact on several major areas of thought and policy, yet his ideas have always been prone to misunderstanding. Dinwiddy introduces Bentham's ideas, examining the various components of his philosophy.

This book confronts the question of who and what is a Nikkei, that is, a person of Japanese descent, by presenting 18 case studies from throughout the Americas-including Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Canada, Paraguay, Peru, and the United States.

An exploration of corporate purpose - a company's expressed overriding reason for existing - and its effect upon strategy, executive leadership, employees, and ultimately, on competitive performance. It argues that the path to financial success lies in a customer-focused corporate purpose.

With a combination of erudition and insight, this work investigates the major aspects of Yiddish language and culture, showing where Yiddish came from and what it has to offer, even as it ceases to be a living language.

This book offers the first full-length English-language biography of Avraam Uri Kovner, a fascinating and peculiar Russian-Jewish writer and criminal who lived at the end of the nineteenth century. It is also an examination of Russo-Jewish identity in the modern period and of larger questions of hybridity and performativity.

In the aftermath of the French Revolution, "freedom" came to have a host of meanings. This volume examines these contested visions of freedom both inside and outside of revolutionary situations in the nineteenth century, as each author explores and interprets the development of nineteenth-century political culture in a particular national context.

In 1800, the per capita income of the United States was twice that of Mexico and roughly the same as Brazil s. By 1913, it was four times greater than Mexico s and seven times greater than Brazil's. This volume seeks to explain the 19th-century lag in Latin American economic development.

Tracing the evolution of state military institutions from the seventh to the twelfth centuries, this book challenges much of the received wisdom of Western scholarship on the origins and early development of warriors in Japan.

Examining the emergence of modernism from the fin-de-siecle primitivist project this volume shows how ethnographic materials shaped a variety of high and low discourses (ethnology, social theory, gender construction, classical scholarship, as well as travel photography) at the turn of the century. Illustrated with 98 photographs and drawings.

A systematic account of Brazil's historical development from 1798 to 1852, this book analyzes the process that brought the sprawling Portuguese colonies of the New World into the confines of a single nation-state.

In launching modern economics, Adam Smith paved the way for laissez-faire capitalism, Marxism, and contemporary social science. This book scrutinizes Smith's disparagement of politics and religion to illuminate the subtlety of his rhetoric, the depth of his thought, and the ultimate shortcomings of his project.

The institutional features and the past and future role of the state should be a central concern of contemporary sociological and political theory, but until now they have been sadly neglected. Lately, in particular, the state''s increasing involvement in the management of industrial and industrializing societies has made it even more important to understand its past development, its current activities, and the related trends in its structure and in its relation to the larger society.As a contribution to this task, Gianfranco Poggi reviews the main phases in the institutional history of the modern state. Restating a typology elaborated, among others by Max Weber, he outlines first the feudal system of rule, then the late-medieval Ständestaat and the absolutist state. Next the book discusses the nineteenth-century constitutional state, seen as the most accomplished embodiment of the modern, Western state. Finally, it points out the major developments which have occurred since the end of the last century in the relationship between the state and society, and identifies the threat these pose to the persistence of Western political values. Throughout, the discussion draws upon an impressive body of literature on the modern state (much of it not available in English) from the fields of history, law, and the social sciences.

This book is a vivid account of life in Moscow, "the most Russian of Russian cities," in the year 1903, a year before Russia's disastrous war with Japan and two years before the momentous Revolution of 1905. Though the undercurrents of social change were running swiftly, the surface stability of the Tsarist regime show no indication of the turmoil ahead.The author, who is perhaps best known for his biography Tolstoy, describes Russian life through the eyes of a fictional young Englishman visiting a prosperous Russian merchant family. All facets of Moscow life are covered, from entertainment and night life to family life and the devotions of the Orthodox. We learn about Russia's factory workers and peasants, its soldiers and lawyers, its priests and its city officials, its Tsar and his entourage: what they do and what they wear, what they think and what they dream. Concluding chapters take our visitor to the famous fair at Nizhny-Novgorod, which was held every year from July 15 to September 10, and on a boat trip down the Volga.

Mr. Whiting has written that rare book - one free from political inference concerning a political act. China's decision is viewed against the background of the problems and complexities of a fledgling Communist government and the book is as close an inside view as is possible to obtain without access to Red Chinese government sources. The decision to enter North Korea by the leaders of the Chinese government marked China as a real force in international relations, one that she had ceased to be. Naturally it was fraught with serious after effects: close affiliation with Russia; crystallization of the strict Marxist position; a death struggle with the West; and most important, China's role as the image of the Saviour in the East against historical "foreign domination". Whiting also handles other offshoots of China's entering the Korean war, for example, the concept of limited war. This is a capable work, penetrating, and with a feel for the Realpolitik of China's decisions. It is certain to raise many questions among serious students of world Communism. (Kirkus Reviews)

The figure of the New Woman, soon to become a major signpost of Chinese modernity, was in the process of being formed at the turn of the 20th century. This book shows how the construction of the New Woman was influenced by the fictional and translational representation of a range of Western female icons, including the French Revolutionary figure Madame Roland and Dumas's "Dame aux camelias."

This collection brings together diverse analyses of women in Japan-including department store elevator girls, tour bus guides, airline stewardesses, soldiers, soccer players, beauty queens, and educators-who have been intimately involved in the practices and professions of modernity.

Rather than envision themselves as agents of state-sponsored repression, the royal book censors of eighteenth-century France wished, through their reports and decisions, to guide the literary traffic of the Enlightenment and expand public awareness of progressive thought.

Drawing upon the insights of several disciplines, this work focuses on the structural and experiential dynamics of interpersonal and collective apologetic discourse as means of tempering antagonisms and resolving conflicts in contemporary Western society.

State-of-the-art reinterpretations of the reasons for Japan's decision to surrender, by distinguished historians of differing national perspectives and differing views.

"Professor Fehrenbacher has prepared a splendid introduction and notes to a documentary portrait of Lincoln through his speeches and writings. . . . Eminently useful and admirable book which teachers and students at nearly all levels will appreciate."--Kliatt"This compendium of letters, speeches and public papers of Mr. Lincoln, put together by one of the outstanding Lincoln scholars in our nation, constitutes only one tenth of all Mr. Lincoln's published works. Yet, Professor Fehrenbacher has chosen those which are really monumental. . . . Professor Fehrenbacher's introduction and head notes for each selection are alone worth the price of the book."--Hobbies

What can reason (or more broadly, thinking) do for us and what can't it do? This book explores the nature and limits of human reason, comparing and evaluating the major theoretical frameworks that have been erected to explain reasoning processes. It discusses the interaction of thinking and emotion in the choice of our actions.

This work critically examines standard assumptions of transitional justice through the lens of survivors' standpoints, and argues for more responsive and place-based approaches to social reconstruction after mass violence and egregious human rights violations.

The history of one of the most important and dramatic episodes in modern science, recounted from the novel vantage point of the dawn of the information age and its impact on representations of nature, heredity, and society.

In this book, Blanchot forcefully distinguishes his critical project from the major intellectual currents of his day, surrealism and existentialism.