A compelling account of the transformative changes Britain is facing today, exploring how we can build a post-COVID society.

2021 and 2022 were two of the most turbulent and disruptive years experienced by Britain in peacetime. Land of Shame and Glory: Britain 2021–22 addresses a series of unprecedented challenges that laid bare the fragility of Britain and the Union during this time. Beginning with the chaotic Fall of Kabul, which exposed Britain's military dependence on the United States, through the prolonged, unsatisfying removal of a prime minister—and the economically catastrophic, short-lived tenure of his successor—that further exposed the vulnerabilities of an unwritten constitution; to the country sweltering in record-breaking temperatures amid dire warnings of climate catastrophe; and finally, to the death of a much-loved monarch, who was a point of consistency during decades of tremendous social and technological change. Peter Hennessy considers the continuities and upheavals of the last seventy years, asking whether there can be said to have been a second Elizabethan Age and lamenting that the post-war period came to its close amid such upheaval and loss.
 

This book showcases the achievements of geographers in helping understand and solve major problems facing Latin America. Chapters cover a variety of topics from conservation to transportation to gender. Each chapter is written by an expert in the geography of Latin America. The chapters include case studies of recent problems or issues in Latin America and provide examples of geographic research that has helped illuminate or solve these problems.

The Covid pandemic has put all modern societies to a serious test of resilience. The interdisciplinary research on which this book is based examined how four European governments behaved in these circumstances. During the months of the crisis, the team of experts coordinated by the editors of this volume took a close look at the decision-making processes in the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, and Slovakia – the so-called Visegrad Four.

The inquiries focused on experiences from the academic, health, economic and social fields. The methods of comparison included surveys, interviews, discourse analysis, for which the adaptive leadership theory provided the conceptual framework.

The conclusions are both academic and practical. Aside the description of the pandemic responses, the research had a formative dimension: how can an adaptive leadership approach better help societies manage the health and societal impacts of similar challenges? The spectrum of emerging anti-democratic tendencies in the region provided the specific context of the exercise. The four states face varying degrees of democratic backsliding as well as illiberal influences that have affected their response to the pandemic, which gives this research on the Visegrad Four a worldwide resonance.

This volume examines the legacy of the East–West divide since the implosion of the communist regimes in Europe. The ideals of 1989 have largely been frustrated by the crises and turmoil of the past decade. The liberal consensus was first challenged as early as the mid-2000s. In Eastern Europe, grievances were directed against the prevailing narratives of transition and ever sharper ethnic-racial antipathies surfaced in opposition to a supposedly postnational and multicultural West. In Western Europe, voices regretting the European Union's supposedly careless and premature expansion eastward began to appear on both sides of the left–right and liberal–conservative divides. The possibility of convergence between Europe's two halves has been reconceived as a threat to the European project.

In a series of original essays and conversations, thirty-three contributors from the fields of European and global history, politics and culture address questions fundamental to our understanding of Europe today: How have perceptions and misperceptions between the two halves of the continent changed over the last three decades? Can one speak of a new East–West split? If so, what characterizes it and why has it reemerged? The contributions demonstrate a great variety of approaches, perspectives, emphases, and arguments in addressing the daunting dilemma of Europe's assumed East–West divide.

A man who shares his name with a famous singer must grapple with his identity, purpose, and love.
 
The Leonard Cohen at the center of Leonard Cohen: A Novel is an everyman, a would-be artist, a would-be lover, a would-be tragic figure, yet a man haunted by the greatness of his namesake. He struggles to compete. He struggles to be more than a punchline in his own mind. He struggles, in particular, to write one song as great as the least of the great Leonard Cohen's songs.

At the center of Leonard's life is Daphne. In their meeting on a Greek island, a contemporary fable of Daphne and Apollo plays out. But even with Daphne, Leonard is shadowed by the other Leonard Cohen, whom he fears is the real Apollo. The ancient myth haunts the fated lovers, and the nobody Leonard Cohen’s life becomes at once a mystery, a miracle, and a myth on its own terms. 

Once upon a time, Apollo fell hard for Daphne, who turned herself into a laurel tree. No less a fate awaits the protagonists of this slender yet universal novel, where art, love, and fame all fatefully intertwine.

