Colin Crouch argues that the decline of those social classes which had made possible an active and critical mass politics has combined with the rise of global capitalism to produce a self-referential political class more concerned with forging links with wealthy business interests than with pursuing political programmes which meet the concerns of ordinary people. He shows how, in some respects, politics at the dawn of the twenty-first century returns us to a world familiar well before the start of the twentieth, when politics was a game played among elites. However, Crouch maintains that the experience of the twentieth century remains salient and it reminds us of possibilities for the revival of politics. This engaging book will prove challenging to all those who claim that advanced societies have reached a virtual best of all possible democratic worlds, and will be compelling reading for anyone interested in the shape of twenty-first-century politics.

    Twenty-two years later, he did. April 1945 – Berlin. The world had been at war for more than five-and-a-half years – approximately seventy million people were dead across the globe. The epicentre of the twelve-year-old Third Reich was now surrounded, enveloped by bitter Soviet forces hardened by Nazi barbarity in the east over the last four years. As the buildings were blasted into rubble, pounded by Russian guns and bombs, before their troops and tanks, Hitler was hunkered down in his last headquarters – the dark and damp bunker under the Reich Chancellery. As the Third Reich began to crumble as fast as the city’s buildings, what was the state of mind of the tyrant? Only his closest and fanatical allies saw the collapse, none more so than Hitler’s servants, Otto Gunsche and Heinz Linge – two individuals which witnessed the final act of their regime. An act tinged over the last ten days in late April with selfish betrayal, increasingly forlorn hope, pleas, desperation and eventually suicide. As the Soviets closed in with impending vigour, in the concrete tomb below ground and under the thunderous booms of the petrifying battle for Berlin, the mind of the dictator disintegrated into drugs, delusion and a determination to die. Not by the enemy bullet but one of his own. This is the story of the people who held a unique place in world history – the ones who were there when the nightmare of Nazism and the horrors which accompanied it was finally banished as a dark chapter in the story of the human race.

    For instance, the average mall shopper will spend about $100, then leave when she hits that limit. She'll probably buy shoes rather than clothing, because she doesn't want to think about her dress size. And the store most likely to get her money isn't the one with the nicest display or the deepest discounts-it's the one closest to her parking spot.In his consulting with dozens of leading companies, Michael J. Silverstein has interviewed thousands of customers, extracting fascinating patterns about what really drives their purchase decisions. His first book, the acclaimed bestseller Trading Up, has taught a generation of marketers about the "new luxury" phenomenon, and why consumers will happily pay a steep premium for goods and services that are emotionally satisfying, from golf clubs to bathroom fixtures to beauty products.But Trading Up revealed only part of the story of the new consumer. The same middle-class people who are happily trading up at Victoria's Secret and Panera are going on treasure hunts at Costco and Home Depot. And they are often getting as much emotional satisfaction in the discount stores as in the luxury stores. TREASURE HUNT shows how even the most mundane shopping-for things like paper towels and pet food-has become an adventure rather than a tedious chore.In just about every category, both the high end and the low end are growing and innovation- rich. Many middle-class consumers gladly spend $5 a day for a Starbucks venti latte; others spend forty cents a day on home-brewed coffee, feel good about their frugality, and save up the difference to buy Apple's newest Nano. TREASURE HUNT explains the success of companies as diverse as Dollar General, H. E. Butt, eBay, Commerce Bank, and Tchibo.But beware: in our bifurcated global market, businesses need a clear strategy for aiming high or low, while avoiding the treacherous middle, where so many have recently stumbled. If your offering isn't exciting enough to inspire trading up, but not enough of a bargain to satisfy the treasure hunters, you'll have no emotional connection with your target audience. And then, as many fallen companies have discovered, your tried-and-true marketing strategies will go into a severe stall.TREASURE HUNT takes us into the homes of real people making real decisions, and into the CEO's offices of innovative companies finding new ways to accommodate them. Written with the same flair, empathy, and intelligence that made Trading Up an instant classic, this is an essential guide to the moods and habits of the constantly changing consumer.

    Why are there wars? Why do countries have a hard time cooperating to prevent genocides or global environmental problems? Why are some countries rich while others are poor? Organized around the puzzles that draw scholars and students alike to the study of world politics, this book gives students the tools they need to think analytically about compelling questions like these.World Politics introduces a contemporary analytical framework based on interests, interactions, and institutions. Drawing extensively on recent research, the authors use this flexible framework throughout the text to get students thinking like political scientists as they explore the major topics in international relations. .

