First published in 2013. Desert Energy examines the key technologies being deployed in an effort to tap the potential presented by the world’s deserts for siting large scale solar power applications, and surveys the feasibility of such projects given the remoteness and hostility of these environments. Focusing on large scale photovoltaics and concentrating solar thermal power, the book explains how the systems work, projects that are being planned, the required scales, and the technical difficulties they need to overcome to function effectively. It then moves on to examine the economics of such projects and the social and environmental effects they may have. The book also considers the future for these systems as well as other, less developed technologies which may have a role to play. With reference throughout to built or planned projects, and written in a clear, jargon-free style, this is a must-read for anyone interested in the development of large scale solar applications.
This Seminar Studies title is a succinct study of modern British foreign policy, focusing on the period from 1945 to the present day. Since the end of the Second World War, Britain has been engaged in international conflicts from the Suez Crisis to the Gulf War and has actively sought involvement in transnational and global affairs. Starting with a brief overview of the rise and fall of the British Empire and continuing chronologically with detailed chapters covering the second half of the twentieth century and the beginning of the twenty-first, Alasdair Blair discusses the highs and lows of British foreign policy in an accessible yet analytical manner. Dealing with themes such as the issues triggered by decolonisation and the changing relationship between Britain and Europe, this text considers the pivotal moments in modern Britain’s engagement with the wider world. Included in this title are supporting materials, such as a chronology of important events from 1945, a Who’s Who of key government figures and a collection of relevant primary sources. Thorough yet concise, Britain and the World since 1945 is the ideal resource for students interested in the development of British foreign policy.
Should a citizen’s right to social welfare be contingent on their personal behaviour? Welfare conditionality, linking citizens’ eligibility for social benefits and services to prescribed compulsory responsibilities or behaviours, has become a key component of welfare reform in many nations. This book uses qualitative longitudinal data, from repeat interviews with people subject to compulsion and sanction in their everyday lives, to analyse the effectiveness and ethicality of welfare conditionality in promoting and sustaining behaviour change in the UK. Given the negative outcomes that welfare conditionality routinely triggers, this book calls for the abandonment of these sanctions and reiterates the importance of genuinely supportive policies that promote social security and wider equality.
The European Union faces a crossroads in the twenty-first century. While there is evidence of declining enthusiasm for European integration, the EU plays an increasingly vital role in tackling problems that can no longer be dealt with at member state level. In recent years, the EU has developed a stronger foreign, security and defence policy, and has had to face up to the challenges of tackling organised crime, human trafficking and drug smuggling. In this fully updated new edition, Alasdair Blair examines the economic, political, social and personal factors that have shaped the process of European integration from the end of the Second World War until the Lisbon Treaty in 2009. Written in a clear and jargon-free style, the book explores: The context of European integration and expansion The relations between the European Union and its member states The institutional evolution of the European Union Methods of decision-making Key policies of the European Union The future direction of the European Union Comprehensive and accessible, this book is an essential guide to understanding the relevance of the European Union in the twenty-first century.
What does it mean to be a human being?' Given this perennial question, Alasdair MacIntyre, one of America's preeminent philosophers, presents a compelling argument on the necessity and importance of philosophy. Because of a need to better understand Catholic philosophical thought, especially in the context of its historical development and realizing that philosophers interact within particular social and cultural situations, MacIntyre offers this brief history of Catholic philosophy. Tracing the idea of God through different philosophers' engagement of God and how this engagement has played out in universities, MacIntyre provides a valuable, lively, and insightful study of the disintegration of academic disciplines with knowledge. MacIntyre then demonstrates the dangerous implications of this happening and how universities can and ought to renew a shared understanding of knowledge in their mission. This engaging work will be a benefit and a delight to all readers.
