Africa is a continent of 54 countries and over a billion people. However, despite the rich diversity of the African experience, it is striking that continuations and themes seem to be reflected across the continent, particularly south of the Sahara. Questions of underdevelopment, outside exploitation, and misrule are characteristic of many--if not most-states in Sub-Saharan Africa. In this Very Short Introduction Ian Taylor explores how politics is practiced on the African continent, considering the nature of the state in Sub-Saharan Africa and why its state structures are generally weaker than elsewhere in the world. Exploring the historical and contemporary factors which account for Africa's underdevelopment, he also analyses why some African countries suffer from high levels of political violence while others are spared. Unveiling the ways in which African state and society actually function beyond the formal institutional facade, Taylor discusses how external factors--both inherited and contemporary--act upon the continent. ABOUT THE SERIES: The Very Short Introductions series from Oxford University Press contains hundreds of titles in almost every subject area. These pocket-sized books are the perfect way to get ahead in a new subject quickly. Our expert authors combine facts, analysis, perspective, new ideas, and enthusiasm to make interesting and challenging topics highly readable.

African Politics: A Very Short Introduction (Very Short Introductions)

Taylor, Ian

Legal Theory & Systems

Oxford University Press

Crime in Context: A Critical Criminology of Market Societies

At the end of the twentieth century, the bookstores are full of books on crime, though this title will certainly not find a place on the same shelves. In the massive Waterstones bookstore in the city of Manchester, England, where I lived through most of the 1990s, the ground floor display area was rearranged in 1995 so as to accommodate, right at the front of the store, several hundred new titles, on topics like Serial Murderers and Sexual Crimes of the Twentieth Century.l Several of these new books are companion volumes to movies on release in the city's cinemas or, in some instances, are simply the original text on which the movies are based. The movies in question - Shallow Grave, Silence of the Lambs, Reservoir Dogs, Natural Born Killers and others - focus heavily on interpersonal violence and murder and also place great emphasis in the manner of many earlier cinematic genres - on the idea of the 'criminal mind' (not least, as a way of dramatizing the detection of the originating criminal act) but also - to a significant extent, these are movies which emphasize the idea and contemporary social presence of evil. Similar moral and psychologistic preoccupations are now also widely apparent on primetime television - most notably, in Britain, in the extraordinarily powerful Cracker series, produced by Granada Television in 1994 and 1995, watched by over 15 million people, and featuring, inter alia, the forensic investigation' of serial and sexual murders, some of them extremely graphically displayed (Crace 1994).2 The prominence of 'Gothic' themes in movies about violent death is not new in itself: there is a long history of interest in the cinema in horror and, indeed, in 'transgression' and evil. What may be definitive about the present genre of movies as well as the range of fictional and non-fictional titles in the bookstores about crime is the overwhelming focus on murder and killing represented in very contemporary and mundane, ordinary and, indeed, 'respectable' settings, and the powerful suggestion that these movies are a representation of the risks and dangers involved in everyday life at the end of the twentieth century. The bookstore display in Waterstones is straightforwardly called the 'Real Crimes' section.

Crime In Context: A Critical Criminology of Market Societies

Politics & Social Sciences

Social Sciences

Routledge

This book aims to explore one of the most obvious areas of discontent in post-Fordist societies, the ever-intrusive fear and reality of crime. It provides an analysis that explains the varieties of actually occurring behaviours which certainly are very firmly defined by their victims as crime.

A major contribution to criminology in which Taylor, Walton and Young provide a framework for a fully social theory of crime.

The New Criminology (International Library of Sociology)

This collection constitutes a salutory demonstration that Britain no longer serves as the centre for cultural studies. Engaging the critical discourses of feminism, postmodernism and postcolonialism, the contributions explore the renegotiations and changes in cultural studies in the wake of its export from Britain. In particular, the volume shows how to understand the experiences of marginalized groups, including women and aboriginal peoples in postcolonial states. Questions about the ongoing globalization of capital and culture are linked to constructions of national, local and individual identities. The alternative relocations of cultural studies offered here manifest two not incommensurate trends: Some contributors consider how textual processes of representation articulate with exclusionary practices. Others keep alive a sense of politics in respect of institutional and policy debates. The result is an invigorated cultural studies which moves between theory and practice, gives primacy to tensions between extra-local centres of political and economic power, and considers lived experiences within their specific geo-cultural contexts.

