World History Political Science

The heroic story of Pussy Riot, who resurrected the power of truth in a society built on lies. On February 21, 2012, five young women entered the Cathedral of Christ the Savior in Moscow. In neon-colored dresses, tights, and balaclavas, they performed a “punk prayer” beseeching the “Mother of God” to “get rid of Putin.” They were quickly shut down by security, and in the weeks and months that followed, three of the women were arrested and tried, and two were sentenced to a remote prison colony. But the incident captured international headlines, and footage of it went viral.

As Hitler's ascendancy began to make a Second World War inevitable, a clandestine network flooded the United States with disinformation aimed at sapping the strength of its war effort and persuading Americans that their natural alliance was with the Axis. Prequel unearths the forgotten story of these insurrectionists, as well as the heroic efforts of the journalists, prosecutors, and regular citizens who sought to expose their plot and bring them to justice. Deeply researched, the story of how the crisis was averted is also a deeply relevant tale for our own disquieting times.

For generations, British thinkers told the history of an empire whose story was still very much in the making. While they wrote of conquest, imperial rule in India, the Middle East, Africa, and the Caribbean was consolidated. While they described the development of imperial governance, rebellions were brutally crushed. As they reimagined empire during the two world wars, decolonization was compromised. Priya Satia shows how these historians not only interpreted the major political events of their time but also shaped the future that followed.

The first 100 days of Franklin Roosevelt's presidency are justly famous, viewed as a period of political action without equal in American history. Yet as historian David B. Woolner reveals, the end of FDR's presidency might very well surpass it in drama and consequence. Drawing on new evidence, Woolner shows how FDR used every ounce of his diminishing energy to pursue the things that mattered most to him: the establishment of the United Nations, the reinvigoration of the New Deal, the possibility of a Jewish homeland in Palestine, and more.

America has a huge problem. It faces four major challenges, on which its future depends, and it is failing to meet them. In That Used to Be Us, Thomas L. Friedman, one of our most influential columnists, and Michael Mandelbaum, one of our leading foreign policy thinkers, analyze those challenges - globalization, the revolution in information technology, the nation's chronic deficits, and its pattern of energy consumption - and spell out what we need to do now to rediscover America and rise to this moment.

Covert agent Cyril DePaul thinks he's good at keeping secrets, especially from Aristide Makricosta. They suit each other: Aristide turns a blind eye to Cyril's clandestine affairs, and Cyril keeps his lover's moonlighting job as a smuggler under wraps. Cyril participates in a mission that leads to disastrous results, leaving smoke from various political fires smoldering throughout the city. Shielding Aristide from the expected fallout isn't easy, though.

Este audiolibro nació en el aire: en las ondas hertzianas que transmitían los micros sobre el pasado de Venezuela que escribió Inés Quintero. Ahora, esta edición permite volver a disfrutar de todos esos divertidos y asombrosos asomos a la historia nacional con toda la frescura, inteligencia y sentido del humor de esta académica tan prestigiosa y tan hábil para comunicarse con el gran público.

On Liberty is an 1859 philosophical treatise by the English philosopher John Stuart Mill (1806 - 1873) which applies an ethical system of utilitarianism to society and the state. Mill starts with a brief overview of the meaning of liberty and proffers his basic argument in favor of liberty for the individual, to the degree that it harms no one else. The value of liberty of opinion and liberty of action are set forth in two chapters.

Pirates and Emperors is a brilliant exploration of the role of the United States in the Middle East that exposes how the media manipulates public opinion about what constitutes "terrorism". Chomsky masterfully argues that appreciating the differences between state terror and nongovernmental terror is crucial to stopping terrorism and understanding why atrocities like the bombing of the World Trade Center and the killing of the Charlie Hebdo journalists happen.

