Suchergebnisse

Similarities between the US, the UK and the Chinese housing markets, including the movements of interest rates and house prices, and the exposure of some Chinese banks to the US mortgage securitization market, have triggered concern about whether China could experience a US-style credit and housing market crisis. Significant differences between China and Western economies make that unlikely in the near future. China's booming house market has been supported by fast economic growth, rapid urbanization and high domestic savings. Chinese banks have also been less exposed to mortgage defaults than their Western counterparts. However, the relative underdevelopment of the financial system-credit monitoring and asset securitization-may expose China to domestic mortgage lending-related crises. (J Contemp China/GIGA)

"The Future of Capitalism After the Financial Crisis: The Varieties of Capitalism Debate in the Age of Austerity contains thirteen world leading political economists writing from within eight different countries who critically analyze the current crisis tendencies of capitalism both globally and in particular countries. Given the likelihood of an increasingly crisis prone future for capitalism, it is important not only to rethink capitalism in its current manifestations or varieties. It is also important to rethink research methods and conceptual frameworks in preparation for understanding an increasingly rocky future in which capitalism itself could go the way of the many species that in the past were endangered only to become extinct. More and more titles of books and articles are suggesting that capitalism or perhaps civilization itself is endangered if we do not make radical changes in the near future. This book breaks with academic path dependency and attempts to open new vistas of political economy and of multidisciplinary analysis are crucially important if our thought processes are to be effective in a world in jeopardy. The varieties of capitalism (VoC) debate itself came into being as the Soviet Union unraveled. It drew in scholarship from a cross-section of Marxian and heterodox political economy. The key argument of VoC was that if capitalism was the only global option then those on the Left must get involved in policy discussions on how capitalist economies can be fashioned to become competitive as well as progressive. However, the financial crisis has seen policy across the advanced economies veer toward competitiveness coupled with austerity. The lesson for the Left is that alternatives to capitalism must be sought in the here and now"--

"On October 4, 1957, in the midst of the Cold War, the Soviet Union launched Sputnik I, the first artificial Earth satellite. For the West, and especially the United States, it was a shattering blow to national morale and pride. It led to a deep-seated fear that the Soviet Union would surpass the United States in both technology and power and that even nuclear war might be near. After Sputnik shows that the late 1950s were not an era of complacency and smugness, but were some of the most anxious years in American history. The Cold War was by no means a time of peace. It was an era of a different kind of battle--one that took place in negotiations and in the internal affairs of many countries, but not always on the battlefield. While many choose to remember President Eisenhower as a near-pacifist, his actions in Lebanon, the Taiwan Straits Crisis, Berlin, and elsewhere proved otherwise. Seconded by his able Secretary of State, he steered America though some of the most difficult parts of the Cold War, not always succeeding, but preventing disaster. The Middle East and Berlin crises, the Indonesian Civil War, Fidel Castro's rise to power, and other events are all bluntly discussed in the light of Western, and other, illusions and delusions. In this engaging history, Levine delves deeply into this often misrepresented period of history, and provides new insight into one of the most formative decades in American history"--Provided by publisher

This volume explores democracy in the 20th century, examining the triumph, crises, recovery, and resilience of democracy and its associated cultures in this period. From 1920 democracy became the hegemonic discourse in political cultures, to the extent that even its enemies claimed its legacy. The end of empires ushered in an unprecedented globalization of democratic aspirations. Barriers of gender and race were gradually removed, and greater equality gave new meaning to citizenship. Yet, already in 1922 democracy was on its back foot with the rise of fascism. Even after the latter s defeat in 1945, liberal democracy died wherever communist democracy triumphed. The situation changed again from 1989, but democratic hubris was then checked by the rise of a new enemy-populism. The paradox is that the century of democracy s triumph was also that of its near final defeat, while the peace and stability that everybody desired and many expected as the outcome of the extension of democracy were, at best, intermittent and geographically limited. Each chapter takes a different theme as its focus: sovereignty; liberty and the rule of law; the common good ; economic and social democracy; religion and the principles of political obligation; citizenship and gender; ethnicity, race, and nationalism; democratic crises, revolutions, and civil resistance; international relations; and democratic politics beyond the polis. These ten different approaches to democracy since 1920 offer a global, synoptic, and probing exploration of the subject

"After more than a century of recurring conflict, the countries of the Asia-Pacific region have managed something remarkable: avoiding war among nations. Since 1979, Asia has endured threats, near-miss crises, and nuclear proliferation but no interstate war. How fragile is this "Asian peace," and what is America's role in it? Van Jackson argues that because Washington takes for granted that the United States is a force for good, successive presidencies have failed to see how their statecraft impedes more durable forms of security and inadvertently embrittles peace. At times, the United States has been the region's bulwark against instability, but America has been a threat to Asian peace as much as it has been its guarantor. By grappling with how America fits into the Asian story, Jackson shows how regional stability has diminished because of U.S. choices, and why America's margin for geopolitical error is less now than ever before."