The events of 1000-1130 were crucial to the successful emergence of the medieval kingdom of the Scots. Yet this is one of the least researched periods of Scottish history. We probably now know more about the Picts than the post-1000 events that underpinned the spectacular expansion of the small kingdom which came to dominate north Britain by the 1130s. This expansion included the defeat and absorption of other significant cultural and political groups to the north and south of the core kingdom, and was accompanied by the introduction of reformed monasticism. But perhaps the most momentous process amongst all these political and cultural changes was the move towards the domination of the kingship by just one segment of the royal kindred, the sons of King Mael Coluim mac Donnchada's second marriage to Queen Margaret. The story of how these sons managed to achieve political supremacy through machination, murder and mutilation runs like an unsavoury thread throughout this book. The book also investigates the building blocks from which the kingdom was constructed and the various processes which eventually allowed the kings of the different peoples of north Britain to describe themselves as Rex scottorum. It is a hugely rewarding voyage of discovery for anyone interested in the formation of the kingdom of the Scots.
Addressing the persistent environmental threat of organic chemicals with a fresh approach to degradation and transformation processes, Organic Chemicals in the Environment: Mechanisms of Degradation and Transformation, Second Edition examines a wide range of compounds as well as abiotic and microbiological reactions mediated by microorganisms
Alasdair Gray is Scotland's best known polymath. Born in 1934 in Glasgow, he graduated in design and mural art from the Glasgow School of Art in 1957. After decades of surviving by painting and writing TV and radio plays, his first novel, the loosely autobiographical, blackly fantastic Lanark, opened up new imaginative territory for such varied writers as Jonathan Coe, A.L. Kennedy, James Kelman, Janice Galloway and Irvine Welsh. It led Anthony Burgess to call him 'the most important Scottish writer since Sir Walter Scott'. His other published books include 1982 Janine, Poor Things (winner of the Whitbread Award), The Book of Prefaces, The Ends of our Tethers and Old Men in Love. In this book, with reproductions of his murals, portraits, landscapes and illustrations, Gray tells of his failures and successes which have led his pictures to be accepted by a new generation of visual artists.
The United States has just gone through the worst economic crisis in a generation. Why wasn’t there more protest, as there was in other countries? During the United States’ last great era of free-market policies, before World War II, economic crises were always accompanied by unrest. "The history of capitalism," the economist Joseph Schumpeter warned in 1942, "is studded with violent bursts and catastrophes." In The End of Protest, Alasdair Roberts explains how, in the modern age, governments learned to unleash market forces while also avoiding protest about the market’s failures. Roberts argues that in the last three decades, the two countries that led the free-market revolution—the United States and Britain—have invented new strategies for dealing with unrest over free market policies. The organizing capacity of unions has been undermined so that it is harder to mobilize discontent. The mobilizing potential of new information technologies has also been checked. Police forces are bigger and better equipped than ever before. And technocrats in central banks have been given unprecedented power to avoid full-scale economic calamities. Tracing the histories of economic unrest in the United States and Great Britain from the nineteenth century to the present, The End of Protest shows that governments have always been preoccupied with the task of controlling dissent over free market policies. But today’s methods pose a new threat to democratic values. For the moment, advocates of free-market capitalism have found ways of controlling discontent, but the continued effectiveness of these strategies is by no means certain.
Argues that trade policy is composed of multiple, distinct policies, each presenting distinct societal preferences, pattern of political institutions, and range of government preferences. Analyzes EU trade policy as a tool of foreign policy, including promoting development, encouraging human rights and environmental protection, and punishing security threats.
There is now widespread agreement that many non-human animals are sentient, and that this fact has important moral and political implications. Indeed, most are in agreement that animal sentience ought to constrain the actions of political institutions, limiting the harms that can be perpetrated against animals. The primary aim of this book is to show that the political implications of animal sentience go even further than this. For this book argues that sentience establishes a moral equality and a shared set of rights amongst those creatures who possess it. Crucially, this worth and these rights create a duty on moral agents to establish and maintain a political order dedicated to their interests. This book is devoted to sketching what this 'sentientist politics' might look like. It argues in favour of a ' sentientist cosmopolitan democracy': a global political system made up of overlapping local, national, regional and global communities comprised of human and non-human members who exist within shared 'communities of fate'. Furthermore, the institutions of those communities should be democratic - that is to say, participative, deliberative and representative. Finally, those institutions should include dedicated representatives of non-human animals whose job should be to translate the interests of animals into deliberations over what is in the public good for their communities.
