Product Description
Originally published in 1921.This volume from the Cornell University Library's print collections was scanned on an APT BookScan and converted to JPG 2000 format by Kirtas Technologies.All titles scanned cover to cover and pages may include marks notations and other marginalia present in the original volume. ... Read more

Product Description
Originally published in 1916.This volume from the Cornell University Library's print collections was scanned on an APT BookScan and converted to JPG 2000 format by Kirtas Technologies.All titles scanned cover to cover and pages may include marks notations and other marginalia present in the original volume. ... Read more

Product Description
Originally published in 1891.This volume from the Cornell University Library's print collections was scanned on an APT BookScan and converted to JPG 2000 format by Kirtas Technologies.All titles scanned cover to cover and pages may include marks notations and other marginalia present in the original volume. ... Read more

Product Description
Originally published in 1882.This volume from the Cornell University Library's print collections was scanned on an APT BookScan and converted to JPG 2000 format by Kirtas Technologies.All titles scanned cover to cover and pages may include marks notations and other marginalia present in the original volume. ... Read more

Product Description
Why should each country have its own exclusive currency? Eric Helleiner offers a fascinating and unique perspective on this question in his accessible history of the origins of national money.

Our contemporary understandings of national currency are, Helleiner shows, surprisingly recent. Based on standardized technologies of production and extraction, territorially exclusive national currencies emerged for the first time only during the nineteenth century. This major change involved a narrow definition of legal tender and the exclusion of tokens of value issued outside the national territory. "Territorial currencies" rapidly became bound up with the rise of national markets, and money reflected basic questions of national identity and self-presentation: In what way should money be managed to serve national goals? Whose pictures should go on the banknotes?

Helleiner draws out the potent implications of this largely unknown history for today's context. Territorial currencies face challenges from many monetary innovations-the creation of the euro, dollarization, the spread of local currencies, and the prospect of privately issued electronic currencies. While these challenges are dramatic, the author argues that their significance should not be overstated. Even in their short historical life, territorial currencies have never been as dominant as conventional wisdom suggests. The future of this kind of currency, Helleiner contends, depends on political struggles across the globe, struggles that echo those at the birth of national money. ... Read more

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The project to transform Iraq from an impoverished dictatorship to a prosperous, functioning, multiethnic democracy that would act as a role model to the states of the Arab Middle East will stand as one of the most ambitious political ventures of the modern era. As Eric Herring and Glen Rangwala show, the Coalition powers that took control of the country in 2003 have become mired in the politics of sect and class, of regional ambition and religious authority. These powers, the authors argue, have sought to draw Iraqi society into a state-building project that would not challenge the Coalition's control: in consequence they have achieved neither objective.

This book analyzes in detail why the Iraqi polity fractured after the invasion, and the consequences of this fragmentation. The major reason advanced by Herring and Rangwala rests not with the Iraqi people's fixed and antagonistic ethnic or sectarian identities, or with specific mistakes made by U.S. administrators, but with the character of the project to rebuild the Iraqi state. Through this project, the Coalition powers have often unwittingly created incentives for unregulated local power struggles, patron-client relations, corruption, smuggling, and violence. These features in turn have substantially shaped Iraq's new political actors.

Placing the Iraq conflict within the context of regional, global, and U.S. politics, Herring and Rangwala explain how the international relations of consent, coercion, and capital accumulation have transformed the lives and allegiances of the Iraqi population. As uncertainty about the future of Iraq and the stability of the Middle East persists, this necessary volume offers a new perspective on the prospects for Iraq and the significance of the occupation. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Useful study of the effects of the invasion and occupation of Iraq
This useful book describes the effects of the US-British occupation of Iraq. Iraq's economy and society are in ruins. The authors write, "The informal economy, corruption in government ministries, lax controls over contractors, preferential treatment for US-based transnationals, the insurgency, compensation and debt are combining in crippling fashion."

