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Synopsis: Ordinary people don't experience history as it is taught by historians. They live across the convenient chronological divides we impose on the past. The same people who lived through the Civil War and the eradication of slavery also dealt with the hardships of Reconstruction, so why do we almost always treat them separately? In this groundbreaking new book, renowned historian Thomas C. Holt challenges this form to tell the story of generations of African Americans through the lived experience of the subjects themselves, with all of the nuances, ironies, contradictions, and complexities one might expect. Building on seminal books like John Hope Franklin's From Slavery to Freedom and many others, Holt captures the entire African American experience from the moment the first twenty African slaves were sold at Jamestown in 1619. Each chapter focuses on a generation of individuals who shaped the course of American history, hoping for a better life for their children but often confronting the ebb and flow of their civil rights and status within society. Many familiar faces grace these pages - Frederick Douglass, W.E.B. DuBois, Martin Luther King, and Barack Obama - but also some overlooked ones. Figures like Anthony Johnson, a slave who bought his freedom in late seventeenth century Virginia and built a sizable plantation, only to have it stolen away from his children by an increasingly racist court system. Or Frank Moore, a WWI veteran and sharecropper who sued his landlord for unfair practices, but found himself charged with murder after fighting off an angry white posse. Taken together, their stories tell how African Americans fashioned a culture and identity amid the turmoil of four centuries of American history

How did the breakdown of Roman rule in the Iberian Peninsula eventually result in the formation of a Visigothic kingdom with authority centralised in Toledo? This collection of essays challenges the view that local powers were straightforwardly subjugated to the expanding central power of the monarchy. Rather than interpret countervailing events as mere 'delays' in this inevitable process, the contributors to this book interrogate where these events came from, which causes can be uncovered and how much influence individual actors had in this process. What emerges is a story of contested interests seeking cooperation through institutions and social practices that were flexible enough to stabilise a system that was hierarchical yet mutually beneficial for multiple social groups. By examining the Visigothic settlement, the interplay between central and local power, the use of ethnic identity, projections of authority, and the role of the Church, this book articulates a model for understanding the formation of a large and important early medieval kingdom.

The review presents a monograph by Natalia Vagapova, a well-known domestic theatre critic, slavist and translator, dedicated to the contribution of Russian emigration to European culture. This study, based on unique factual and archival material, gives a deep and objective idea about fruitful influence that reprsentatives of Russian theatre school exerted on the development of Bulgarian and Yugoslavian Theatres. The most outstanding directors who left Russia - Nikolai Massalitinov, Petr Sharov, Yuriy Rakitin - spread the experience of Moscow Art Theatre and the system of Stanislavsky, and made a huge impact on the history of forein theatre, especially the spread of Chekhov's drama.

In April 1997, during the Dutch presidency of the European Union, a three-day international conference was held in The Hague, The Netherlands, on the subject of The Quality of European and National Legislation and the Internal Market. The present publication comprises the proceedings and conclusions of this timely conference, which was organized by the T.M.C. Asser Instituut, The Hague, on behalf of the Ministries of Justice and Economic Affairs of The Netherlands and the European Commission. The objective of the conference was to suggest ways of improving the legislation in the European Union against the background of the common market. The quality of the drafting of Community legislation is crucial if it is to be properly implemented by competent national authorities and better understood by the public and in business circles. The conference focused on European legislation and on national legislation in the Member States. Representatives of the European Union, the governments, the academic world, industry and consumer organizations gave their views of and commented on the three main themes of the conference: (I) the experiences on European and national level regarding the judicial quality of legislation; (II) simplification of existing legislation and (III) assessment of draft legislation. The updated and revised versions of their studies and comments are published in the present book. During the final session of the conference, current initiatives in the field of improving the quality of legislation were reviewed (e.g., on consolidation, codification, guidelines and deregulation). The main findings of the conference were brought to the attention of the Internal Market Council and the IGC as a preparation of the European Council of Amsterdam (16-17 June, 1997) where the Draft Treaty of Amsterdam was concluded. Many of the conference findings and suggestions were repeated in the documents of the Draft Treaty. In addition to the above-mentioned contributions, the book contains (i) a valuable methodical digest of the conference, including a closer evaluation of the Draft Treaty of Amsterdam, and (ii) a summing-up of the results of the important debate by Professor L.J. Brinkhorst (European Parliament, Strasbourg/Brussels). The book is also enriched by relevant documentation in the field

Providing a new picture of the socio-economic map of central Europe after several years of transformation, and focusing in particular on Poland, this book gives an account of the major problems of regional restructuring. The author identifies the opportunities and problems faced by particular regions by relating the Polish experience to the experience of other central European countries. This in turn provides a general picture of spatial patterns of transformation in this specific part of Europe and will interest those concerned with the transformation of Eastern Europe

A highly accessible narrative survey of political thought over the past two millenia. Exploring many key ideas in the Western tradition, it begins with the classic political thought of the ancient Greeks, moves through the medieval and early Christian views of politics, and concludes by exploring the modern re-interpretation of political life.

In Introduction: The Return of the Left, Andrew Arato notes that, despite pessimistic post-1989 predictions concerning the incompatibility of privatization, monetary responsibility, & market-oriented reforms, East/Central European countries have sustained populist democracies in their shift to a market economy. While the newly pragmatic & reconstructed (formerly communist) parties support such innovations, strong political rival parties with similar social democratic agendas represent a challenge. The ghettoized ex-communists, marginalized because of still vivid popular memories of a totalitarian past, emerge stronger from negative campaigning. In Interview with Adam Michnik, this leading Polish Opposition intellectual, who spoke out against decommunization, explains his differences with political scientists Alexander Smolar, the leader in the battle for collective memory. He also discusses: differences between radical democracy & liberalism; changes in attitudes toward the Catholic church; & the evolution of Labor Solidarity, the independent Left party. In Interview with Janos Kis, this Hungarian writer identifies economic & religious factors shaping recent reversals favoring postcommunist leaders in Hungary. Other issues discussed include speculation on the ongoing realignment & coalition formation among the country's various liberal, socialist, democratic, & communist political parties. In Interview with Claus Offe (U of Bremen, D-2800 33 Federal Republic of Germany), this German sociologist offers insights into the latest elections, in which the former East German Socialist Unit Party, now the Party of Democratic Socialism, made significant political advances in the eastern states, due to its regionalist appeal, voicing of popular protest, & socialist agenda. J. Sadler

Abstract: "As tensions between the United States and China are on the rise, Europe needs to prepare for the contingency of a US-China cold war-like stand-off in Asia. Currently, Europe's political engagement with East Asia is quite underwhelming while European interest are as substantial as numerous. In this article, we focus on the question of how Europe could and should position itself in East Asia in order to increase its political weight, to cope with the negative repercussions of conflict between China and the United States, and to prevent Europe's imminent marginalization in this globally important region. For Europe and the European Union in particular, all this demands urgently to come up with a more unified and cohesive strategic approach. If Europe wants to play a meaningful role in the Asian century, significant steps are required in order to bolster Europe's existing economic and political weight with genuine 'actorness' abroad."