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History tells us that industrial development with all of its pollution, inequity and exploitation is the inevitable destiny of human societies. Yet is this really the case or are we trapped in a prevailing 'develop-mentality' that demands an endless cycle of inputs, outputs, consumption and waste on a finite planet? And is there another, better way for humans and the biosphere? This incisive, epic work turns the dominant industrial development model and its economics upside down and argues for a new way of thinking about the meaning of development and the complexion of our economy. The book traces the origin and development of the concept of development in the economic context, and suggests ...
The second volume of Priscilla Alderson’s popular and renowned book Childhoods Real and Imagined relates dialectical critical realism to childhood. By demonstrating their relevance and value to each other, Alderson presents a practical introductory guide for applying critical realism to research about children and young people. Each chapter summarises key themes from several academic disciplines and policy areas, ranging from climate change and social justice between generations, to neoliberalism, social reform and imagining utopias. Children’s and adults’ views and experiences are reviewed, and whereas the first volume deals with more personal and local aspects of childhood, this volume widens the scope into debates about global politics, which so seldom mention children. Each chapter demonstrates how children and young people are an integral part of the whole of society and are often especially affected by policies and events. This book is written for everyone who is researching, studying or teaching about childhood, or who cares for and works with children and young people, as well as those interested in critical realist approaches.
Growth against Democracy: Savage Developmentalism in the Modern World, by H.L.T. Quan, is a radical critique of development as a modern project. Using three historical cases (Brazil-Japan, China-Africa, and US-Iraq), Quan probes the discursive practices of modern development, exploring the coercive and juridical dimensions of trade, diplomacy and war and their impact. This study builds on the critical works of neoliberalism, capitalist development, and empire to lay the groundwork for an honest assessment of neoliberal economics and foreign conducts and their impact on human life.
"For decades, government, industry, and the mainstream media have extolled the virtues of biotechnology. Their dominant message -- that biotechnology can improve everything from our health and diet to our environment and economy -- is unmistakably celebratory. We hear about biotechnology's power to reverse environmental degradation, help medical researchers identify disease genes, and increase industrial efficiency, output, and jobs. Government and industry rarely tell us about biotechnology's negative side effects. Not only are genetically engineered crops still failing to deliver consistently higher yields; there is also mounting evidence that genetically engineered organisms come with a h...
In nearly all societies gender has been, and continues to be, central in defining roles and responsibilities related to the production, manufacturing, provisioning, eating, and disposal of food. The 2016 Yearbook of Women's History presents a collection of articles that look into food-related practices and shifting relations of gender across food systems. Authors explore changing understandings of food-related activities at the intersection of food and gender, across time and space. Articles about the lives of market women in late medieval food trades in the Low Countries, the practices of activist women in the garbage movement of prewar Tokyo, the way grain storage technologies affect women in Zimbabwe, through to the impact of healthy eating blogs in the digital age.
With tens of millions of hectares and hundreds of millions of lives in the balance, the debate over who should control South Asias forests is of tremendous political significance. This book provides an insightful and thorough assessment of important forest management transitions currently underway. MARK POFFENBERGER, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR OF COMMUNITY FORESTRY INTERNATIONAL The contributions in this volume not only breathe life into the fi eld of writing and analysis related to forests, they do so on the strength of extraordinarily insightful research. Kudos to Springate-Baginski and Blaikie for providing us with a set of thoroughly researched, provocative studies that should be required readin...
Must freedom be sacrificed to achieve ecological sustainability - or vice versa? Can we be genuinely free and live in sustainable societies? This book argues that we can, if we recognise and celebrate our ecological embeddedness, rather than seeking to transcend it. But this does not mean freedom can simply be redefined to fit within ecological limits. Addressing current unsustainability will involve significant restrictions, and hence will require political justification, not just scientific evidence. Drawing on material from perfectionist liberalism, capabilities approaches, human rights, relational ethics and virtue theory, Michael Hannis explores the relationship between freedom and sust...
This collection is the first to specifically address our current understanding of the evolution of human childhood, which in turn significantly affects our interpretations of the evolution of family formation, social organization, cultural transmission, cognition, ontogeny, and the physical and socioemotional needs of children. Moreover, the importance of studying the evolution of childhood has begun to extend beyond academic modeling and into real-world applications for maternal and child health and well-being in contemporary populations around the world. Combined, the chapters show that what we call childhood is culturally variable yet biologically based and has been critical to the evolutionary success of our species; the significance of integrating childhood into models of human life history and evolution cannot be overstated. This volume further demonstrates the benefits of interdisciplinary investigation and is sure to spur further interest in the field.
This book develops the term ‘Sustainable Innovations’ and defines it on the basis of plant variety innovations that, by their very nature, (i) permit the in situ conservation of agrobiodiversity and genetic variability in diverse geographic and climatic conditions, (ii) do not exclude any potential innovators from the process of innovation, and thereby (iii) ensure that both formal and informal innovations can continue to take place in the generations to come (in both the developed and developing world). The book studies the Indian Plant Variety Protection Act, the UPOV Acts and associated agricultural policies from a legal, philosophical, historical and economic perspective with the aim of determining the means of promoting sustainable innovations in plant varieties and identifying laws, policies and practices that are currently acting as impediments to promoting the same.