This beginner's guide to Hamas has been fully revised and updated. It now covers all the major events since the January 2006 elections, including the conflict with Fatah and Israel's brutal offensive in Gaza at the end of 2008.

Explaining the reasons for Hamas's popularity, leading Al-Jazeera journalist and Cambridge academic Khaled Hroub provides the key facts that are so often missing from conventional news reports. It's a one-stop guide that gives a clear overview of Hamas's history, key beliefs, and its political agenda.

This unique book provides a refreshing perspective that gets to the heart of Hamas.

Hannah Arendt is one of the most famous political theorists of the twentieth century, yet in the social sciences her work has rarely been given the attention it deserves. This careful and comprehensive study introduces Arendt to a wider audience.

Finn Bowring shows how Arendt's writings have engaged with and influenced prominent figures in the sociological canon, and how her ideas may shed light on some of the most pressing social and political problems of today. He explores her critique of Marx, her relationship to Weber, the influence of her work on Habermas and the parallels and discrepancies between her and Foucault. This is a clearly written and scholarly text which surveys the leading debates over Arendt’s work, including discussions of totalitarianism, the public sphere and the nature of political responsibility.
This book will bring new perspectives to students and lecturers in sociology and politics.

When capitalism is clearly catastrophically out of control and its excesses cannot be sustained socially or ecologically, the ideas of Herbert Marcuse become as relevant as they were in the 1960s. This is the first English introduction to Marcuse to be published for decades, and deals specifically with his aesthetic theories and their relation to a critical theory of society.

Although Marcuse is best known as a critic of consumer society, epitomised in the classic One-Dimensional Man, Malcolm Miles provides an insight into how Marcuse's aesthetic theories evolved within his broader attitudes, from his anxiety at the rise of fascism in the 1930s through heady optimism of the 1960s, to acceptance in the 1970s that radical art becomes an invaluable progressive force when political change has become deadlocked.

Marcuse's aesthetics of liberation, in which art assumes a primary role in interrupting the operation of capitalism, made him a key figure for the student movement in the 1960s. As diverse forms of resistance rise once more, a new generation of students, scholars and activists will find Marcuse’s radical theory essential to their struggle.

Popular anger against the financial system has never been higher, yet the practical workings of the system remain opaque to many people. The Heretic's Guide to Global Finance aims to bridge the gap between protest slogans and practical proposals for reform.

Brett Scott is a campaigner and former derivatives broker who has a unique understanding of life inside and outside the financial sector. He builds up a framework for approaching it based on the three principles of 'Exploring', 'Jamming' and 'Building', offering a practical guide for those who wish to deepen their understanding of, and access to, the inner workings of financial institutions.

Scott covers aspects frequently overlooked, such as the cultural dimensions of the financial system, and considers major issues such as agricultural speculation, carbon markets and tar-sands financing. Crucially, it also showcases the growing alternative finance movement, showing how everyday people can get involved in building a new, democratic, financial system.

For thousands of years, the region of Palestine and the East Mediterranean has been denied an indigenous voice for an inclusive history. Three religions ascribe their origins to this part of the world, appropriating and re-appropriating the "Holy Land" time and again.

Hidden Histories offers a powerful corrective to common understandings. It emphasizes Palestine's long history and dispels many old and new myths – covering issues of religious origins and sacred sites, identity and self-colonization, and the retrieval of ancient heritage.

This is a thoroughly updated and revised edition of a popular classic of modern anthropology. The authors provide summaries of ‘Enlightenment’, ‘Romantic’ and ‘Victorian’ anthropology, from the cultural theories of Morgan and Taylor to the often neglected contributions of German scholars. The ambiguous relationship between anthropology and national cultures is also considered.

The book provides an unparalleled account of theoretical developments in anthropology from the 1920s to the present, including functionalism, structuralism, hermeneutics, neo-Marxism and discourse analysis. There are brief biographies of major anthropologists and coverage of key debates including totemism, kinship and globalisation.

This essential text on anthropology is highly engaging, authoritative and suitable for students at all levels.

Hizbu’llah is the largest and most prominent political party in Lebanon, and one of the most renowned Islamist movements in the world. In this book, Amal Saad-Ghorayeb examines the organisation’s understanding of jihad and how this, together with its belief in martyrdom, brought about the withdrawal of Israeli occupation forces from Lebanon in May 2000.

Saad-Ghorayeb explores the nature of the party’s struggle against the West by studying its views on the use of violence against Westerners. Crucially, she also addresses the question of whether Hizbu’llah depicts this struggle in purely political or civilisational terms. The existential nature of the movement’s conflict with Israel is analysed and the Islamic roots of its anti-Judaism is unearthed.

The author explores the mechanics and rationale behind the party’s integration into the Lebanese political system, and sheds light on how it has reconciled its national idenitity with its solidarity with the Muslim umma.

Historian Eric Hobsbawm is possibly the foremost chronicler of the modern age. His panoramic studies of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, stretching from the French Revolution to the fall of Soviet communism, have informed the historical consciousness of scholars and general readers alike. At the same time, his writings on labour movements and socialist politics have occupied a central place in left-wing debates. Despite this, no extended study of Hobsbawm's work has yet been attempted Gregory Elliott fills this gap in exemplary fashion.

Elliott analyses both the scholarly record of Hobsbawm and the intellectual and political journey that his life represents. In doing so, he seeks to situate Hobsbawm's thought within the context of a generalised crisis of confidence on the Left after the fall of the Berlin Wall.

