The symbolic meaning of plants, their relevance to religion and the metaphorical provocations in the order of knowledge, culture and political power underline the role of plants as something more than passive objects. Current theoretical and artistic discourses have been seeking access to the world independently of man by focusing on the nonhuman other. The contributors to this volume examine the historical, philosophical and scientific findings that generate this idea. In what way are such perspectives manifest in contemporary art? Do artists develop a particular approach that enables nonhuman life forms like plants, insects or animals to have an impact?

Analysing social change has too often been characterized by parochialism, either a Eurocentrism that projects European experience outwards or a disciplinary narrowness that ignores insights from other academic disciplines. This book moves beyond these limits to develop a global perspective on social change. The book provincializes Europe in order to analyse European modernity as the product of global developments and brings together renowned scholars from international relations, history and sociology in the search for common understandings. In so doing, it provides a range of promising theoretical approaches, analytical takes and substantive research areas that offer new vistas for understanding change on a global scale.

Field to Palette: Dialogues on Soil and Art in the Anthropocene is an investigation of the cultural meanings, representations, and values of soil in a time of planetary change. The book offers critical reflections on some of the most challenging environmental problems of our time, including land take, groundwater pollution, desertification, and biodiversity loss. At the same time, the book celebrates diverse forms of resilience in the face of such challenges, beginning with its title as a way of honoring locally controlled food production methods championed by "field to plate" movements worldwide. By focusing on concepts of soil functionality, the book weaves together different disciplinary perspectives in a collection of dialogue texts between artists and scientists, interviews by the editors and invited curators, essays and poems by earth scientists and humanities scholars, soil recipes, maps, and DIY experiments. With contributions from over 100 internationally renowned researchers and practitioners, Field to Palette presents a set of visual methodologies and worldviews that expand our understanding of soil and encourage readers to develop their own interpretations of the ground beneath our feet.

Recognizing the vital importance of concepts in shaping our understanding of international relations, this ground-breaking new book puts concepts front and centre, systematically unpacking them in a clear, critical and engaging way. With contributions from some of the foremost authorities in the field, Concepts in World Politics explores 17 core concepts, from democracy to globalization, sovereignty to revolution, and covers: The multiple meanings of a concept, where these meanings come from, and how they are employed theoretically and practically The consequences of using concepts to frame the world in one way or another The method of concept analysis A challenging and stimulating read, Concepts in World Politics is an indispensable guide for all students of international relations looking to develop a more nuanced and sophisticated understanding of world politics.

The nature of armed conflict has changed in recent decades. This presents new challenges for the prevention of violence, the promotion of disarmament and the securing of durable peace. The essays in this book address important aspects related to these challenges, with references to the work of prominent German peace researcher Herbert Wulf. Topics covered include demilitarization, small arms control, security sector reform, post-conflict construction, peace-building in failed states and, as guiding theme, the limits and possibilities of security governance.

This book claims a political value for olfactory artworks by situating them squarely in the contemporary moment of various forms of political resistance. Each chapter presents the current research and art practices of an international group of artists and writers from the United States, Canada, France, Germany, Switzerland, Thailand, Sweden, and the Netherlands. The book brings together new thinking on the potential for olfactory art to critique and produce modes of engagement that challenge the still-powerful hegemonic realities of the twenty-first century, particularly the dominance of vision as opposed to other sensory modalities. The book will be of interest to scholars working in contemporary art, art history, visual culture, olfactory studies, performance studies, and politics of activism.

The original Handbook of International Relations was the first authoritative and comprehensive survey of the field of international relations. In this eagerly-awaited new edition, the Editors have once again drawn together a team of the world′s leading scholars of international relations to provide a state-of-the-art review and indispensable guide to the field, ensuring its position as the pre-eminent volume of its kind. The Second Edition has been expanded to 33 chapters and fully revised, with new chapters on the following contemporary topics: - Normative Theory in IR - Critical Theories and Poststructuralism - Efforts at Theoretical Synthesis in IR: Possibilities and Limits - International Law and International Relations - Transnational Diffusion: Norms, Ideas and Policies - Comparative Regionalism - Nationalism and Ethnicity - Geopolitics in the 21st Century - Terrorism and International Relations - Religion and International Politics - International Migration A truly international undertaking, this Handbook reviews the many historical, philosophical, analytical and normative roots to the discipline and covers the key contemporary topics of research and debate today. The Handbook of International Relations remains an essential benchmark publication for all advanced undergraduates, graduate students and academics in politics and international relations.

In an age of rife consumption and increasing need for consideration of sustainable social practices, an exploration of the aesthetics of weather from various angles becomes vital in shedding light on its importance to our experience of the changing world. In response, offering the first in-depth and nuanced examination of the aesthetics of weather, this book underlines the relevance the concept has for scientific communication, for fostering sustainable patterns of behaviour and for rejecting the environmentally-damaging “consumption” of landscapes and fine weather. In addition, it provides examples taken from global, contemporary popular culture whilst calling attention to the socioeconomic and political dimensions of individual experience, demonstrating and analysing our fascination with, and cultural interpretations of, weather phenomena in our everyday lives. Within its three sections, the volume reinvents traditional phenomenological methods to create socially, politically and historically embedded 'phenomenographies' and explore the importance of aesthetic practices in shaping our experience of weather and climate. It also provides a deeper engagement with general topics, such as the relationship between perception, emotion, imagination, and cognition in our aesthetic experience of the weather, combining these with aesthetic analyses of the so-called “fine weather”. With its broad scope of inquiry ranging from Aristotle to eco-phenomenology, from the pioneers of scientific meteorology to contemporary art, and from everyday aesthetics to geoengineering, this book argues that an aesthetics of weather inflected by greater knowledge and the taking of a critical stance towards aestheticism can become a valuable ally to climate ethics in the Anthropocene.