Our books are sold around the world, have been translated into over 50 languages, won many awards, and have been adapted for film and stage. We publish stories that feature strong female characters and explore themes of social justice, human rights, equality, and ability issues. Our list spans adult fiction and nonfiction; children’s fiction, nonfiction and picture books; and young adult fiction and nonfiction.
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In the wake of 9/11, the Asian crisis and the 2004 tsunami, traditional analytical frameworks are increasingly unable to explain how individuals and communities are rendered insecure, or advance individual, global or environmental security. In the Asia-Pacific, the accepted wisdom of realism has meant that analyses rarely move beyond the statist, militarist and exclusionary assumptions that underpin traditional realpolitik. This innovative new book challenges these limitations and addresses the missing problems, people and vulnerabilities of the Asia-Pacific region. It also turns a critical eye on traditional interstate strategic dynamics. Critical security in the Asia-Pacific applies both a critical theoretical approach that interrogates the deeper assumptions underpinning security discourses, and a human-centred policy approach that focuses on the security, welfare and emancipation of individuals and communities. Leading Asia-Pacific researchers combine to apply these frameworks to the most pressing issues in the region, from the Korean peninsula to environmental change, Indonesian conflict, the 'war on terror' and the plight of refugees. The result is a sophisticated and accessible account of often-neglected realities of marginalization in the region, and a compelling argument for the empowerment and security of the most vulnerable.
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EU security governance assesses the effectiveness of the EU as a security actor. The book has two distinct features. Firstly, it is the first systematic study of the different economic, political and military instruments employed by the EU in the performance of four different security functions. The book demonstrates that the EU has emerged as an important security actor, not only in the non-traditional areas of security, but increasingly as an entity with force projection capabilities. Secondly, the book represents an important step towards redressing conceptual gaps in the study of security governance, particularly as it pertains to the European Union. The book links the challenges of governing Europe's security to the changing nature of the state, the evolutionary expansion of the security agenda, and the growing obsolescence of the traditional forms and concepts of security cooperation. ;
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Making a bold intervention into critical security studies literature, this book explores the ontological relationship between mortality and security. It considers the mortality theories of Heidegger and Bauman alongside literature from the sociology of death, before undertaking a comparative exploration of the memorialisation of four prominent post-terrorist sites: the World Trade Centre in New York, the Bali bombsite, the London bombings and the Norwegian sites attacked by Anders Breivik. By interviewing the architects and designers of these reconstruction projects, the book shows that practices of memorialisation are a retrospective security endeavour - they conceal and re-narrate the traumatic incursion of death. Disaster recovery is replete with security practices that return mortality to its sublimated position and remove the disruption posed by mortality to political authority. The book will be of significant interest to academics and postgraduates working in the fields of critical security studies, memory studies and international politics.
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How do people seek security in relation to their sense of 'who they are'? How can one make sense of insecurity at the intersection of competing identity claims? Based on the voices of Mayan women, Stern critically re-considers the connections between security, subjectivity and identity. By engaging in a careful reading of how Mayan women 'speak' security in relation to the different contexts that inform their lives, she explores the multiplicity of both identity and security, and questions the main story of security imbedded in the modern 'paradox of sovereignty.' Her provocative analysis thus raises vital questions about what might constitute 'security', and the 'insecurity' that is its inevitable supplement. Her study also offers an innovative methodology that bridges many different disciplines and substantively develops the method of 'reading' politics as a 'textual practice'. It will be essential reading for students of security, identity politics, feminism, and Latin American studies.
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Based on geo- and biopolitical analyses, this book reconsiders how security policies and practices legitimate state and non-state violence in the Colombian conflict. Using the case study of the official Democratic Security Policy (DSP), Echavarría examines how security discourses write the political identities of state, self and others. She claims that the DSP delimits politics, the political, and the imaginaries of peace and war through conditioning the possibilities for identity formation. In/security in Colombia offers an innovative application of a large theoretical framework on the performative character of security discourses and furthers a nuanced understanding of the security problematique in a postcolonial setting. This wide-reaching study will benefit students, scholars and policy-makers in the fields of security, peace and conflict, and Latin American issues. ;
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This book explores how different publics make sense of and evaluate anti-terrorism powers within the UK, and the implications of this for citizenship and security. Drawing on primary empirical research, the book argues that whilst white individuals are not unconcerned about the effects of anti-terrorism, ethnic minority citizens (including, but not only those identifying as Muslim) believe that anti-terrorism powers have impacted negatively on their citizenship and security. This book thus offers the first systematic engagement with 'vernacular' or 'everyday' understandings of anti-terrorism policy, citizenship and security. It argues that while transformations in anti-terrorism frameworks impact on public experiences of security and citizenship, they do not do so in a uniform, homogeneous, or predictable manner. At the same time, public understandings and expectations of security and citizenship themselves shape how developments in anti-terrorism frameworks are discussed and evaluated. This important new book will be of interest to researchers and students working in a wide range of disciplines including Political Science, International Relations, Security Studies and Sociology.