"In 2007, a tsunami slammed a small island in the western Solomon Islands, wreaking havoc on its coastal communities and ecosystems. Drawing on over ten years of ethnographic and environmental science research, Matthew Lauer provides an intimate account of this catastrophic event that explores how a century of colonization, Christianity, and increasing entanglement with capitalism prefigured the local response and the tumultuous recovery process. Despite near total destruction of several villages, few people lost their lives, as nearly everyone fled to high ground before the tsunami struck. To understand their astonishing, lifesaving response, Lauer argues that we need to rethink the popular portrayals of indigenous ecological knowledge that inform environmental research and contemporary disaster mitigation strategies so as to avoid displacing those aspects of indigenous knowing and being that tend to be overlooked. In an increasingly disaster-prone era of ecological crises, this important study challenges readers to expand their thinking about the causes and consequences of calamities, the effects of disaster relief and recovery efforts, and the nature of local knowledge"--

Linking literature from the sociological study of the apocalyptic with the sociology and philosophy of science, Apocalyptic Narratives explores how the apocalyptic narrative frames and provides meaning to contemporary, secular and scientific crises, focussing on nuclear war, general environmental crisis and climate change in both English and German speaking cultural contexts. In particular, the book will use social identity and representation theories, the sociologies of risk and Lakatos' philosophy of science to trace how our cultural background and apocalyptic tradition shape our wider interpretation, communication and response to contemporary global crisis. The set of environmental and other challenges that the world is facing is often framed in terms of apocalyptic or existential crisis. Yet apocalyptic fears about the near future are nothing new. This book looks at the narrative connections between our current sense of crisis and the apocalyptic. The book will be of interest to readers interested in environmental crisis and communication, the sociology and philosophy of science and existential risk, but also to readers interested in the apocalyptic and its contemporary relevance

This book critically explores past and present principles of central banking, and outlines a new framework for future stabilization policy. Through compact and concise chapters, it demonstrates why a constant long-term interest rate would be the most beneficial target for monetary policy to follow. A novel set of policy tools and institutional arrangements suitable to reliably meet this target are developed. It is argued that the proposed framework would be clearly superior to conventional policies in preventing financial market crises, maintaining high employment, and keeping the economy at or near potential. The merits and shortcomings of alternative theories such as Modern Monetary Theory are also discussed. This book will be relevant to researchers and policymakers as well as professional investors, analysts, and commentators of financial markets and the economy at large. Burkhard Wehner is an independent scholar and theorist in economics and political science. He has developed alternative theories and concepts of democracy, social and monetary policy, and the labor market.

Fresh water scarcity is a critical challenge, with social, economic, political and environmental consequences. Water crises in Australia have already led to severe restrictions being applied in cities, drought ravaging farmlands, and the near-terminal decline of some rivers and wetlands. "A Water Story" provides an account of Australian water management practices, set against important historical precedents and the contemporary experience of other countries. It describes the nature and distribution of the country's natural water resources, management of these resources by Indigenous Australians, the development of urban water supply, and support for pastoral activities and agricultural irrigation, with the aid of case studies and anecdotes. This is followed by discussion of the environmental consequences and current challenges of water management, including food supply, energy and climate change, along with options for ensuring sustainable, adequate high-quality water supplies for a growing population. This book is an important resource for water professionals and those with an interest in water and the environment and related issues, as well as students and the wider community

Introduction : satellites and surveillance capitalism -- "A permanent state of 'Cold War'" : preparing the environment, 1940-1968 -- "Our knowledge is in the holes" : software consulting and the sweat-equity formula, 1968-1977 -- "Innovation in a cold climate" : remote sensing and the government contracting paradigm, 1971-1980 -- "Two things went wrong at once" : financial crises, mythical man-months, and the near-death experience, 1975-1981 -- "Unscrambling the mess" : financial restructuring, management discipline, and the military contracting formula, 1981-1987 -- "The systems vision was too hard" : investor strategies, product development, and the demise of the manufacturing vision, 1982-1988 -- "One amorphous mass" : systems integration, strategic planning, and the search for liquidity, 1988-1993 -- "This company will be sold" : MDA's public offering, Orbital's acquisition, and the dot-com bust, 1993-2001 -- "Shades of grey" : 11 September 2001, the homeland security bubble, and Canada's sovereignty imbroglio, 2001-2008 -- "A lucky escape" : the great recession, property information divestment, and the acquisition of a critical mass in satellite manufacturing, 2009-2012 -- Conclusion: "Unseen, in the background" : a view from the security state

An introductory Chpt notes that both Latinos in Los Angeles & poor residents of large Latin American cities are faced with massive unemployment, hunger, high-density housing, poor transportation, & public health crises. Like Los Angeles, Latin American cities have areas that are well-defined by social class; but it is also fairly common in Latin America for the rich & poor to live near each other in better areas of town. However, proximity does not guarantee access to public services, which are biased toward the middle classes, because the rich rely on the private sector for health, education, & security. The drug-free zones, gang-free parks, & closed-circuit surveillance in shopping malls that have been responses to the rioting that erupted in Los Angeles during the 1990s are only available to upper-income groups in Latin America, where the violence of past authoritarian regimes has created a culture of fear. Hopes that the transition to democratic governments would decrease violence & fear have not been realized, & many urban residents live a terror-filled existence that is the focus of the essays in this volume. J. Lindroth