Regional / International studies Books

This book charts the development of the First Vietnam War - the war between the Vietnamese Communists (the Viet Minh) and the French colonial power - considering especially how relations between the Viet Minh and the Chinese Communists had a profound...

India's national parliamentary elections typically result in the election of majority parliaments and the formation of a single-party majority government. However, India's national party system has changed beyond recognition since the parliamentary...

Imam Abü Hamid al-Ghazalı is perhaps the most celebrated Muslim theologian of medieval Islam yet little attention has been paid to his personal theology. This book sets out to investigate the relationship between law and politics in the writings of...

China has made huge economic strides in recent decades but poverty is still a major issue on the agenda for rural China. Poverty and Development in China analyses how poverty is recognized and measured and how people in poverty are identified, literally...

Incorporating original fieldwork carried out over a period of more than ten years, combined with innovative theoretical argument, Globalization, Culture and Society in Laos presents one of the first sociological investigations into modern Laos. Boike...

This book deals with the relationship between historical scholarship and politics in twentieth century Egypt. It examines the changing roles of the academic historian, the university system, the state and non-academic scholarship and the tension...

Despite notable socio-economic development in the Arab region, a deficit in democracy and political rights has continued to prevail. This book examines the major reasons underlying the persistence of this democracy deficit over the past decades and...

After the ceasefire, a group of architects and planners from the American University of Beirut formed the Reconstruction Unit to help in the recovery process and in rebuilding the lives of those affected by the 2006 war in Lebanon .Here, a series of case...

Much traditional historiography consciously and unconsciously glosses over certain discourses, narratives, and practices. This book examines silences or omissions in Middle Eastern history at the turn of the twenty-first century, to give a fuller account...

Relating the Muslim understanding of Moses in the Qur'an to the Epic of Gilgamesh, Alexander Romances, Aramaic Targums, Rabbinic Bible exegesis, and folklore from the ancient and medieval Mediterranean, this book shows how Muslim scholars authorize and...

Sufism is often understood to be the mystical dimension of Islam, and many works have focused on the nature of "mystical experiences" and the relationship between man and God. Yet Sufism was a human response to a wide range of contexts and circumstances;...

The fragility of the liberal democratic state after 1789 is illustrated in the history of the European Jews from the French Revolution to the Holocaust. Emancipation and hope of emancipation amongst the European Jewish population created a plethora of...

Indonesia has a long and rich tradition of transgender cultures, with many festivals and local rites involving members of transgender communities. This book examines how transgendered individuals and transgendered communities are represented in...

The rise of Maoism as one of the organized political movement in India is the outcome of a historical situation. Both colonialism and the failure of the Indian state to implement land reforms more stringently in the aftermath of independence resulted in...

No other crisis in Africa has received as much attention in the West during the past 10 years as the war in Darfur, yet the underlying complexities of the war and the background to the crisis remains poorly understood by scholars, activists and aid...

As the recent revolutions in the Middle East have demonstrated, civil society in this part of the world is on the move. The increasingly important role of non-state actors - a phenomenon of globalization- has characterized developments throughout the...

This book is concerned with EU democracy promotion inside Tunisia, the first Arab signatory of an Association Agreement with the EU. Focusing on the content, context, mechanisms, and outcomes of democratization via association, the authors examine...

Contributing to the growing discourse on political parties in Asia, this book looks at parties in Southeast Asia's most competitive electoral democracies of Indonesia, Thailand and the Philippines. It highlights the diverse dynamics of party politics in...

This book traces the impact of the global financial crisis on East Asia, and the way that key regional states responded to the crisis. It considers the extent to which the region is decoupling from the global economy (or the West), the impact of crises...

Public-private partnerships are increasingly advocated to alleviate deficiencies in the public health system as well as to reduce economic stress on those who seek services from an expensive, burgeoning and unregulated private health sector. Focusing on...

This book is concerned with Turkey's political evolution, the role of Kemalism, and why a social democratic alternative has never fully developed. Concentrating on the electoral weaknesses of the Turkish centre-left, represented by the Republican...

This book presents and analyses the oldest sub-national war of postcolonial South Asia, between the Indian state and the Nagas of Northeast India. It offers a serious and thorough political history on the Naga region over three periods, pre-colonial,...

In the last five to ten years, pressure for political liberalisation, and the growth of civil society and independent media, inside Arab countries have prompted the debate about violent events in the postcolonial period. This book features studies of six...

