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Against Elections
A small book with great weight and urgency to it, this is both a history of democracy and a clarion call for change. "Without drastic adjustment, this system cannot last much longer," writes Van Reybrouck, regarded today as one of Europe's most astute thinkers. "If you look at the decline in voter turnout and party membership, and at the way politicians are held in contempt, if you look at how difficult it is to form governments, how little they can do and how harshly they are punished for it, if you look at how quickly populism, technocracy and anti-parliamentarianism are rising, if you look at how more and more citizens are longing for participation and how quickly that desire can tip over...
Congo
Epic yet eminently readable, penetrating and profoundly moving, ‘Congo’ traces the fate of one of the world's most devastated countries, second only to war-torn Somalia: the Democratic Republic of Congo.
Revolusi
**Shortlisted for the Baillie Gifford Prize 2024** A story of staggering scope and drama, Revolusi is the masterful and definitive account of the epic revolution that sparked the decolonisation of the modern world. 'Astounding . . . history at its best' Yuval Noah Harari 'Utterly compelling . . . masterful' Financial Times *Summer Reads 2024* 'Superb' Guardian *SHORTLISTED FOR THE CUNDILL HISTORY PRIZE 2024* On a sunny Friday morning in August 1945, a handful of tired people raised a homemade cotton flag and on behalf of 68 million compatriots announced the birth of a new nation: Indonesia. Four million civilians had died during the Japanese wartime occupation that ousted its Dutch colonial ...
The State of Africa
'Meredith has given a spectacularly clear view of the African political jungle' – Spectator 'This book is hard to beat... Elegantly written as well as unerringly accurate' – Financial Times The fortunes of Africa have changed dramatically since the independence era began in 1957. As Europe’s colonial powers withdrew, dozens of new states were born. Africa was a continent rich in mineral resources and its economic potential was immense. Yet, it soon struggled with corruption, violence and warfare, with few states managing to escape the downward spiral. So what went wrong? In this riveting and authoritative account, Martin Meredith examines the myriad problems that Africa has faced, focusing upon key personalities, events and themes of the independence era. He brings his compelling analysis into the modern day, exploring Africa’s enduring struggles for democracy and the rising influence of China. It is essential reading for anyone seeking to understand the continent’s plight and its hopes for a brighter future.
From Primitives to Primates
Where do our images about early hominids come from? In this fascinating in-depth study, David Van Reybrouck demonstrates how input from ethnography and primatology has deeply influenced our visions about the past from the 19th century to this day - often far beyond the available evidence. Victorian scholars were keen to look at contemporary Australian and Tasmanian aboriginals to understand the enigmatic Neanderthal fossils. Likewise, today's primatologists debate to what extent bonobos, baboons or chimps may be regarded as stand-ins for early human ancestors. The belief that the contemporary world provides 'living links' still goes strong. Such primate models, Van Reybrouck argues, continue...
A Jihad for Love
Mohamed El-Bachiri is a Muslim. He lost his wife Loubna in the Brussels bombing of March 2016 – a young woman murdered by a fanatical jihadist. Mohamed was left to bring up their three sons on his own. Instead of hating or collapsing into grief, he put together a short book of reflections on love, loss and the ways in which we can live together despite differences of religion and ideology. It is a plea for tolerance and compassion, a rejection of fanaticism, and it is a heartbreaking book. Mohamed El-Bachiri shows how an argument for treating each other with kindness and respect can survive even the most brutal atrocity. For him, Islam should be a struggle for love, and the struggle for love should involve us all.
Stringer
In the powerful travel-writing tradition of Ryszard Kapuscinski and V.S. Naipaul, a haunting memoir of a dangerous and disorienting year of self-discovery in one of the world's unhappiest countries.
The Great Regression
We are living through a period of dramatic political change – Brexit, the election of Trump, the rise of extreme right movements in Europe and elsewhere, the resurgence of nationalism and xenophobia and a concerted assault on the liberal values and ideals associated with cosmopolitanism and globalization. Suddenly we find ourselves in a world that few would have imagined possible just a few years ago, a world that seems to many to be a move backwards. How can we make sense of these dramatic developments and how should we respond to them? Are we witnessing a worldwide rejection of liberal democracy and its replacement by some kind of populist authoritarianism? This timely volume brings toge...
Family Britain, 1951-1957
Family Britain continues David Kynaston's groundbreaking series Tales of a New Jerusalem, telling as never before the story of Britain from VE Day in 1945 to the election of Margaret Thatcher in 1979. 'The book is a marvel ... the level of detail is precise and fascinating' Sunday Telegraph 'A wonderfully illuminating picture of the way we were' The Times As in Austerity Britain, an astonishing array of vivid, intimate and unselfconscious voices drive the narrative. The keen-eyed Nella Last shops assiduously at Barrow Market as austerity and rationing gradually give way to relative abundance; housewife Judy Haines, relishing the detail of suburban life, brings up her children in Chingford; t...
Congoism
To justify the plundering of today's Democratic Republic of the Congo, U.S. intellectual elites have continuously produced dismissive Congo discourses. Tracing these discourses in great depth and breadth, Johnny Van Hove shows how U.S. intellectuals (and their influential European counterparts) have used the Congo in similar fashions for their own goals. Analyzing intellectuals as diverse as W. E. B. Du Bois, Joseph Conrad, and David Van Reybrouck, the book offers a theorization of Central West Africa, a case study of normalized narratives on the "Other," and a stirring wake-up call for contemporary writers on international history and politics.
