Born in 1915 in France to artists—an American mother with Quaker roots from New York, and a New Zealand-born father—Thomas Merton would become one of the twentieth century’s most influential spiritual leaders. Baptized as a Catholic at age twenty-six, he joined a Trappist monastery near Louisville a year later. From that point on, his spiritual side exploded into a tsunami of directions—Eastern Orthodoxy, Judaism, Islam, Taoism, Buddhism, Hinduism, and more. At age thirty-three, he became a best-selling author, beginning with his autobiography, The Seven Storey Mountain. He corresponded with Nobel Prize laureates and other literary and political luminaries. His public opposition to the Vietnam War assured his worldwide celebrity. In late 1968, at the peak of his popularity, Merton died in Thailand after addressing a conference of Western Christian monks and nurses stationed in Asia. For decades it was thought that, wet from a shower, he was electrocuted by a faulty standing fan. But for a growing number of his admirers there were dark suspicions that he might well have been assassinated by those who feared his antiwar message. In 2013 the author and his wife Sharon retraced Merton’s last days in Thailand. This book tells what they learned.”
As a Christian and a U.S. legal consultant to Third World countries, Paul is amazed by how citizens of even the most impoverished areas and living in the most wretched of conditions manage to foster benevolence, goodwill, and peace in their lives and lands. But in the rich Western world, much of it either godless or mired in aggressive religiosity, these goals are seldom achieved. Paul is deeply troubled by this anomaly, and he finds himself engaging in a lively debate with an imaginary visitor, Kierkegaard's clown. Named after the mid-nineteenth century Protestant philosopher, the clown challenges Paul's Western complacency and draws a curious link between religion, war, and poverty by taking Paul to "circus tents"-poor and despondent sections in America, India, and Iraq. It's in Baghdad where Paul's journey to enlightenment truly begins. Along with a group of like-minded individuals-Christian, Muslim, and Jewish-and with the clown as his unwavering guide, Paul searches for the theological and philosophical answers to his questions and discovers that the ultimate truth lies within his own heart.
In a tradition that dates back to the time of Thucydides, and the Peloponnesian War, the systematic examination of conflict and war has long been a preoccupation of political scientists seeking to resolve the enduring question: Why do wars occur? This study directly engages this question with a specific focus on explaining the conflict between Iran and Iraq, arguably the longest and one of the more costly conventional wars of the twentieth century. Explaining the systemic nature of conflict within the Middle East, and specifically between Iran and Iraq, the book illustrates how IR theory can be utilised in explaining conflict dynamics in the Middle East. The author’s integrated approach to understanding interstate conflict escalation demonstrates that when taken together issues, interaction and power capabilities lend themselves to a much richer account of the dyadic relationship between Iran and Iraq in the lead up to war in 1980. Addressing a disparity between international relations and Middle Eastern area studies, this book fills an important gap in the existing scholarly literature on the causes of war. As such, it will be of great interest to scholars of peace and conflict studies, Middle Eastern studies and International Relations.
This book explores the new product development process of firms developing frugal innovation for the base-of-the-pyramid (BOP) markets in developing countries. Frugal innovations are products characterised by an affordable price-point, durability, usability and core functionalities that are highly adapted to BOP consumers’ needs. Frugal products have the potential to drive the development progress and living standards of low-income consumers. With an innovation framework developed from worldwide frugal case studies, this book provides detailed insights through two in-depth start-up firms in Indonesia that have successfully launched frugal products for the low-income market. These two start-ups have addressed two major development challenges for not just Indonesia, but also the global BOP market – traditional methods of cooking and access to clean drinking water. A detailed roadmap is developed from insights into the processes and management decisions of these two start-ups and combined with previous studies on frugal products. Providing a detailed roadmap across the different phases and stages of the new product development process when developing frugal products, this book will be insightful to not only innovators but also investors and government agencies supporting their activities.
Jerry Sanfords historical thriller, The Lost Spy, is a riveting blend of fact and fi ction as ex-CIA operative Cole Rider is mysteriously transported to northern Florida in 1942. A beautiful British agent comes to his aid and helps recruit him into the Offi ce of Strategic Services, the CIAs predecessor. Searching for answers, Rider is catapulted into a deadly race with a Nazi assassin to locate Werner Heisenberg, a German Nobel Prize-winning physicist. Heisenberg heads Adolph Hitlers atomic bomb project but has recently disappeared, possibly in the United States. With the stunning agent at his side and British Naval Commander Ian Fleming a step behind, Rider must win that race or fi nd the atomic bomb in Hitlers hands.
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