This book is a decisive contribution to the study of Kurdish history in Syria since the mandatory period (1920-1946) up to nowadays. Avoiding an essentialist approach, Jordi Tejel provides fine, complex and sometimes paradoxical analysis about the...

Casting new light on majority-minority relations and the struggle for Buraku liberation, this book focuses on Matsumoto Jiichiro, arguably the most important Buraku leader of the twentieth century, locating his experience within the broader developments...

Written in a clear and easy-to-follow style, this revealing text examines the contemporary political geography of the West Bank and Gaza strip. Descriptive in nature, it documents the changes and developments since 1967 right up to the disengagement...

The Power of Sovereignty explores the religio-political and philosophical concepts of Sayyid Qutb, one of the most influential political thinkers for contemporary Islamists and who has greatly influenced the likes of Osama Bin Laden. Executed by the...

This study of the Anglo-Iranian relationship analyzes the opening up of the Karun trade, discussing the region's demography, commerce and industry before the Karun advent, and the impact of British political and commercial penetration.

From its origins as a distinct set of ritualised practices in the sixteenth century to its international expansion in the twentieth, tea culture has had a major impact on artistic production, connoisseurship, etiquette, food, design and more recently, on...

Politics, Religion and Power in the Great Lakes Region covers the political, religious and power relations in the contemporary Great Lakes States: Uganda, Rwanda, Burundi, the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Tanzania, Kenya and the Sudan. The work is...

Declining budgets and withdrawing military forces seem to spell a period of diminishing influence for U.S. business and government officials overseas.Not so!Bees and Spiders provides answers on how to develop real influence that does not come through...

Historically, Indian cinema has positioned women at the intersection of tradition and a more evolving culture, portraying contradictory attitudes which affect women's roles in public and private spheres.Examining the work of three directors from West...

China has emerged in the 21st century as a sophisticated, and sometimes contentious, actor in the United Nations Security Council. This is evident in a range of issues, from negotiations on Iran's nuclear program to efforts to bring peace to Darfur. Yet...

The emergence of Islam in the seventh century AD still polarises scholars who seek to separate religious truth from the historical reality with which it is associated. However, history and prophecy are not solely defined by positive evidence or...

This book offers a critical examination of contemporary higher education reforms in Thailand situated in the broader historical, socio-economic and political changes. Through a qualitative case study with three methods of inquiry, this book explores why...

This book examines the security challenges and opportunities that the nation-states of Asia confront in an era of globalization.

Focused on three Egyptian revolutions - in 1919, 1952, and 2011 - this edited book argues that each of these revolutions is a milestone which represents a meaningful turning point in modern Egyptian history.

Born of Japan's cultural encounter with Western entertainment media, manga (comic books or graphic novels) and anime (animated films) are two of the most universally recognized forms of contemporary mass culture. Because they tell stories through visual...

Between Fall 2002 and Spring 2003, most of the national leadership of China's party, state, and military organs will be replaced by a new generation of officials. The accession to power of this "Fourth Generation" leadership, and the "Fifth Generation"...

Drawing on sources in Japanese, Chinese, and American archives and libraries, this book reassesses another facet of Woodrow Wilson's agenda at the 1919 Paris Peace Conference at the end of World War I. Breaking with accepted scholarly opinions, the...

Japan seeks economic competitiveness vis-a-vis the West and economic dominance in Asia, but it mainly competes through cooperative use of economic resources, which facilitates realization of the goals of partner nations. This book studies Japan's balance...

The remote vastness of Mongolia has remained somewhat of a mystery to most Westerners - no less so in the 20th century. Homeland of the legendary conqueror Chingiz Khan, in modern times Mongolia itself has been the object of imperial rivalry. For most of...

As the influence of the United States in Asia declines with the end of the Cold War, America must look more to brains than military might in achieving our objectives in the region. But after repeatedly allowing Japan - our closest ally in Asia - to...

This book is based on four visits to China between 1971 and 1989 by Honda Katsuichi, an investigative journalist for Asahi Shimbun. His aim is to show in pitiless detail the horrors of the Japanese Army's seizure and capture of Nanjing in December 1937...

Chinese urbanization, including the daily life, migration strategies, and life choices of villagers and townspeople, is the focus of this study by Chinese and North American scholars. The study looks at the urbanization process and the vitality of...

The issues surrounding Hong Kong's global position and international links grow increasingly complex by the day as the process of Hong Kong's transformation from a British colony to a Chinese Special Administration Region unfolds. This volume addresses a...

The stories in this anthology take issue with worn stereotypes and reflect both everyday life and the great upheavals that have marked modern Indonesian national life.