The occupation has promoted sectarian strife. The US has been "playing off the centre against the periphery, playing off political parties against tribes and other embedded leaders ... the outcome has been a lack of a truly national, integrative political process which subordinates the local." In sum, "The fragmentary nature of the Iraqi state, partial as a mechanism of order and weak as a service provider, has been instrumental in the alignment of populations with groups rooted in principles specific to a sect."

The occupation relies on coercion not consent. "In circumstances in which a sizeable portion of the population rejects a form of rule, military doctrine provides a strong predisposition for US personnel to respond to the expression of popular grievances, peaceful dissent and armed opposition with repressive measures. The US and Britain have a long history of engaging in counter-insurgency for repressive purposes, either directly or in conjunction with military, paramilitary and militia forces in other states. Central aspects of the conduct of the US and those it has backed in Iraq - such as imprisonment without due process, disappearances, torture, impunity and indiscriminate use of force - are characteristic of the coercive counter-insurgency it has been involved with in places such as Vietnam, Central America, Colombia and Afghanistan."

The US claims that its forces are fighting foreigners, but its own Arabic website in July 2004 listed 10,000 detainees; 9,900 were Iraqi. Further, "Despite the many allegations that have been made about the role of the Iranian and Syrian Governments in supporting the insurgents, the evidence of either government's involvement in creating and sustaining the insurgency does not exist."

The authors note, "The armed conflict in Iraq from 2003 onwards has been primarily one in which the US has attempted to bring Iraq under the rule of a central government and the insurgents have concentrated their attacks on Coalition personnel. Although inter-sectarian violence has grown considerably in Iraq since 2005, this has remained on a smaller scale than violence between the Coalition and insurgents. Hence representations of the armed conflict as being primarily a civil war are - thus far - misleading." 80% of all attacks are still on the Coalition forces.

The authors conclude, "It is not a benign imperialism ... [because it is] running counter to expressed Iraqi preferences and concentrated on serving the interests of foreign actors."
... Read more

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A book in current affairs by a columnist for The Nation whose first book sold some 30,000 copies.The new book continues the work the author began in Sound and Fury: The Washington Punditocracy and the Collapse of American Politics (Harper-Collins, 1992).Alterman says that elites dominate U.S. foreign policy at every turn, and that the gap between the views of the public and those of the policy-making elites has increased to the extent that the United States has become an empire.Journalist and historian Eric Alterman argues that the vast majority of Americans have virtually no voice in the conduct of U.S. foreign policy. With policymakers answerable only to a small coterie of self-appointed experts, corporate lobbyists, self-interested parties, and the elite media, the U.S. foreign policy operates not as the instrument of a democracy, but of a "pseudo-democracy": a political system with the trappings of democratic checks and balances but with little of their content. This failure of American democracy is all the more troubling, Alterman charges, now that the Cold War is over and the era of global capital has replaced it. Americans' stake in so-called foreign policy issues from trade to global warming is greater than ever. Yet the current system serves to mute their voices and ignore their concerns.

Experts have long insisted that the public is too ignorant to contribute to the creation of successful foreign policy. But over the course of two hundred years, as Alterman makes clear, the American people have shown an impressive consistency in their ideals and values. The problem for any elite, the author explains, is that Americans often define their interests quite differently than those who would speak in their name. The American public's values are, ironically, much closer to the "liberal republican" philosophy of our founders than to those of our most powerful elites.Alterman concludes with a series of challenging proposals for reforms designed to create a truly democratic U.S. foreign policy.Amazon.com Review
Americans are often assailed for their lack of knowledgeconcerning foreign affairs. Collective current-events acumen seemsconfined to the U.S. unless an incident is covered live by CNN andinvolves high-tech gadgetry and explosions. Eric Alterman, a columnistfor The Nation and a Senior Fellow at the World PolicyInstitute, admits a national detachment, but blames the process andculture behind the making of foreign policy, not the American people,for creating this climate of skepticism and ignorance.

