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First Published in 2011. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.
In Empire Versus Democracy, Carl Boggs traces the authoritarian trajectory of American politics since World War II, with emphasis on the growing concentration of corporate and military power that has accompanied the United States assumption of leading superpower on the world scene. The rise of the U.S. as unchallenged imperial nation has meant the steady expansion of a permanent war economy and security state that, working in tandem with large business interests, has led to proliferation of American armed-forces bases around the world, recurrent military interventions, swollen government bureaucracy, massive public expenditures, heavy reliance on surveillance and secrecy, and diminished resources for social infrastructure and social programs. Boggs shows that, as in the case of the Roman and other previous empires, enlargement of U.S. imperial power has resulted in a decline of civic engagement and local participation along with skewed priorities favoring the war economy and security state. Inevitably, this has meant a weakening of electoral and legislative politics, overwhelmed by the centers of enormous wealth and power. The goal of this new, unique Series is to offer readable, teachable "thinking frames" on today’s social problems and social issues by leading scholars, all in short 60 page or shorter formats, and available for view on http://routledge.customgateway.com/routledge-social-issues.html For instructors teaching a wide range of courses in the social sciences, the Routledge Social Issues Collection now offers the best of both worlds: originally written short texts that provide "overviews" to important social issues as well as teachable excerpts from larger works previously published by Routledge and other presses.
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In the post-Cold War era, why has democratization been slow to arrive in the Arab world? This book argues that to understand support for the authoritarian status quo in parts of this region--and the willingness of its citizens to compromise on core democratic principles--one must factor in how a strong U.S. presence and popular anti-Americanism weakens democratic voices. Examining such countries as Jordan, Kuwait, Morocco, Palestine, and Saudi Arabia, Amaney Jamal explores how Arab citizens decide whether to back existing regimes, regime transitions, and democratization projects, and how the global position of Arab states shapes people's attitudes toward their governments. While the Cold War's end reduced superpower hegemony in much of the developing world, the Arab region witnessed an increased security and economic dependence on the United States. As a result, the preferences of the United States matter greatly to middle-class Arab citizens, not just the elite, and citizens will restrain their pursuit of democratization, rationalizing their backing for the status quo because of U.S. geostrategic priorities. Demonstrating how the preferences of an international patron serve as a constraint or an opportunity to push for democracy, Jamal questions bottom-up approaches to democratization, which assume that states are autonomous units in the world order. Jamal contends that even now, with the overthrow of some autocratic Arab regimes, the future course of Arab democratization will be influenced by the perception of American reactions. Concurrently, the United States must address the troubling sources of the region's rising anti-Americanism.
The first panoramic history of the Western world from the 1970s to the present day, Empire of Democracy is the story for those asking how we got to where we are. Half a century ago, at the height of the Cold War and amidst a world economic crisis, the Western democracies were forced to undergo a profound transformation. Against what some saw as a full-scale “crisis of democracy”— with race riots, anti-Vietnam marches and a wave of worker discontent sowing crisis from one nation to the next— a new political-economic order was devised and the postwar social contract was torn up and written anew. In this epic narrative of the events that have shaped our own times, Simon Reid-Henry shows how liberal democracy, and western history with it, was profoundly reimagined when the postwar Golden Age ended. As the institutions of liberal rule were reinvented, a new generation of politicians emerged: Thatcher, Reagan, Mitterrand, Kohl. The late twentieth century heyday they oversaw carried the Western democracies triumphantly to victory in the Cold War and into the economic boom of the 1990s. But equally it led them into the fiasco of Iraq, to the high drama of the financial crisis in 2007/8, and ultimately to the anti-liberal surge of our own times. The present crisis of liberalism enjoins us to revisit these as yet unscripted decades. The era we have all been living through is closing out, democracy is turning on its axis once again. As this panoramic history poignantly reminds us, the choices we make going forward require us first to come to terms with where we have been.
This new book from Antonio Negri, one of the most influential political thinkers writing today, provides a concise and accessible introduction to the key ideas of his recent work. Giving the reader a sense of the wider context in which Negri has developed the ideas that have become so central to current debates, the book is made up of five lectures which address a series of topics that are dealt with in his world-famous books empire, globalization, multitude, sovereignty, democracy. Reflections on Empire will appeal to anyone interested in current debates about the ways in which the world is changing today, to the many people who are followers of Negri's work and to students and scholars in sociology, politics and cultural studies.
As we approach the elections of 2004, U.S. progressives are faced with the challenge of how to confront our unresponsive and apparently untouchable power structures. With millions of antiwar demonstrators glibly dismissed as a "focus group," and with the collapse of political and intellectual dialogue into slogans and soundbites used to stifle protest-"Support the Troops," "We Are the Greatest Nation on Earth," etc.-many people feel cynical and hopeless. Citizens of the Empire probes into the sense of disempowerment that has resulted from the Left's inability to halt the violent and repressive course of post-9/11 U.S. policy. In this passionate and personal exploration of what it means to be a citizen of the world's most powerful, affluent and militarized nation in an era of imperial expansion, Jensen offers a potent antidote to despair over the future of democracy. In a plainspoken analysis of the dominant political rhetoric-which is intentionally crafted to depress political discourse and activism-Jensen reveals the contradictions and falsehoods of prevailing myths, using common-sense analogies that provide the reader with a clear-thinking rebuttal and a way to move forward with progressive political work and discussions. With an ethical framework that integrates political, intellectual and emotional responses to the disheartening events of the past two years, Jensen examines the ways in which society has been led to this point and offers renewed hope for constructive engagement. Robert Jensen is a professor of media law, ethics and politics at the University of Texas, Austin. He is the author of Writing Dissent: Taking Radical Ideas from the Margins to the Mainstream, among other books. He also writes for popular media, and his opinion and analytical pieces on foreign policy, politics and race have appeared in papers and magazines throughout the United States.
Uiteenzetting over de opkomst van het populisme en het gevaar daarvan voor de democratie.
Named one of the ten best books of the year by the Chicago Tribune A Publishers Weekly best book of 2019 | A 2019 NPR Staff Pick A pathbreaking history of the United States’ overseas possessions and the true meaning of its empire We are familiar with maps that outline all fifty states. And we are also familiar with the idea that the United States is an “empire,” exercising power around the world. But what about the actual territories—the islands, atolls, and archipelagos—this country has governed and inhabited? In How to Hide an Empire, Daniel Immerwahr tells the fascinating story of the United States outside the United States. In crackling, fast-paced prose, he reveals forgotten episodes that cast American history in a new light. We travel to the Guano Islands, where prospectors collected one of the nineteenth century’s most valuable commodities, and the Philippines, site of the most destructive event on U.S. soil. In Puerto Rico, Immerwahr shows how U.S. doctors conducted grisly experiments they would never have conducted on the mainland and charts the emergence of independence fighters who would shoot up the U.S. Congress. In the years after World War II, Immerwahr notes, the United States moved away from colonialism. Instead, it put innovations in electronics, transportation, and culture to use, devising a new sort of influence that did not require the control of colonies. Rich with absorbing vignettes, full of surprises, and driven by an original conception of what empire and globalization mean today, How to Hide an Empire is a major and compulsively readable work of history.
All empires fall, and America is no exception. What comes next?