This wholly original reassessment of critical issues in modern Chinese history traces social, economic, and ecological change in inland North China during the late Qing dynasty and the Republic. Using many new sources, Kenneth Pomeranz argues that the development of certain regions entailed the systematic underdevelopment of other regions. He maps changes in local finance, farming, transportation, taxation, and popular protest, and analyzes the consequences for different classes, sub-regions, and genders. Pomeranz attributes these diverse developments to several causes: the growing but incomplete integration of North China into the world economy, the state's abandonment of many hinterland areas and traditional functions, and the effect of local social structures on these processes. He shows that hinterlands were made, not merely found, and were powerfully shaped by the strategies of local groups as well as outside forces.

From Kabul to London, two young brothers hiding out on the road, running for their lives .

Ancient Rome was one of the greatest cities of the pre-industrial era. Like other such great cities, it has often been deemed parasitic, a drain on the resources of the society that supported it. Rome's huge population was maintained not by trade or manufacture but by the taxes and rents of the empire. It was the archetypal 'consumer city'. However, such a label does not do full justice to the impact of the city on its hinterland. This book examines the historiography of the consumer city model and reappraises the relationship between Rome and Italy. Drawing on archaeological work and comparative evidence, the author shows how the growth of the city can be seen as the major influence on the development of the Italian economy in this period as its demands for food and migrants promoted changes in agriculture, marketing systems and urbanisation throughout the peninsula.

From its foundation, the city of Constantinople dominated the Byzantine world. It was the seat of the emperor, the centre of government and church, the focus of commerce and culture, by far the greatest urban centre; its needs in terms of supplies and defense imposed their own logic on the development of the empire. Byzantine Constantinople has traditionally been treated in terms of the walled city and its immediate suburbs. In this volume, containing 25 papers delivered at the 27th Spring Symposium of Byzantine Studies held at Oxford in 1993, the perspective has been enlarged to encompass a wider geographical setting, that of the city’s European and Asiatic hinterland. Within this framework a variety of interconnected topics have been addressed, ranging from the bare necessities of life and defence to manufacture and export, communications between the capital and its hinterland, culture and artistic manifestations and the role of the sacred.

This book illustrates and discusses the main characteristics of port-city development dynamics with a focus on the fast-growing city-states of the Middle East, which are emerging as key players in logistics and the global supply chain. Maritime ports and the cities hosting them have long fascinated scholars – geographers, economists, architects, urban planners, sociologists etc. – as they become centres of exchange where different social and urban environments meet, at the intersection between land and sea. Given that the current body of literature on the topic is biased – mainly concerning the Western world and East Asian region – with mono-disciplinary tendencies, this book outlines a theoretical basis from a wide range of literature, linking port-city studies, globalization theories and logistics, and adopts a multidisciplinary perspective. The main target audience of the book includes scholars and graduate students in urban studies, spatial planning, urban and regional economics, logistics, geography and transport geography with an interest in studying port geography and the port-city interface, port infrastructure development and port hinterland dynamics; it will also benefit policymakers and urban planners whose work involves these topics.

Beginning a new series from a military science fiction master with over 3 million books in print. A young hero comes of age in the crucible of war and galactic struggle. When Allen Allenson, scion of a noble family that has fallen on hard times, gets a mission to roust the power-hungry Terrans from a "wild" star sector where they're encroaching, he jumps at the chance to show his individual worth, improve his family's fortunes¾and gather enough lucre to make a good marriage. But the wily Terrans are not so easily persuaded by a young colonial they think of as a "rube." Worse, "Riders"¾the being who naturally ply the wilderness between the stars, are playing their own deadly political games¾against the Terrans, against the colonials, and against one young greenhorn commander in particular: naŠf young Allen, whom they figure they can manipulate to do their bidding. The one thing nobody has counted on is the fact that Allen, while young and inexperienced, happens to be a hero in the making much to his own amazement. At the publisher's request, this title is sold without DRM (Digital Rights Management).

The cabin has become our third place, our hideaway where we can recharge our spirits and reconnect with ourselves, away from the restraints of society and the stress of the everyday. This book presents the best new cabin architecture and design. We all need to be somewhere else, just for a little while. The cabin is that somewhere else. They allow us to get into a different state of mind, one where we can just have a good time. Four walls and a roof and a weekend--these getaways free us from the distracting and unessential, and put us back in touch with nature and our own inner peace. In cabins, we can savor solitude or share experiences with friends among mountains, rivers, woods, and wildlife. The Hinterland explores architecture and design approaches to creating the refuges that refresh and revitalize amidst the beauty of nature.

A Finalist for the Pulitzer Prize and Winner of the Bancroft Prize. "No one has written a better book about a city…Nature's Metropolis is elegant testimony to the proposition that economic, urban, environmental, and business history can be as graceful, powerful, and fascinating as a novel." —Kenneth T. Jackson, Boston Globe

The Templar: Lieutenant Iari discovers a murder with an impossible suspect. The Spy: officially, Gaer is an ambassador from the vakari. Unofficially, he's also a spy. As they both search for truth, they discover that the murderous riev, one of the battle-mecha decommissioned after the end of the last conflict and repurposed for manual labor - is just a weapon in the hands of a wielder with wider ambitions than homicide, including releasing horrors not seen since the war, that make a rampaging riev seem insignificant. Author of "How Rory Thorne Destroyed the Multiverse." Print run 12,000.

This book traces the history and development of the port of Benguela, the third largest port of slave embarkation on the coast of Africa, from the early seventeenth to the mid-nineteenth century. Benguela, located on the central coast of present-day Angola, was founded by the Portuguese in the early seventeenth century. In discussing the impact of the transatlantic slave trade on African societies, Mariana P. Candido explores the formation of new elites, the collapse of old states and the emergence of new states. Placing Benguela in an Atlantic perspective, this study shows how events in the Caribbean and Brazil affected social and political changes on the African coast. This book emphasizes the importance of the South Atlantic as a space for the circulation of people, ideas and crops.