This is the most authoritative account available of the presidency of Georges Pompidou. Pompidou consolidated the constitutional changes made by de Gaulle, to the extent that he is now regarded as the Fifth Republic's second founding father, and continued his haughty attitudes to foreign policy. He also launched a program of modernization and industrialization: under Pompidou France saw both the climax and the end of the postwar boom. Serge Berstein and Jean-Pierre Rioux analyze the politics of the period, and also give an overview of France's economy, culture and society.

This book, now available in paperback, concerns the everyday private and public lives of the citizens of ancient Rome. Drawing on a broad selection of contemporary sources, the author examines the institutions, actions and rituals of day to day life.

The emergence of the military agency of the Soviet state is a crucial but neglected aspect of inter-war Soviet history, and in this pioneering study Francesco Benvenuti provides a detailed analysis of the politics (as opposed to the operational activities) of the Red Army during the Civil War. Several historians have suggested that the roots of Stalinism may be found in the Bolshevik experience during the Civil War, and Benvenuti shows that the military opposition inside the party was much stronger than conventionally supposed: Trotsky's subsequent political weakness owed much to his ruthless...

Synopsis: It has been said that history teaches us that history teaches us nothing. However true this may be in general terms, the fact that we so frequently look to the past in an attempt to shape our future by applying its lessons in the present suggests we remain keen to learn. In the context of the subject of this book, though the stalwarts of the faith can serve as tremendous examples, it is to the lessons of Scripture that we must turn if we are to have a better idea of what the kingdom of God is, what that means for us as believers, and how we can be better equipped to extend its...

November may be said to have four protagonists: a group of night-shift workers in Southeast France; their friends, relatives, lovers, acquaintances; the factory in which they work; the work itself. The focus is on two and a half hours during one evening in November 1976 and the plastic die-casting workshop where the men are employed. Staggering in scope, November is a virtuoso performance--a contemporary take on the classical modernist novel, anatomizing the ways we live, think, and labor: what we've lost, and what we're losing.