"The public's values," writes Alterman in Who Speaks forAmerica?, "are a good deal closer to the liberal republican valuesof the country's original founders than are those of the establishmentthat professes to represent them. The problem is not that the publicdoes not care. Rather, it has no idea how to force the government torespond to its preferences." The preferences Alterman indicates arebased on a wide range of public-opinion polls that demonstrate thesharp dichotomy between what citizens consider important andworthwhile and what lawmakers, self-appointed experts, corporatelobbyists, and other elitists comprising the "punditocracy" actuallyput into practice as foreign policy. For instance, polls reveal thatthe public attitude toward the United Nations is overwhelminglyfavorable; that nearly all forms of covert governmental actionconducted abroad are viewed as inexcusable; that there is strongpublic opposition to the size and scope of U.S. arms sales across theglobe; and protecting the environment is given a higher priority thaninsuring adequate energy supplies. All of these opinions areinconsistent with current American foreign policy, yet voters areunable (or, some would argue, unwilling) to exert any meaningful andsustained influence over the manner in which the government interactswith the world.

According to Alterman, the primary reason for a lack of public accessto this process is the attitude historically held by leaders that thepublic is ill-equipped to make decisions concerning foreignaffairs. "How, then," he asks, "can the United States claim to be afunctioning democracy when one of the most crucial aspects of publicpolicy allows for almost no democratic participation?" The shortanswer is that it can't, so Alterman offers an "immodest proposal" foroverhauling the current system--though immodest is putting itlightly. He should be credited for highlighting a significant problemin this informed and important book, but it must be noted that hissolutions are so sweeping, and the implications so vast, that actuallyactivating them would require restructuring the electoral process andcreating new institutions from the ground up--a radical idea with afamiliar ring.--Shawn Carkonen ... Read more

Customer Reviews (3)

Compelling case for a democratic foreign policy
Eric Alterman is a rare journalist who actually believes in a democratic foreign policy. Yes, it is depressing that this thesis is even controversial, but it unfortunately is. Alterman makes an eloquent case for more public participation in the nation's foreign policy.

To prove his contention that leading intellectuals are anti-democratic, Alterman quotes one think tank policy "expert" who flat-out says, "I don't think the people should have any voice in foreign policy," (he does not unfortunately name the elitist). Alterman demonstrates that the elite consensus is wrong;popular opinion on foreign policy is neither irrational nor constantly shifting.

Best of all, Alterman is intellectually honest. A supporter of high levels of immigration, he nonetheless honest enough to admit that the American people want immigration greatly reduced. (This fact has been supported by numerous opinion polls conducted by the Chicago Council of Foreign Relations).He challenges pro-immigration advocates to make a better case for their position to the American people. I highly recommend Who Speaks for America.

This book goes against the writing of founding fathers
Our founding fathers had the good sense to create the United States as a represenative republic instead of a democracy.

The mess with true democracy and the recall mess in California show why the founding fathers were on the money with the idea of a represenative republic instead of giving the masses immediate control through the chaotic process of a true democracy.

This book as with all Eric Alterman books, his Altercation on msnbc.com, and his column in "the Nation" are designed to show us that the country should be to the left so that it goes along with Eric Alterman's ideals.

The purpose of this book and other Alterman books is to say since the government won't do things my way, I'll create a book based on questionable documentation to show why I'm right.

I don't fault Eric Alterman for his leftist and radical beliefs which are to the left of most liberals, democrats, and even Bill and Hillary Clinton.

What I don't like is when Eric Alterman tells the rest of us why were wrong when we don't agree with his leftist, liberal, and radical beliefs.

History Lessons
As a non-US citizen, this eye-opening book is a challenge. Intricate, with massive information and intense analysis, the book is a must tounderstand how US foreign policy evolved andrevolved around similar interventionist attitudes. History tells, according to Alterman, how it can repeat itself with the help of US officials.Rewritten history as in the Orwellian 1984 is the means by which the most antidemocratic facets of US state policies are set into place. I learned about this book in a C-Span 2 panel and Alterman's words did not disappointed me a bit. ... Read more

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Struggle for Empire explores the contest for kingdoms and power among Charlemagne's descendants that shaped the formation of Europe. It examines this pivotal era through the reign of Charlemagne's grandson, Louis the German (826-–876), one of the longest-ruling Carolingian kings. Eric J. Goldberg's book brings the enigmatic Louis to life and makes a vital contribution to recent reevaluations of the late Carolingian age.

