This book questions the common understanding of party political behaviour, explaining some of the sharp differences in political behaviour through a focused case study—drawing systematically on primary and archival research—of the Australian Labor Party’s political and policy directions during select periods in which it was out of office at the federal level: from 1967–72, 1975–83, and 1996–2001. Why is it that some Oppositions contest elections with an extensive array of detailed policies, many of which contrast with the approach of the government at the time, while others can be widely criticised as ‘policy lazy’ and opportunistic, seemingly capitulating to the government of the day? Why do some Oppositions lurch to the right, while others veer leftward? Each of these periods was, in its own way, crucial in the party’s history, and each raises important questions about Opposition behaviour. The book examines the factors that shaped the overall direction in which the party moved during its time in Opposition, including whether it was oriented towards emphasising programmes traditionally associated with social democrats, such as pensions, unemployment support, and investment in public health, education, infrastructure, and publicly owned enterprises, as well as policies aimed at reducing the exploitation of workers. In each period of Opposition examined, an argument is made as to why Labor moved in a particular direction, and how this period compared to the other periods surveyed. The book rounds off with analysis of the generalisability of the conclusions drawn: how relevant are they for understanding the behaviour of other parties elsewhere in the world? Where are social democratic parties such as the ALP heading? Is Opposition an institution in decline in the Western world?
Into the Wild meets Walden—a lyrical memoir for nature lovers and for anyone who has wondered what it would be like to disconnect from our hyper-connected culture and seek more meaningful connections After losing vision in one eye and becoming estranged from his family and friends, a young man spent two years searching for identity in self-imposed solitude in the backwoods of northern Vermont, where he embarked on a project of stripping away facades and all social ties--and learned to face himself. On a clear May afternoon at the end of his junior year at Harvard, Howard Axelrod played a pick-up game of basketball. In a skirmish for a loose ball, a boy’s finger hooked behind Axelrod’s eyeball and left him permanently blinded in his right eye. A week later, he returned to the same dorm room, but to a different world. A world where nothing looked solid, where the distance between how people saw him and how he saw had widened into a gulf. Desperate for a sense of orientation he could trust, he retreated to a jerry-rigged house in the Vermont woods, where he lived without a computer or television, and largely without human contact, for two years. He needed to find a more lasting sense of meaning away from society’s pressures and rush. Named one of the best books of the year by Slate, Chicago Tribune, Entropy Magazine, and named one of the top 10 memoirs by Library Journal
G. W. F. Hegel's first masterpiece, the Phenomenology of Spirit, is one of the great works of philosophy. It remains, however, one of the most challenging and mysterious books ever written. Michael Inwood presents this central work to the modern reader in an intelligible and accurate new translation. This translation attempts to convey, as accurately as possible, the subtle nuances of the original German text. Inwood also provides a detailed commentary that explains what Hegel is saying at each stage of his argument and also discusses the philosophical issues it raises. This volume will therefore prove invaluable to those who want to get to grips with Hegel's thought processes and to follow his complex argument.
The purpose of this book, first published in 1990, is to call attention to the contrast between the remarkable politicization of the rhetoric of literary criticism and the scarcity of interest in the concrete historical and political contexts of literary texts. Deconstruction and the Politics of Criticism will be of interest to students of literature and literary theory.
(New adult paranormal fantasy with witches, werewolves, demons) Come the Brotherhood You must be careful. I turn toward the voice, see a shape floating next to me in the dark, glowing softly iridescent, all the colors of the rainbow and others for which I have no names. Of what? The sound and feel of the shape is feminine. She lifts her arm and points. I see them then, below and before me, two vast armies stretching out over an empty gray plane, facing each other. But they've not yet begun to fight. I recognize witches and vampires, Sidhe and demons, other creatures I've never laid eyes on, crowding one side. On the other side are humans, feeling empty and cold, though their power crackles around them like electric fire. You must be ready. My companion's voice is very sad, makes tears rise in my eyes. The war is coming and you only have a little time left to prepare. When Syd dreams of a terrible battle between sorcerers and all other magical races, she is tasked by a mysterious maji with protecting the Light and the Shadow, a pair of teenagers she rescues from the veil. Forced to track down the Chosen of the Light for assistance against this new threat, Syd teams with an unlikely foe turned ally in a stand against the rise of the sorcerer’s Brotherhood. KEYWORDS: witches, paranormal series, paranormal books, paranormal fantasy, witches, witch, witch books, magical realism, witch fantasy, magical fantasy, vampire series, vampire books, shifter books, shifter series, werewolf series, werewolf books, vampire book
The year 1000 A.D. was one of strange history. Its advent threw the people of Europe into a state of mortal terror. Ten centuries had passed since the birth of Christ. The world was about to come to an end. Such was the general belief. How it was to reach its end,—whether by fire, water, or some other agent of ruin,—the prophets of disaster did not say, nor did people trouble themselves to learn. Destruction was coming upon them, that was enough to know; how to provide against it was the one thing to be considered. Some hastened to the churches; others to the taverns. Here prayers went up; there wine went down. The petitions of the pious were matched by the ribaldry of the profligate. Some made their wills; others wasted their wealth in revelry, eager to get all the pleasure out of life that remained for them. Many freely gave away their property, hoping, by ridding themselves of the goods of this earth, to establish a claim to the goods of Heaven, with little regard to the fate of those whom they loaded with their discarded wealth. It was an era of ignorance and superstition. Christendom went insane over an idea. When the year ended, and the world rolled on, none the worse for conflagration or deluge, green with the spring leafage and ripe with the works of man, dismay gave way to hope, mirth took the place of prayer, man regained their flown wits, and those who had so recklessly given away their wealth bethought themselves of taking legal measures for its recovery. Such was one of the events that made that year memorable. There was another of a highly different character. Instead of a world being lost, a world was found. The Old World not only remained unharmed, but a New World was added to it, a world beyond the seas, for this was the year in which the foot of the European was first set upon the shores of the trans-Atlantic continent. It is the story of this first discovery of America that we have now to tell. In the autumn of the year 1000, in a region far away from fear-haunted Europe, a scene was being enacted of a very different character from that just described. Over the waters of unknown seas a small, strange craft boldly made its way, manned by a crew of the hardiest and most vigorous men, driven by a single square sail, whose coarse woollen texture bellied deeply before the fierce ocean winds, which seemed at times as if they would drive that deckless vessel bodily beneath the waves. This crew was of men to whom fear was almost unknown, the stalwart Vikings of the North, whose oar-and sail-driven barks now set out from the coasts of Norway and Denmark to ravage the shores of southern Europe, now turned their prows boldly to the west in search of unknown lands afar. Shall we describe this craft? It was a tiny one in which to venture upon an untravelled ocean in search of an unknown continent,—a vessel shaped somewhat like a strung bow, scarcely fifty feet in length, low amidships and curving upwards to high peaks at stem and stern, both of which converged to sharp edges. It resembled an enormous canoe rather than aught else to which we can compare it. On the stem was a carved and gilt dragon, the figurehead of the ship, which glittered in the bright rays of the sun. Along the bulwarks of the ship, fore and aft, hung rows of large painted wooden shields, which gave an Argus-eyed aspect to the craft. Between them was a double row of thole-pins for the great oars, which now lay at rest in the bottom of the boat, but by which, in calm weather, this "walker of the seas" could be forced swiftly through the yielding element.