Relocating Cultural Studies (International Library of Sociology)

The New European Criminology gathers together leading criminologists from all over Europe to consider crime and responses to crime within and across national borders. For the first time it allows students to experience the most exciting work in European criminology and to compare approaches to crime in different parts of Europe. The five sections of the book look at: * the effects of European harmonisation on crime * criminal justice, law enforcement and penal reform * organised crime, from the Mafia in Italy to drug running in the Balkans * local crime in international contexts * possible future directions for criminology and some suggestions for a new criminology of war.

The New European Criminology: Crime and Social Order in Europe (Intl.Geosphere Programme Book Ser.;3)

South, Nigel

Ruggiero, Vincenzo

Africa in International Politics: External Involvement on the Continent (Routledge Advances in International Relations and Global Politics)

Locating Africa on the global stage, this book examines and compares external involvement in the continent, exploring the foreign policies of major states and international organizations towards Africa.

Reference

Ian Taylor and Karen Smith present a much-needed and full examination of the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), covering its history and current activities. All the key areas are covered by accessibly written chapters, including: an overview of UNCTAD: what it is, why it was formed and why it is important how the organization operates today: what it does and how it does it key criticisms made against the organization: is it relevant in today's world? emerging issues within the organization and its future direction. In the current era of globalization and what appears to be the dominance of neo-liberal economic thought, UNCTAD has sought to make itself germane to ongoing international debates. The implications of this for the organization's key remit, namely making the world a fairer place, are something that this book unpacks.

United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) (Global Institutions)

Business & Money

Smith, Karen

International

Ian Taylor and Karen Smith present a much-needed and full examination of the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), covering its history and current activities. All the key areas are covered by accessibly written chapters, including:  an overview of UNCTAD: what it is, why it was formed and why it is important how the organization operates today: what it does and how it does it  key criticisms made against the organization: is it relevant in today’s world?  emerging issues within the organization and its future direction. In the current era of globalization and what appears to be the dominance of neo-liberal economic thought, UNCTAD has sought to make itself germane to ongoing international debates. The implications of this for the organization’s key remit, namely making the world a fairer place, are something that this book unpacks.

With China’s rise to the status of world power, trade and political links between Africa and China have been escalating at an astonishing rate. Sino-African relations are set to become an increasingly significant feature of world politics as China’s hunger for energy resources grows and many African countries seek a partner that, unlike the West, does not worry about democracy and transparency, or impose political conditions on economic relations. Ian Taylor, one of the foremost authorities on the international relations and political economy of Africa, provides a comprehensive assessment of relations between China and Africa. He discusses the historical evolution of Sino-African relations in the period since the 1949 revolution, with particular emphasis on the period since the end of the Cultural Revolution. Considering in detail China’s relations with Angola, Mozambique, Zimbabwe, Namibia, Zambia, South Africa, Botswana, Lesotho, Swaziland and Malawi, Taylor demonstrates how China has used the rhetoric of anti-hegemonies to secure and promote its position in the Third World. Taylor gives an engaging account of the hitherto under-researched topic of relations between China and Africa, a phenomenon of growing importance in contemporary international politics.

China and Africa: Engagement and Compromise (Routledge Contemporary China Series)

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Taylor, Ian. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by Taylor, Ian

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Taylor, Ian. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

African Politics: A Very Short Introduction (Very Short Introductions)

Crime In Context: A Critical Criminology of Market Societies

Crime In Context: A Critical Criminology of Market Societies

The New Criminology (International Library of Sociology)

Relocating Cultural Studies (International Library of Sociology)

The New European Criminology: Crime and Social Order in Europe (Intl.Geosphere Programme Book Ser.;3)

Africa in International Politics: External Involvement on the Continent (Routledge Advances in International Relations and Global Politics)

United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) (Global Institutions)

United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) (Global Institutions)

China and Africa: Engagement and Compromise (Routledge Contemporary China Series)