In the Treaty of Verdun of 843, Louis inherited the eastern territories of the Carolingian empire, thereby laying the foundations for an east Frankish kingdom. But, as Goldberg emphasizes, Louis was never satisfied with his realm beyond the Rhine. Louis was a skilled and cultured ruler who modeled himself on Charlemagne, and he aspired to rebuild his grandfather's empire. This ambition to reunite Europe brought Louis into repeated conflict with other rulers: Carolingian kings, Byzantine emperors, Bulgar khans, Roman popes, and Slavic warlords. While Louis ultimately failed to reunify the empire, his fifty-year reign produced a period of remarkable political consolidation and cultural creativity in central Europe.

By highlighting the ways in which dynastic rivalries, aristocratic rebellions, diplomacy, and warfare shaped Louis's reign, Struggle for Empire uncovers the dynamism and innovation of ninth-century kingship. To trace Louis's evolving policies, Goldberg moves beyond the evidence traditionally used to study his reign--the Annals of Fulda--and exploits the visual arts, liturgy, archeology, and especially charters. The result is a remarkably comprehensive and colorful picture of Carolingian kingship in action. ... Read more

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What Is It Then between Us? marks the appearance of a bright new star in the poetry criticism firmament. Eric Murphy Selinger explores the complex history of American love poetry with panache, acumen, and scholarly precision. His readings of love poems by writers as diverse as Anne Bradstreet, Emily Dickinson, William Carlos Williams, and James Merrill are both nimble and persuasive. Itself written con amore, What Is It Then between Us? is a pioneering study of the imaginative ways our poets have recorded the ordeals and pleasures of love in their verse."--Herbert Leibowitz, Editor and Publisher, Parnassus: Poetry in Review

Tracing the solitude of the American self, the difference between idolatrous and companionate affection, and the dream of an "America of love," Eric Murphy Selinger shows how such concerns can shape a poet's most intimate decisions about genre and form. His lucid, elegant prose illuminates not only well-known love poets, including Emily Dickinson and William Carlos Williams, but also more unexpected figures, notably Wallace Stevens and Mina Loy.Like the poets he discusses, Selinger refuses to view love reductively. Rather, he takes the impulse to debunk love as part of his subject, whether it crops up in Puritan theology or contemporary literary theory. As he details Whitman's courtship of his readers, weighs the restorations of romance in H. D. and Ezra Pound, and demonstrates the bonds between poets as disparate as Robert Creeley and Robert Lowell, Selinger establishes love poetry as an essential American genre. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Could Have Been, Should Have Been, But Isn't
In this extremely interesting book, Selinger argues that love is not an occasional subject for American poets, but is, in fact, the very heart and soul of American poetry.He even traces a line from Winthrop's "A Modell of Christian Charity," to the poetry of James Merrill, demarcating differing ideas of love and poetics along the way and arguing that the two strains of love--Petrachian and Protestant--both struggle within American poetry.

Selinger begins by asserting, "since no one before me has put together a book of American poetry of love, either a critical study or an anthology, I have no monolith to undermine, no canon to shoot down."In essence, he has no bone to pick and is simply concerned with the close readings of the poems and his own very interesting claim.

Selinger is definitely at his best when he engages in intimate readings, as when he chides Emerson for being "to self-ironic and New Englandly proper," or when he spends time explicating the fifth section of Whitman's "Song of Myself," in which "Whitman pivots from mystical insights to home truths," a shift, he says that was engendered by "a mention of love."

It is when Selinger moves away from his reading of the poems that his book ceases to be about poetics and patterns and begins to literalize the "lessons" of the poems via vague references to psychoanalysis.