Praise for previous editions: 'Something of a godsend ... as a teaching resource this book is second to none ... achieves levels of multiplicity rarely, if ever, reached by others.' - Borderlines: Studies in American Culture This third edition of American Cultural Studies has been updated throughout to take into account the developments of the last six years, providing an introduction to the central themes in modern American culture and explores how these themes can be interpreted. Chapters in the book discuss the various aspects of American cultural life such as religion, gender and sexuality, and regionalism. Updates and revisions include: discussion of Barack Obama’s rise to power and the end of the ‘Bush Years’ consideration of ‘Hemispheric American Studies’ and the increasing debates about globalisation and the role of the USA up-to-date case-studies, such as The Wire and Nurse Jackie, more on suburbia, the Mexican-border crossing, the Twilight phenomena etc updated further-reading lists.Accompanying website. American Cultural Studies is a core text and an accessible introduction to the interdisciplinary study of American culture.
The first full-length study of Frederick Douglass' visit to Scotland in 1846Frederick Douglass (1818-95) was not the only fugitive from American slavery to visit Scotland before the Civil War, but he was the best known and his impact was far-reaching. This book shows that addressing crowded halls from Ayr to Aberdeen, he gained the confidence, mastered the skills and fashioned the distinctive voice that transformed him as a campaigner. It tells how Douglass challenged the Free Church over its ties with the Southern plantocracy; how he exploited his knowledge of Walter Scott and Robert Burns to brilliant effect; and how he asserted control over his own image at a time when racial science and blackface minstrel shows were beginning to shape his audiences' perceptions. He arrived as a subordinate envoy of white abolitionists, legally still enslaved. He returned home as a free man ready to embark on a new stage of his career, as editor and proprietor of his own newspaper and a leader in his own right.Key Features:First full-length study of Frederick Douglass' visit to Scotland in 1846Reveals fresh information about, and deepens our understanding of, a major 19th-century intellectual at a crucial stage in his political and professional developmentSubjects Douglass' speeches and letters to close readings and situates them in the immediate context of their delivery and compositionDemonstrates the extent to which Douglass was closely acquainted with Scottish literature, history and current affairsEnhances our knowledge of Douglass as a performer, his ability to read audiences, and how he moved and influenced them
From the heat and dust of the Dardanelles to the mud of the Western Front, Corporal Angus Mackay had one constant companion, his diary. He wrote of the battles and campaigns he fought in, names that would go down in history: Gallipoli, the Somme, Ypres and Arras. Serving in the the 1st/5th Battalion (Queens Edinburgh Rifles) Royal Scots and later the 88th Brigade Machine Gun Corps, he left a record of one man's extraordinary and tragic war. In Somewhere in Blood Soaked France, Alasdair Sutherland reveals this previously unpublished account of the First World War, complete with historical context, orders of battle and extracts from official war diaries. This rare source - it was an offence to keep a record in a case of capture - offers a stirring insight into the bravery of Mackay and his companions, who were not afraid to die for their country. 'If I go under it will be in a good cause, so roll on the adventure.
Berkeley's Principles of Human Knowledge is a key text in the history of British Empiricism and 18th-century thought. As a free-standing systematic exposition of Berkeley's ideas, this is a hugely important and influential text, central to any undergraduate's study of the history of philosophy.
