Failed States and the Origins of Violence


Book Description

What makes a terrorist? Is an individual inherently predisposed to be attracted to political violence or does exposure to a certain environment desensitize them in such a way that violence represents a viable mode for addressing political grievances? Identifying state failure as the impetus for political violence this book addresses these questions and focuses on why existing extremist groups find failed states so attractive. Utilizing global barometer data, Tiffiany Howard examines the underpinnings of individual support for political violence and argues that an insidious pattern of deprivation within failed states drives ordinary citizens to engage in and support extreme acts of political violence. A rigorous examination of four regions plagued by a combination of failed states and political violence-Sub Saharan Africa, The Middle East and North Africa, Southeast and South Asia, and Latin America-this text draws parallels to arrive at a single conclusion: that failed states are a natural breeding ground for terrorism and political violence.




Why Nations Fail


Book Description

Brilliant and engagingly written, Why Nations Fail answers the question that has stumped the experts for centuries: Why are some nations rich and others poor, divided by wealth and poverty, health and sickness, food and famine? Is it culture, the weather, geography? Perhaps ignorance of what the right policies are? Simply, no. None of these factors is either definitive or destiny. Otherwise, how to explain why Botswana has become one of the fastest growing countries in the world, while other African nations, such as Zimbabwe, the Congo, and Sierra Leone, are mired in poverty and violence? Daron Acemoglu and James Robinson conclusively show that it is man-made political and economic institutions that underlie economic success (or lack of it). Korea, to take just one of their fascinating examples, is a remarkably homogeneous nation, yet the people of North Korea are among the poorest on earth while their brothers and sisters in South Korea are among the richest. The south forged a society that created incentives, rewarded innovation, and allowed everyone to participate in economic opportunities. The economic success thus spurred was sustained because the government became accountable and responsive to citizens and the great mass of people. Sadly, the people of the north have endured decades of famine, political repression, and very different economic institutions—with no end in sight. The differences between the Koreas is due to the politics that created these completely different institutional trajectories. Based on fifteen years of original research Acemoglu and Robinson marshall extraordinary historical evidence from the Roman Empire, the Mayan city-states, medieval Venice, the Soviet Union, Latin America, England, Europe, the United States, and Africa to build a new theory of political economy with great relevance for the big questions of today, including: - China has built an authoritarian growth machine. Will it continue to grow at such high speed and overwhelm the West? - Are America’s best days behind it? Are we moving from a virtuous circle in which efforts by elites to aggrandize power are resisted to a vicious one that enriches and empowers a small minority? - What is the most effective way to help move billions of people from the rut of poverty to prosperity? More philanthropy from the wealthy nations of the West? Or learning the hard-won lessons of Acemoglu and Robinson’s breakthrough ideas on the interplay between inclusive political and economic institutions? Why Nations Fail will change the way you look at—and understand—the world.




Violence and Social Orders


Book Description

This book integrates the problem of violence into a larger framework, showing how economic and political behavior are closely linked.




Terrorism and Political Violence


Book Description

This book introduces you to the key issues in contemporary studies on Terrorism. Its interdisciplinary approach provides a unique intellectual rigour which introduces readers to cutting-edge research. Bringing together chapters contributed by members of the Terrorism and Political Violence Association network, it offers an insight into a variety of traditional and critical perspectives. It also equips Undergraduate and Postgraduate students with the study skills needed to succeed in coursework and assignments, especially dissertation work. Drawing on the expertise of TAPVA members, this book: Explores contemporary issues, such as drone warfare, state violence, children and political violence, cyber-terrorism and de-radicalisation. Features case studies drawn from a range of international examples, lists of further reading, key concepts and questions for use in seminars and private study. Provides you with study skills content designed to help you complete your dissertation. This is the perfect textbook to guide you through your studies in terrorism, political violence, international security and strategic studies.




On War


Book Description




Fixing Failed States


Book Description

Social science.




Frontiers of Violence in North-East Africa


Book Description

Relates violent conflict through the 19th and 20th centuries in the region of Ethiopia and Eritrea and the Sudanese and Somali frontiers to ethnic, political, and religious conflict and the violent state- and empire-building processes which have defined the region.




Failing States, Collapsing Systems


Book Description

This work executes a unique transdisciplinary methodology building on the author’s previous book, A User’s Guide to the Crisis of Civilization: And How to Save it (Pluto, 2010), which was the first peer-reviewed study to establish a social science framework for the integrated analysis of crises across climate, energy, food, economic, terror and the police state. Since the 2008 financial crash, the world has witnessed an unprecedented outbreak of social unrest in every major continent. Beginning with the birth of the Occupy movement and the Arab Spring, the eruption of civil disorder continues to wreak havoc unpredictably from Greece to Ukraine, from China to Thailand, from Brazil to Turkey, and beyond. Yet while policymakers and media observers have raced to keep up with events, they have largely missed the biophysical triggers of this new age of unrest – the end of the age of cheap fossil fuels, and its multiplying consequences for the Earth’s climate, industrial food production, and economic growth. This book for the first time develops an empirically-ground theoretical model of the complex interaction between biophysical processes and geopolitical crises, demonstrated through the analysis of a wide range of detailed case studies of historic, concurrent and probable state failures in the Middle East, Northwest Africa, South and Southeast Asia, Europe and North America. Geopolitical crises across these regions, Ahmed argues, are being driven by the proliferation of climate, food and economic crises which have at their root the common denominator of a fundamental and permanent disruption in the energy basis of industrial civilization. This inevitable energy transition, which will be completed well before the close of this century, entails a paradigm shift in the organization of civilization. Yet for this shift to result in a viable new way of life will require a fundamental epistemological shift recognizing humanity’s embeddedness in the natural world. For this to be achieved, the stranglehold of conventional models achieved through the hegemony of establishment media reporting – dominated by fossil fuel interests – must be broken. While geopolitics cannot be simplistically reduced to the biophysical, this book shows that international relations today can only be understood by recognizing the extent to which the political is embedded in the biophysical. Although the book offers a rigorous scientific analysis, it is written in a clean, journalistic style to ensure readability and accessibility to a general audience. It will contain a large number of graphical illustrations concerning oil production data, population issues, the food price index, economic growth and debt, and other related issues to demonstrate the interconnections and correlations across key sectors.




1919, The Year of Racial Violence


Book Description

1919, The Year of Racial Violence recounts African Americans' brave stand against a cascade of mob attacks in the United States after World War I. The emerging New Negro identity, which prized unflinching resistance to second-class citizenship, further inspired veterans and their fellow black citizens. In city after city - Washington, DC; Chicago; Charleston; and elsewhere - black men and women took up arms to repel mobs that used lynching, assaults, and other forms of violence to protect white supremacy; yet, authorities blamed blacks for the violence, leading to mass arrests and misleading news coverage. Refusing to yield, African Americans sought accuracy and fairness in the courts of public opinion and the law. This is the first account of this three-front fight - in the streets, in the press, and in the courts - against mob violence during one of the worst years of racial conflict in US history.




The Origins of Political Order


Book Description

Nations are not trapped by their pasts, but events that happened hundreds or even thousands of years ago continue to exert huge influence on present-day politics. If we are to understand the politics that we now take for granted, we need to understand its origins. Francis Fukuyama examines the paths that different societies have taken to reach their current forms of political order. This book starts with the very beginning of mankind and comes right up to the eve of the French and American revolutions, spanning such diverse disciplines as economics, anthropology and geography. The Origins of Political Order is a magisterial study on the emergence of mankind as a political animal, by one of the most eminent political thinkers writing today.