Rich in content and written in Elliott's authoritative and highly readable style, this book is a must for anyone with an interest in Hobsbawm and the crisis of the Left.

The Horn of Africa, comprising Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Sudan and Somalia, is the most conflict-ridden region in Africa. This book explores the origins and impact of these conflicts at both an intra-state and inter-state level and the insecurity they create.

The contributors show how regional and international interventions have compounded pre-existing tensions and have been driven by competing national interests linked to the 'War on Terror' and acts of piracy off the coast of Somalia.

The Horn of Africa outlines proposals for multidimensional mechanisms for conflict resolution in the region. Issues of border demarcation, democratic deficit, crises of nation and state building, and the roles of political actors and traditional authorities are all clearly analysed.

This book analyses the causes of armed conflicts in Southern Africa during the Cold War. It examines the influence of the various external forces in the region during this period and their relationship to local movements and governments.

The book focuses on states experiencing violent internal conflict and foreign intervention, that is Angola, Mozambique, Namibia , South Africa and Zimbabwe.

The author provides an unique history of the key part that the Soviet Union played in these developments. Spanning 30 years, the book explores how each country struggled for genuine independence against colonialism and apartheid and their place in the wider conflicts encompassed by the Cold War.

How a Century of War Changed the Lives of Women looks at the remarkable impact of war on women in Britain. It shows how conflict has changed women’s lives and how those changes have put women at the centre of peace campaigning.

Lindsey German, one of the UK's leading anti-war activists and commentators, shows how women have played a central role in anti-war and peace movements, including the recent wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. The women themselves talk about how they overcame prejudice and difficulty to become active. The book integrates this experience with a historical overview, analysing the two world wars as catalysts of social change for women. It looks at how the changing nature of war, especially the involvement of civilians, increasingly involves significant numbers of women.

As well as providing an inspiring account of women's opposition to war, the book also tackles key contemporary developments, challenging negative assumptions about Muslim women and showing how anti-war movements are feeding into a broader desire to change society.

How to Look Good in A War examines the methods used to depict, defend and justify the use of state violence. Many books have shown how 'truth is the first casualty of war' but this is the first to analyse exactly how pro-war narratives are constructed and normalised.

Brian Rappert details the 'upside-down' world of war in which revelation conceals, knowledge fosters uncertainty, and transparency obscures. He looks at government spin during recent wars in Iraq, Afghanistan and Libya where officials manoeuvre between circulating and withholding information.

Examining how organised violence is justified, How to Look Good in A War draws on experiences from recent controversy to consider how ignorance about the operation of war is produced and how concerned individuals and groups can intervene to make a difference.

Michel Foucault’s Discipline and Punish is one of the best-selling works of critical theory and a key text on many undergraduate courses. However, it is a long, difficult text which makes Anne Schwan and Stephen Shapiro's excellent step-by-step reading guide a welcome addition to the How to Read Theory series.

Undergraduates across a wide range of disciplines are expected to have a solid understanding of Foucault's key terms, which have become commonplace in critical thinking today. While there are many texts that survey Foucault's thought, these are often more general overviews or biographical précis that give little in the way of robust explanation and discussion. In contrast, Schwan and Shapiro take a plain-speaking, yet detailed, approach, specifically designed to give students a thorough understanding of one of the most influential texts in contemporary cultural theory.

When Hugo Chavez, then President of Venezuela, died in 2013, millions across the globe mourned. In an age where most politicians inspire only apathy and cynicism, Chavez's popularity, radicalism and vibrant personality were truly unique.

Released one year after Chavez's unexpected death, this dramatic and intimate biography traces Chavez's life from an impoverished rural family to the Miraflores Presidential Palace in Caracas. Mike Gonzalez shows how Chavez's 'Bolivarian revolution' aimed to complete Simon Bolivar’s promise of a Latin America free from imperialism.

Gonzalez details Chavez's close connection to the masses and how he enraged wealthy elites by declaring his support for 21st century socialism. He concludes that the struggle for social justice inspired by Chavez can and must continue. This is an ideal guide to Chavez's inspiring life and legacy.

This book champions social movements as one of the most influential agents that shape our conceptions of human rights.

Stammers argues that human rights cannot be properly understood outside of the context of social movement struggles. He explains how much of the literature on human rights has systematically obscured this link, consequently distorting our understandings of human rights.

Stammers identifies the contours of a new framework through which human rights can be understood. He suggests that what he calls the 'paradox of institutionalisation' can only be addressed through a recognition of the importance of human rights arising out of grassroots activism, and through processes of institutional democratisation.

Humans and Other Animals is about the myriad and evolving ways in which humans and animals interact, the divergent cultural constructions of humanity and animality found around the world, and individual experiences of other animals.

Samantha Hurn explores the work of anthropologists and scholars from related disciplines concerned with the growing field of anthrozoology. Case studies from a wide range of cultural contexts are discussed, and readers are invited to engage with a diverse range of human-animal interactions including blood sports (such as hunting, fishing and bull fighting), pet keeping and ‘petishism’, eco-tourism and wildlife conservation, working animals and animals as food. The idea of animal exploitation raised by the animal rights movements is considered, as well as the anthropological implications of changing attitudes towards animal personhood, and the rise of a posthumanist philosophy in the social sciences more generally.

Key debates surrounding these issues are raised and assessed and, in the process, readers are encouraged to consider their own attitudes towards other animals and, by extension, what it means to be human.