Financial services industry has shown trends of increased consolidation across different types of financial institutions. This book focuses on the conglomeration of banking and insurance activities among financial institutions of the 15 old members of the European Union, and addresses the development and impact of conglomeration linkages between these fifteen and the ten new member states. Most of the large groups combining banking and insurance activities groups among the former member states of the European Union are often linked to the largest such institutions in the new member states, having created the linkages mainly through Merger & Acquisition Activities; with greater accent on the banking sector and lesser connections on insurance side. Financial conglomeration linkages between the EU-15 and the new member states highlight investment attractiveness of the new members, with the appeal of new markets that allow the presence of more participants. Both institution-specific and country-specific factors play role in conglomeration across the new member states.

Living the High Life in Minsk looks at the sources of stability and instability in post-Soviet authoritarian states through the case study of President Lukashenka’s firm hold on power in Belarus. In particular, it seeks to understand the role of energy relations, policies, and discourses in the maintenance of this power. The central empirical question Balmaceda seeks to answer is what has been the role of energy policies in the maintenance of Lukashenka’s power in Belarus? In particular, it analyzes the role of energy policies in the management of Lukashenka’s relationship with three constituencies crucial to his hold on power: Russian actors, the Belarusian nomenklatura, and the Belarusian electorate.

In terms of foreign relations, the book focuses on the factors explaining Lukashenka’s ability to project Belarus’ power in its relationship with Russia in such a way as to compensate for its objective high level of dependency, assuring high levels of energy subsidies and rents continuing well beyond the initial worsening of the relationship in c. 2004. In terms of domestic relations, Balmaceda examines Lukashenka’s specific use of those energy rents in such a way as to assure the continuing support of both the Belarusian nomenklatura and the Belarusian electorate. 

A reflection on the reconstruction of the Berlin Palace and its contradictory use as an ethnological museum.

Having recently accepted German citizenship, writer and activist Priya Basil explores the Humboldt Forum from a deeply personal perspective. She delves into the question of what such a building, such a project, means for an understanding of the past and for belonging in the present. This much disputed, contested, celebrated monument now exists—but what exactly does it monumentalize? Basil writes, “In German, the word Schloss means a palace, and also a lock. The central question: Can a lock also be a key?”

Since the early twentieth century, the United States has led a global prohibition effort against certain drugs in which production restriction and criminalization are emphasized over prevention and treatment as means to reduce problematic usage. This “war on drugs” is widely seen to have failed, and periodically decriminalization and legalization movements arise. Debates continue over whether the problems of addiction and crime associated with illicit use of drugs stem from their illegal status or the nature of the drugs themselves. In The Long War on Drugs Anne L. Foster explores the origin of the punitive approach to drugs and its continued appeal despite its obvious flaws. She provides a comprehensive overview, focusing not only on a political history of policy developments but also on changes in medical practices and understanding of drugs. Foster also outlines the social and cultural changes prompting different attitudes about drugs; the racial, environmental, and social justice implications of particular drug policies; and the international consequences of US drug policy.

When Losing Control was first published a decade ago it was years ahead of its time. Its argument was simple - the real causes of global insecurity were the widening socio-economic divide, global marginalisation and environmental limitations, especially climate change and conflict over energy resources.

Paul Rogers, one of the most original thinkers on international security, pointed to a world in which irregular warfare from the margins would prevent powerful states from maintaining their position. He even predicted accurately how the United States would respond to a catastrophic attack.

The new edition brings the whole analysis right up to date, arguing persuasively that the world’s elite cannot maintain control and that a far more emancipatory and sustainable approach to global security has to be developed.

In Love and Abolition, Alison Rose Reed traces how the social life of Black queer performance from the 1960s to the present animates the unfinished work of abolition. She grounds social justice–oriented reading and activist practices specifically in the movement to abolish the prison industrial complex, with far-reaching implications for how we understand affective response as a mobilizing force for revolutionary change.

Reed identifies abolition literature as an emergent field of inquiry that emphasizes social relationships in the ongoing struggle to dismantle systems of coercion, criminalization, and control. Focusing on love as an affective modality and organizing tool rooted in the Black radical tradition’s insistence on collective sociality amidst unrelenting state violence, Reed provides fresh readings of visionaries such as James Baldwin, Ntozake Shange, Sharon Bridgforth, and vanessa german. Both abolitionist manifesto and examination of how Black queer performance offers affective modulations of tough and tender love, Love and Abolition ultimately calls for a critical reconsideration of the genre of prison literature—and the role of the humanities—during an age of mass incarceration.