    Unlike other PR texts that steer clear of the cases, the ethical challenges, the how to counsel, and the public relations conundrums that force students to think, this book prepares students to deal with a full range of situations and arrive at effective, ethical solutions that distinguish the practice.

    In Those Who Work, Those Who Don't, Jennifer Sherman offers a much-needed sympathetic understanding of poor rural Americans, persuasively arguing that the growing cultural significance of moral values is a reasonable and inevitable response to economic collapse and political powerlessness.Those Who Work, Those Who Don't is based on the intimate interviews and in-depth research Sherman conducted while spending a year living in "Golden Valley," a remote logging town in Northern California. Economically devastated by the 1990 ruling that listed the northern spotted owl as a threatened species, Golden Valley proved to be a rich case study for Sherman. She looks at how the members of the community coped with downward mobility caused by the loss of timber industry jobs and examines a wide range of reactions. She shows how substance abuse, domestic violence, and gender roles fluctuated under the town's economic strain.Compellingly written, shot through with honesty and empathy, Those Who Work, Those Who Don't is a rare firsthand account that studies the rural poor. As incomes erode and the American dream becomes more and more inaccessible, Sherman reveals that moral values and practices become a way for the poor to gain status and maintain a sense of dignity in the face of economic ruin.

    But in fact, Immanuel Wallerstein argues, a more nuanced evaluation of recent history reveals that America has been fading as a global power since the end of the Vietnam War, and its response to the terrorist attacks of September 11 looks certain to hasten that decline. In this provocative collection, the visionary originator of world-systems analysis and the most innovative social scientist of his generation turns a practiced analytical eye to the turbulent beginnings of the 21st century. Touching on globalization, Islam, racism, democracy, intellectuals, and the state of the Left, Wallerstein upends conventional wisdom to produce a clear-eyed—and troubling—assessment of the crumbling international order.

    A dazzling tale of incredible wealth, ferocious disputes, beautiful women, private jets, mega-yachts, the world’s best footballers – and chauffeur-driven Range Rovers with tinted windows.A group of buccaneering Russian oligarchs made colossal fortunes after the collapse of communism – and many of them came to London to enjoy their new-found wealth. Londongrad tells for the first time the true story of their journeys from Moscow and St Petersburg to mansions in Mayfair, Knightsbridge and Surrey – and takes you into a shimmering world of audacious multi-billion pound deals, outrageous spending and rancorous feuds.But while London's flashiest restaurants echoed to Russian laughter and Bond Street shop-owners totted up their profits, darker events also played themselves out. The killing of ex-KGB man Alexander Litvinenko in London to the death – in a helicopter crash he all but predicted – of Stephen Curtis, the lawyer to many of Britain's richest Russians, chilled London's Russians and many of those who know them.This is the story of how Russia's wealth was harvested and brought to London – some of it spent by Roman Abramovich on his beloved Chelsea Football Club, some of it spent by Boris Berezovsky in his battles with Russia's all-powerful Vladimir Putin. Londongrad is a must-read for anyone interested in how vast wealth is created, the luxury it can buy and the power and intrigue it produces.

    But the full impact of the crises we have recently faced will create far more problems, and unless you're prepared, you'll struggle to regain your financial footing.In The Great Reflation, author Tony Boeckh helps you understand how these crises, and the policies passed to jumpstart the economy, will play out for investments and business, and provides you with the tools to excel in today's rapidly evolving financial landscape. He reveals how similar episodes compare with the current crises and what this could mean for your financial future.Arms you with practical insights that will allow you to evaluate different investment options Explores the implications of the end of the private debt cycle, the possible rise of a new age of thrift, and the new government debt crisis Reveals how you can profit from once-in-a-lifetime opportunities as well as proper portfolio allocation strategies While things may never return to "normal," you can still make choices that will allow you to prosper. This book will show you how.