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On the afternoon of September 11 2001 the Irish Prime Minister (Taoiseach), Bertie Ahern ordered the 'heads of the security services of key government departments' to undertake a complete re-evaluation of measures to protect the state from attack. Hence, underway within hours of the 9/11 outrage in the United States was potentially the most far-reaching review of Irish national security in decades. This book, the first major academic investigation of Irish national security policy as it has operated since 9/11, provides a theoretically informed analysis of that re-evaluation and the decisions which have been taken as a consequence of it up until September 2008. In so doing it draws on unprecedented access to Ireland's police, security and intelligence agencies; over twenty senior personnel agreed to be interviewed. Theoretically the author demonstrates the utility to the analysis of national security policy of three conceptual models of historical institutionalism, governmental politics and threat evaluation. The text is of interest to scholars of Security Studies, International Relations and Politics, as well as state and NGO personnel, journalists and general readers. ;
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This book represents the first ever comprehensive study of the EU's foreign and security policy in Bosnia. Drawing on a wealth of fresh empirical material, it demonstrates that institutions are a key variable in explaining levels of common foreign security policy (CFSP) coherence and effectiveness over time. In doing so, it also sheds new light on the role that intergovernmental, bureaucratic and local political contestation have played in the formulation and implementation of a European foreign policy. The study concludes that the EU's involvement in Bosnia has not only had a significant impact on this Balkan country in its path from stabilisation to integration, but has also transformed the EU, its foreign and security policy and shaped the development of the EU's international identity along the way. The book will be of great interest to researchers and students of EU politics, International Relations and Bosnian politics. ;
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Drawing on recently released documents and private papers, this is the first book-length study to examine the intimate relationship between the Attlee government and Britain's intelligence and security services at the start of the Cold War. Often praised for the formation of the modern-day 'welfare state', Attlee's government also played a significant, if little understood, role in combating communism at home and overseas, often in the face of vocal, sustained opposition from its own backbenches. This book tells the story of Attlee's Cold War. From Whitehall vetting to secret operations in Eastern Europe and the fallout of Soviet atomic espionage on both sides of the Atlantic, it provides a fresh interpretation of the Attlee government, making it essential reading for anyone interested in the Labour Party, intelligence, security and Britain's foreign and defence policy at the start of the Cold War.
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This book is about the relationship between societies and their security forces at times of great political and societal change. It uses the experiences of Croatia, Serbia and Montenegro to examine the control, management and reform of armed forces, police and intelligence agencies in the aftermath of conflict and authoritarianism. The book assesses the theory and practice of security sector reform programmes in the context of Europe and the Western Balkans, the relationship between security sector reform and normative international policy more generally, and the broader dynamics of post-conflict and post-authoritarian transformation. In so doing it addresses two underlying questions. First, how and in what ways does reform in the security sector interrelate with processes of domestic political and societal transformation, particularly democratisation. Second, how and in what ways do these processes relate and respond to internationally-driven efforts to promote a particular type of security sector reform as a component of wider peacebuilding and democracy promotion strategies.
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Can Russia, the European Union and the three major EU member states adopt a unified policy line in the global arena? Charlotte Wagnsson investigates the cohesiveness of 'greater Europe' through the detailed scrutiny of policy statements by the leadership elites in the UK, France, Germany, Russia and the EU in connection with three defining events in international security: the crisis in Kosovo of 1999; the terrorist attacks of 9/11 and the Iraq crisis of 2003. This extensive empirical enquiry results in a critical constructivist response to neorealist understandings of European security. The book contrasts the EU's new way of 'doing security' with the established, competitive bilateral interplay in the European security sphere and provides a clue to the kind of security politics that will prevail in Europe. It considers the extent to which the major European players pursue similar objectives, and assesses the possible implications for, and the chances of, greater Europe emerging as a cohesive global actor. ;
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The construction, control and preservation of the Official Record is inherently contested. Those seeking greater openness and (democratic) accountability argue 'sunlight is [...] the best of disinfectants', while others seek stricter information control because, to their mind, sound government arises when advice and policy are formulated secretly. This edited volume explores the intersection of the Official Record, oversight, national security and democracy. Through US, UK and Canadian case studies, this volume will benefit higher level undergraduate readers and above to explore the Official Record in the context of the national security operations of democratic states. All chapters are research-based pieces of original writing that feature a document appendix containing primary documents (often excerpts) that are key to a chapter's narrative. As a result, this book interrogates the boundaries between national security, accountability, oversight, and the Official Record.
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