Selinger uses the poems as little lessons in love and then substantiates his claims with an often intrusive and unnecessary gallery of Gallic critics:Derrida, Barthes, Kristeva, Beauvoir.Then poems then become psychological and ideological love lessons:wounds and reparations, self versus other, male versus female, etc.Reading the poems as such, their successes and failures do not hinge upon the language they use or even their artistry, but upon how well the poems help to create "an America of Love."

Selinger also fails to distinguish between Love and love; the philosophical idea which, in America is inextricably bound up with the ideas of eros, agape and carritas, and the love that exists between two people.This lack of distinction would presume that the private and the poetic are always political and that American poems are no more than the autobiographies of lovers and political manifestos.

Selinger's interest lies more in the objects of the poet's love than in the poems, themselves.His chapter on Creeley and Lowell is more about the poets' relationships with their wives and lovers than it is about their poetry.Selinger even admits as much when he says, "In my reading of Creeley I have not, I realize, attended to questions of composition as much as the poet would like."That sentence is appended with a quotation from Creeley, himself: "Some concerns have been persistent, e.g., the terms of marriage, relations of men and women, sense of isolation...But I have never...begun with any sense of 'subject,' since the point I wish to make is that I am writing."The writing, however, is what Selinger eschews when discussing poetry."To turn the beloved into a poem," Selinger claims in his chapter on Adrienne Rich, "does a certain violence to her sovereignty of self."

What Selinger fails to do is to accept the poems on their own terms.When he struggles through Mina Loy's harrowing Songs to Johannes, he flips back and forth between considering the "I" of the poem a persona and then Loy, herself, alternately finding the poem both "successful" and "troubled."Here, Selinger uses Kristeva's analysis to explain Loy's unwillingness to reconcile the figures in the poem, but this unwillingness is never considered an aesthetic choice, as it should have been, but the inevitable working out of personal difficulties on the page.

Poetry is a theory in and of itself.When an author composes poetry, he is theorizing about the world or about ideas, finding metaphors and similes and struggling to find the words with which to describe his vision and revision of the world.Poetry is then philosophy, psychology and literary theory.Too often, though, poetry is not allowed to escape from the limitation of its historical periodicity or the personal lives of its practitioners.Conversely, critics also find anachronistic attributes in poems in order to legitimize the poet through a contemporary idea or politic.This, of course, implies that what is contemporary is best; that American love poetry has been undergoing a progressive evolution.It implies that what we know about love today is more sophisticated than what poets knew and wrote decades ago.

Selinger's final chapter is on James Merrill and it is in this chapter that he comes closest to what poetry really is.His obvious respect and love for Merrill's poetry allows him to read it more carefully and more like pure poetry.Here there is more care with his ideas that American ideas of love are played out in American poetry and he is careful to distinguish between person and poem.Had he only been content to read the other poets with such an open mind, he would have written a thoroughly fascinating book on the limits of American love as engaged in American poetry.As it stands, the book does a disservice to poets who, like Emily Dickinson, deserves true readings of their poetry and not psychological examinations of their sexuality, marriageability or personal life. ... Read more

Product Description
Originally published in 1887.This volume from the Cornell University Library's print collections was scanned on an APT BookScan and converted to JPG 2000 format by Kirtas Technologies.All titles scanned cover to cover and pages may include marks notations and other marginalia present in the original volume. ... Read more

Product Description
Originally published in 1882.This volume from the Cornell University Library's print collections was scanned on an APT BookScan and converted to JPG 2000 format by Kirtas Technologies.All titles scanned cover to cover and pages may include marks notations and other marginalia present in the original volume. ... Read more

Product Description
Originally published in 1912. This volume from the Cornell University Library's print collections was scanned on an APT BookScan and converted to JPG 2000 format by Kirtas Technologies.All titles scanned cover to cover and pages may include marks notations and other marginalia present in the original volume. ... Read more

Product Description
Originally published in 1921.This volume from the Cornell University Library's print collections was scanned on an APT BookScan and converted to JPG 2000 format by Kirtas Technologies.All titles scanned cover to cover and pages may include marks notations and other marginalia present in the original volume. ... Read more