This thoughtful introduction to British politics explores a country undergoing a painful transition as the twenty-first century approaches. Informed throughout by a comparative public policy perspective, this book surveys British policy, institutions, and behavior since World War II. Donley Studlar analyzes challenges facing contemporary Britain and suggests the likely official responses in areas ranging from constitutional change to foreign policy. Considering issues such as domestic economic and social welfare policy, Studlar also looks at noneconomic regulation of individual behavior and...

This clear, objective introduction to the politics of Czechoslovakia and the successor Czech and Slovak Republics provides a comprehensive analysis of Czechoslovakia in the postcommunist period. Carol Leff builds a framework for understanding the dynamics of the triple transition: democratization, marketization, and a national transformation that has reconfigured the dynamic between state and nation. She shows how the interaction of these three transformational agendas has shaped Czechoslovakia's development, ultimately culminating in the paradoxical disintegration of a state that most of its...

Norway is by history and culture very much a Scandinavian nation with its own unique profile. This book analyzes the factors that have shaped the sociocultural fabric of Norwegian politics. One of the most important themes Heidar analyzes is the power of the periphery, both in social as well as geographic terms. In the geographic sense, Norway is a small nation, and although it has been able to remain economically and politically stable, it is situated on the European flank. It is therefore dependent upon and vulnerable to external economic and political developments. In critical periods of...

In one generation, modern Ireland has experienced rapid political, economic, and social transformation. Every aspect of Irish life and public policy has changed. Ireland: Historical Echoes, Contemporary Politics charts and explains the facets of that change--including the nation's economic development strategy, the education revolution, Irish language policy, the path of Church-State relations, the impact of the media, the dynamic role of women, and constitutional and political development as well. The book also charts Ireland's place in Europe and the world through the Second Irish...

This volume sets out to provide an accessible introduction to the institutions, policy concerns and international roles of the Pacific Islands. The author paints an overall picture of the region, delineating the geographic and cultural features of the major island groups, examining the island's history of contact with the West, and discussing issues of local and international concern, such as nuclear testing and the destructive exploitation of the island's natural resources.

The Cape Verde Islands, an Atlantic archipelago off the coast of Senegal, were first settled during the Portuguese Age of Discovery in the fifteenth century. A Crioulo population quickly evolved from a small group of Portuguese settlers and large numbers of slaves from the West African coast. In this important new study, Dr. Richard Lobban sketches Cape Verde's complex history over five centuries, from its role in the slave trade through its years under Portuguese colonial administration and its protracted armed struggle on the Guinea coast for national independence, there and in Cape...

A unified nation with a single people, the Philippines is also a highly fragmented, plural society. Divided between uplander and lowlander, rich and poor, Christian and Muslim, between those of one ethnic, linguistic, and geographic region and those of another, the nation is a complex mosaic formed by conflicting forces of consensus and national identity and of division and instability.It is not possible to comprehend the many changes in the Philippinessuch as the rise and fall of Ferdinand Marcos or the revolution that toppled himwithout an awareness of the religious, cultural, and economic...