    If you’re curious about how the economy functions and don’t know where to start, Economics will guide you through the essentials, laying out the basic concepts and issues in the field of economics, from business cycles and free markets to social security and healthcare reform, and more. Packed with eye-opening information, key concepts, and need-to-know terms, this easy-to-read primer lets you explore economics at your own pace. Get a straightforward overview of the economy that’s stripped of overwhelming jargon, so you can gain a deeper understanding of economics as it applies to everyday life. You’ll review important background on differing economic schools of thought—from influential theories to the main thinkers driving them—so you can develop your own conclusions. Economics features: An overview of markets and how they operate A review of broad themes—like taxes, inequality, and jobs—as they apply to everyday life Explorations of business cycles covering what happens during a recession Useful timelines and real-world stories that help you travel the world of economics

    Naturalist. Warrior. President. There are so many sides to Theodore Roosevelt that it is easy to overlook one of his most enduring contributions to American public life: the use of fame to fuel his political career.In this concisely written, enlightening book, presidential historian Lewis L. Gould goes beyond the bully pulpit stereotypes to reveal how Roosevelt used his celebrity to change American politics. Based on research gleaned from the personal papers of Roosevelt and his contemporaries, TheodoreRoosevelt recaptures its subject's bold activism and irrepressible, larger-than-life personality. Beginning with his privileged childhood in New York City, the narrative traces his election to the New York Assembly, where he quickly rose through the ranks of the Republican Party. It is here that hefirst applied his shrewd ability to keep himself in the spotlight--a skill that served him well as commander of a volunteer regiment (dubbed Roosevelt's Rough Riders) in the Spanish-American War. Gould shows how Roosevelt rode a wave of popular acclaim at the war's end, assuming the governorshipof New York and serving as president from 1901 to 1909. While covering his major accomplishments as chief executive, including his successes as a trust-buster, labor mediator, and conservationist, Gould explains how fame both sustained and limited Roosevelt when he ran for president in 1912 andopposed Woodrow Wilson's policies during World War I.Theodore Roosevelt delivers the most insightful look yet at a pioneer of political theater--a man whose vigorous idealism as a champion of democracy serves as a counterpoint to the cynicism of today's political landscape. The book will coincide with the 100th anniversary of Roosevelt's third partyrun for the Progressive or Bull Moose Party.

    Trillions of dollars of financial assets and shareholder value destroyed; worldwide GDP stalled; new jobs vanishingly scarce. But this isn’t just a severe recession. It’s evidence that our economic institutions are obsolete—a set of ideas inherited from the industrial age that no longer work for business, people, society, or the future.In The New Capitalist Manifesto, economic strategist Umair Haque argues that business as usual has outgrown the old paradigm of short-term growth, competition at all costs, adversarial strategy, and pushing costs onto future generations. These outworn assumptions are good for creating only “thin” value—gains that are largely illusory and produce diminishing returns every year. For “thick” value—enduring, meaningful, sustainable advantage that deeply benefits the larger society—Haque details five new cornerstones of prosperity in the twenty-first century:•Loss advantage: From value chains to value cycles•Responsiveness: From value propositions to value conversations•Resilience: From strategy to philosophy•Creativity: From protecting a marketplace to completing a marketplace•Difference: From goods to bettersThe New Capitalist Manifesto makes a passionate, razor-sharp economic case that these methods will produce a more enduring prosperity for business as well as society.

    Marked by the Manson murders, rampant inflation, and recession, the decade seemed to usher in a gritty and unsightly reality. The city of glitz and glamour overnight became the city of smog and traffic, a cultural and environmental wasteland.Los Angeles in the 1970s was a complex and complicated city with local cultural touchstones that rarely made it near the silver screen. In Los Angeles in the 1970s, LA natives, transplants, and escapees talk about their personal lives intersecting with the city during a decade of struggle. From The Doors’ John Densmore seeing the titular L.A. Woman on a billboard on Sunset, to Deanne Stillman’s twisting path from Ohioan to New Yorker to finally finding her true home as an Angeleno, to Chip Jacobs’ thrilling retelling of the “snake in the mailbox” attempted murder, to Anthony Davis recounting his time as “Notre Dame Killer” and USC football hero, these are stories of the real Los Angeles—families trying to survive the closing of factories, teens cruising Van Nuys Boulevard, the Chicano Moratorium that killed three protestors, the making of a porn legend.Los Angeles in the 1970s is a love letter to the sprawling and complicatedfabric of a Los Angeles often forgotten and mostly overlooked. Welcome to the Gold Mine.

    Following in the successful vein of Managing for the Future (1992) and Managing in a Time of Great Change (1995), the incomparable Peter Drucker is back with fresh thoughts, insights, and knowledge about the ever-changing business society around us and the ever-expanding management roles required of us all-chiefs, executives, managers, and knowledge workers alike.Two main themes are explored in many of the chapters in Managing in the Next Society: the rapidly expanding information shock wave that had its Internet Big Bang as recently as 1995; and the changing shape of our society to come-six major trends that are rapidly transforming our world into what Peter Drucker calls The Next Society.