The definitive guide to seeing all the wonders of Scotland under paddle power. Scotland is one of the most appealing destinations for kayakers, canoeists and paddleboarders from all over the world. That's because if there is one country best seen from the water, it is Scotland. Loch Ness contains more water than all of the rivers and lakes in England and Wales combined – and there are 27,000 other lochs to explore as well. What's more, with 125,000km of rivers and 800 islands, there's always somewhere new to paddle. And the spectacular Scottish scenery only adds to the appeal. This book is the complete guide to paddling the wonderfully varied waterways, lochs, rivers and coasts of Scotland, compiled by Ally Findlay, a paddleboard instructor and tour guide based in Glasgow. He covers all regions of Scotland: - South Scotland, including the coast at Kirkcudbright and Fleet Bay, and inland to Loch Ken, and the Galloway Canoe Trail - Central Scotland, including Loch Lomond and the beautiful Trossachs National Park - East Coast Scotland, including the Forth Bridges - West Coast Scotland, from the coast at Arasaig to lochs and rivers including the amazing Rannoch Moor - Scottish Highlands, which become a magical playground in the northwest following the Inverpoly routes From short paddles to day trips into the stunning wilderness, this book covers excursions for all occasions and all levels of ability, explaining where to begin and what to look out for. Most are well suited to canoe and kayak, but going further, some are even better explored standing up on a paddleboard, including cross-Scotland routes such as the Shin System. With beautiful and evocative photography, and clear maps, this is the essential guide to seeing Scotland under paddle power, exploring where to go, how to get there and what to see en route.
Environmental problems have become increasingly complex. The procedures for investigating these problems cross the traditional boundaries of organic and analytical chemistry, microbiology and biology. Organic Chemicals: An Environmental Perspective brings together the basic issues of chemical analysis, distribution, persistence, and ecotoxicology. The author illustrates each point with specific examples and presents a mechanistic approach to microbial reactions. Extensive cross referencing between chapters provides cohesion and complete coverage of issues tangential to each topic. The new edition has been extensively revised, and contains a new appendix, a new chapter, plus further revised information throughout the book. In fact, it is a completely new book. A major difficulty in environmental science is that much of the background is widely scattered in the specialized chemical, microbiological, and biological literature. The coverage of all these areas in a single volume, the coherence supplied by the cross references, and the extensive references to the original literature makes Organic Chemicals: An Environmental Perspective a unique resource.
Illuminating the development and character of Scottish Protestantism, The Culture of Controversy proposes new ways of understanding religion and politics in early modern Scotland. The Culture of Controversy investigates arguments about religion in Scotland from the Restoration to the death of Queen Anne and outlines a new model for thinking about collective disagreement in seventeenth- and eighteenth-century societies. Rejecting teleological concepts of the 'public sphere', the book instead analyses religious debates in terms of a distinctively early modern 'culture of controversy'. This culture was less rational and less urbanised than the public sphere. Traditional means of communication such as preaching and manuscript circulation were more important than newspapers and coffeehouses. As well as verbal forms of discourse, controversial culture was characterised by actions, rituals and gestures. People from all social ranks and all regions of Scotland were involved in religious arguments, but popular participation remained of questionable legitimacy. Through its detailedand innovative examination of the arguments raging between and within Scotland's main religious groups, the presbyterians and episcopalians, over such issues as Church government, state oaths and nonconformity, The Culture ofControversy reveals hitherto unexamined debates about religious enthusiasm, worship and clerical hypocrisy. It also illustrates the changing nature of the fault line between the presbyterians and episcopalians and contextualises the emerging issues of religious toleration and articulate irreligion. Illuminating the development and character of Scottish Protestantism, The Culture of Controversy proposes new ways of understanding religion and politics in late seventeenth- and early eighteenth-century Scotland and will be particularly valuable to all those with an interest in early modern British history. Alasdair Raffe is Lecturer in History at Northumbria University, Newcastle upon Tyne.
Gray argues that a truly independent Scotland will only ever exist when people in every home, school, croft, farm, workshop, factory, island, glen, town and city feel that they too are at the centre of the world. Independence asks whether widespread social welfare is more possible in small nations such as Norway and New Zealand than in big ones like Britain and the U.S.A. It describes the many differences between Scotland and England. It examines the people who choose to live north of the border. It shows Scotland's relevance to the rest of the world. It attempts to conjure a vision of how a Scots parliament might benefit the people of this small but dynamic nation. And it tells how democracy will only truly succeed when every person believes that their vote will make a difference.