This rather incoherent work by Russian anarchist philosopher Michael Bakunin is described in a way that he described his own life: a fragment. Rife with criticisms on Christianity and the technocracy, Bakunin presses communist values without fear of bordering extremism. Listening to this work is like walking through Bakunin’s disjointed mind; often cutting off and starting mid-sentence, including footnotes several paragraphs long as if his thoughts suddenly start to wander, as well as ending rather abruptly mid-sentence.

The untold story of how Russia refined the art and science of targeted assassination abroad—while Western spies watched in horror as their governments failed to guard against the threat. Unflinchingly documenting the growing web of death on British and American soil, Heidi Blake bravely exposes the Kremlin's assassination campaign as part of Putin's ruthless pursuit of global dominance—and reveals why Western governments have failed to stop the bloodshed.

In the last few years, China's aid program has leapt out of the shadows. But China's tradition of secrecy about its aid fueled rumors and speculation, making it difficult to gauge the risks and opportunities provided by China's growing embrace. This well-timed book, by one of the world's leading experts, provides the first comprehensive account of China's aid and economic cooperation overseas. Deborah Brautigam tackles the myths and realities, explaining what the Chinese are doing, how they do it, how much aid they give, and how it all fits into their "going global" strategy.

The defense of human rights is often marked by ethical dilemmas, which are especially acute in Israel, where lawyers have for decades sought redress for the abuse of Palestinian rights in the country's High Court - that is, in the court of the abuser. In The Wall and the Gate, Michael Sfard chronicles this struggle - a story that has never before been fully told - and in the process engages the core principles of human rights legal ethics.

The September 11 assault on the World Trade Center was the most sophisticated and horrifying in a series of operations masterminded by Osama bin Laden and his Jihad group - an organization that CNN's terrorism analyst Peter Bergen calls Holy War, Inc. One of only a handful of journalists to have interviewed the world's most wanted man face to face, Bergen explains the Jihadist network that operates globally and in secrecy.

A major historical account of the Korean War, its origins, and its evolving impact on the world. Sixty years after North Korean troops crossed the 38th parallel into South Korea, the Korean War has not yet ended. Sheila Miyoshi Jager presents the first comprehensive history of this misunderstood war, one that risks involving the world’s superpowers - again. Her sweeping narrative ranges from the middle of the Second World War - when Korean independence was fiercely debated between Roosevelt, Stalin, and Churchill - to the present day.

Swansong 1945 chronicles the end of Nazi Germany and World War II in Europe through hundreds of letters, diaries, and autobiographical accounts covering four days that fateful spring: Hitler's birthday on April 20, American and Soviet troops meeting at the Elbe on April 25, Hitler's suicide on April 30, and finally the German surrender on May 8.

Is America a source of pride, as Americans have long held, or shame, as Progressives allege? Beneath an innocent exterior, are our lives complicit in a national project of theft, expropriation, oppression, and murder? Or is America still the hope of the world? New York Times best-selling author Dinesh D'Souza says these questions are no mere academic exercise.

The Kremlin intrigues, the private worlds of the Soviet Empire's ruling class, Radzinsky thrillingly brings them to life. And the riddle of that most cold-blooded of leaders, a man for whom nothing was sacred in his pursuit of absolute might, and perhaps the greatest mass murderer in Western history, is solved.

Conflicts over specific rules lie at the heart of the disputes, which are about much more than sovereignty over islands and rocks in the South and East China Seas. Instead, the main contests concern the strategic maritime space associated with those islands. To consolidate control over this vital maritime space, China's leaders have begun to implement "China's law of the sea": building domestic legal institutions, bureaucratic organizations, and a naval and maritime law enforcement apparatus to establish China's preferred maritime rules on the water and in the diplomatic arena.

Scattered over the territory between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea lie the remnants of failed peace proposals, international summits, secret negotiations, UN resolutions, and state-building efforts. The conventional story is that these well-meaning attempts at peacemaking were repeatedly, perhaps terminally, thwarted by violence. Through a rich interweaving of reportage, historical narrative, and powerful analysis, Nathan Thrall presents a startling counterhistory.