This accessible, user-friendly and bang-up-to-dateintroduction to International Politics blends key facts and terms withstrong analytical commentary, examining the debates and issues of greatestrelevance to the study of the subject.Focusing on the period since 1900, thebook provides detailed coverage of key events from the origins of the FirstWorld War to the post-Cold War international order. Written in a clear andjargon-free style, particular features include:*The shift from Great Powersto Superpowers in the first half of the twentieth century*The Cold War andpost-Cold War order*A fresh approach to understanding the relevancy oftheory*State and non-state actors*The challenge of globalization*Order,justice and security in International PoliticsThis clear and authoritativeaccount of International Politics benefits from an exhaustive list of boxes,tables and figures, as well as extensive cross-referencing throughout. Thisbook is an essential guide to understanding the challenges that face worldpeace and security in the twenty-first century.
Highly controversial when it was first published in 1981, Alasdair MacIntyre's After Virtue has since established itself as a landmark work in contemporary moral philosophy. In this book, MacIntyre sought to address a crisis in moral language that he traced back to a European Enlightenment that had made the formulation of moral principles increasingly difficult. In the search for a way out of this impasse, MacIntyre returns to an earlier strand of ethical thinking, that of Aristotle, who emphasised the importance of 'virtue' to the ethical life. More than thirty years after its original publication, After Virtue remains a work that is impossible to ignore for anyone interested in our understanding of ethics and morality today.
The amount of data produced, captured and transmitted through the media has never been greater. But for this data to be useful, it needs to be properly understood and claims made about or with data need to be properly scrutinized. Through a series of examples of statistics in the media, this book shows you how to critically assess the presentation of data in the media, to identify what is significant and to sort verifiable conclusions from misleading claims. How accurate are polls, and how should we know? How should league tables be read? Are numbers presented as ‘large’ really as big as they may seem at first glance? By answering these questions and more, readers will learn a number of statistical concepts central to many undergraduate social science statistics courses. By tying them in to real life examples, the importance and relevance of these concepts comes to life. As such, this book does more than teaches techniques needed for a statistics course; it teaches you life skills that we need to use every single day.
This engaging and practical guide is a much-needed new textbook that illustrates the power of geographic information systems (GIS) and spatial analysis. Today's planner has a wealth of data available to them, much of which is increasingly linked to a specific location. From football clubs to Twitter conversations, government spending to the spread of diseases – data can be mapped. Once mapped, the data begins to tell stories, patterns are revealed, and effective planning decisions can be made. When used effectively, GIS allows students, planners, residents and policymakers to solve wicked problems in the environment, society and the economy. Geospatial data is now more freely available than it ever has been, as is much of the necessary software to analyse it. This contemporary text offers a practical guide to spatial analysis and what it can show us. In addition to explaining what GIS is and why it is such a powerful tool, the authors cover such topics as geovisualization, mapping principles, network analysis and decision making. Offering more than just theoretical or technical principles and concepts, the book applies GIS techniques to the real world, draws on global examples and provides practical advice on mapping the built environment. This accessible text is essential reading for undergraduate and postgraduate students taking planning modules on GIS, data analysis and mapping, as well as for all planners, urbanists and geographers with an interest in how GIS can help us better understand the built environment from a socio-economic perspective.
This accessible, user-friendly guide provides students with all the key information and analysis on the European Union and its policies. It covers the main areas, such as the single market and budgeting, and also explores recent developments involving the introduction of the Economic and Monetary Union and the Treaty of Nice. With the accession of ten new member States, the EU is experiencing dramatic changes and this is a comprehensive and thematic guide to all the recent developments. Companion to the European Union is an essential purchase for all students getting to grips with the complexities of the EU and is also an excellent resource for lecturers and professionals.
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