Other books that might interest you

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  Baggage of Empire - Reporting...

  Martin Adeney

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  Born just as the British Empire was taking its last breaths, Martin Adeney was part of the 'twilight generation' caught between the imperial and postimperial ages, forced to navigate the insecurities - political, economic and cultural - faced by the British as we struggled to understand and adapt to our diminished place in the world order.
  A compelling blend of memoir and narrative history, Baggage of Empire leads us through the crumbling ruins of great industries and imperial trade cities; from the retreat of the northern newspaper empires to an almost exclusively southern, metropolitan viewpoint; through the tumultuous dominance and decline of the trade unions; to the rise of Thatcherism and big business.
  From the unique vantage point his career as a journalist has given him, particularly as industrial editor of BBC TV, Adeney notes that many of the issues that preoccupied us in the late '60s and early '70s - including immigration, housing, education, industry and communications - remain the daily currency of our political discourse. Despite all of our material prosperity and cultural self-confidence, we are all burdened, in one way or another, by the baggage of empire.

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  Exceptional America - What...

  Mugambi Jouet

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  In this provocative book, Mugambi Jouet describes why Americans are far more divided than other Westerners over basic issues, including wealth inequality, health care, climate change, evolution, gender roles, abortion, gay rights, sex, gun control, mass incarceration, the death penalty, torture, human rights, and war. 
  Raised in Paris by a French mother and Kenyan father, Jouet then lived in the Bible Belt, Manhattan, and beyond. Drawing inspiration from Alexis de Tocqueville, he wields his multicultural sensibility to parse how the intense polarization of U.S. conservatives and liberals has become a key dimension of American exceptionalism—an idea widely misunderstood as American superiority. While exceptionalism once was a source of strength, it may now spell decline, as unique features of U.S. history, politics, law, culture, religion, and race relations foster grave conflicts. They also shed light on the intriguing ideological evolution of American conservatism, which long predated Trumpism. 
  Anti-intellectualism, conspiracy-mongering, a visceral suspicion of government, and Christian fundamentalism are far more common in America than the rest of the Western world—Europe, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand.

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  The Invisible Bridge - The Fall...

  Rick Perlstein

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  From the bestselling author of Nixonland: a dazzling portrait of America on the verge of a nervous breakdown in the tumultuous political and economic times of the 1970s. 
   
  In January of 1973 Richard Nixon announced the end of the Vietnam War and prepared for a triumphant second term-until televised Watergate hearings revealed his White House as little better than a mafia den. The next president declared upon Nixon's resignation "our long national nightmare is over"-but then congressional investigators exposed the CIA for assassinating foreign leaders. The collapse of the South Vietnamese government rendered moot the sacrifice of some 58,000 American lives. The economy was in tatters. And as Americans began thinking about their nation in a new way-as one more nation among nations, no more providential than any other-the pundits declared that from now on successful politicians would be the ones who honored this chastened new national mood. 
   
  Ronald Reagan never got the message. Which was why, when he announced his intention to challenge President Ford for the 1976 Republican nomination, those same pundits dismissed him-until, amazingly, it started to look like he might just win. He was inventing the new conservative political culture we know now, in which a vision of patriotism rooted in a sense of American limits was derailed in America's Bicentennial year by the rise of the smiling politician from Hollywood. Against a backdrop of melodramas from the Arab oil embargo to Patty Hearst to the near-bankruptcy of America's greatest city, The Invisible Bridge asks the question: what does it mean to believe in America? To wave a flag-or to reject the glibness of the flag wavers?

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  Night Thoughts

  Wallace Shawn

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  This “acerbic yet compassionate” meditation on humanity by the acclaimed actor and playwright offers “curiosity, thoughtfulness, sharp logic, deep emotion” (Publishers Weekly, starred review).   Beloved actor and Obie Award–winning playwright Wallace Shawn has been an incisive commentator on civilization and its discontents for decades. Now, having recently passed the age of seventy and watched Donald Trump claim the presidency, he offers a late-stage critique of his species, which he sees as being divided between the lucky and the unlucky.   In Night Thoughts, Shawn takes the lucky—himself included—to task for their complacency while offering fascinating reflections on “civilization, morality, Beethoven, 11th-century Japanese court poetry, and his hopes for a better world, among other topics” (Publishers Weekly, starred review).

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  How the West Stole Democracy...

  Elizabeth F. Thompson

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  “This expertly researched account brings to life a meaningful but underexplored chapter in world history.” —Publishers Weekly 
   
  When Europe’s Great War engulfed the Ottoman Empire, Arab nationalists rose in revolt against the Turks. The British supported the Arabs’ fight for an independent state and sent an intelligence officer, T.E. Lawrence, to join Prince Faisal, leader of the Arab army and a descendant of the Prophet. In October 1918, Faisal, Lawrence, and the Arabs victoriously entered Damascus, where they declared a constitutional government in an independent Greater Syria. 
   
  At the Paris Peace Conference, Faisal won the support of Woodrow Wilson, who sent an American commission to Syria to survey the political aspirations of its people. However, other Entente leaders at Paris—and later San Remo—schemed against the Arab democracy, which they saw as a threat to their colonial rule. On March 8, 1920, the Syrian-Arab Congress declared independence and crowned Faisal king of a “representative monarchy.” Rashid Rida, a leading Islamic thinker of the day, led the constituent assembly to establish equality for all citizens, including non-Muslims, under a full bill of rights. 
   
  But France and Britain refused to recognize the Damascus government, instead imposing a system of mandates on the Arab provinces of the defeated Ottoman Empire, on the pretext that Arabs weren’t yet ready for self-government. Under such a mandate, the French invaded Syria in April, crushing the Arab government and sending Faisal and Congress leaders into exile. The fragile coalition of secular modernizers and Islamic reformers that might have established democracy in the Arab world was destroyed, with profound consequences that reverberate still. 
   
  Using many previously untapped primary sources, including contemporary newspaper accounts and letters, minutes from the Syrian-Arab Congress, and diary and journal entries from participants, How The West Stole Democracy From The Arabs is a groundbreaking account of this extraordinary, brief moment of unity and hope—and of its destruction. 
   
  “Important and fascinating.” —Amaney A. Jamal, Edwards S. Sanford Professor of Politics, Princeton University

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  Dark Psychology - The Power of...

  Amanda Grapes

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  This book contains the following 3 titles: 
  Book 1: People who are manipulative, often make use of secret tactics to get other people to do what they want. They try to exercise control over their victims by using hidden aggression methods. This is different from regular aggression, because it is typically sneaky and subtle. 
  In the third chapter of this book, self-help scams are addressed. The self-help industry is a multi-billion-dollar industry that feeds on the gullible wishful thinking of the ones who go to seminars, buy books, overpriced courses, etc. 
  Among other things, we’ll also discuss topics like the power of influence, especially in the world of the internet; and we will go into what peer pressure does to youngsters and adults. 
  Book 2: In this book, you will learn more about the culture we live in today. Are we being brainwashed by the media? How is social media affecting us? 
  And with those two questions in mind, does this mean there are more narcissists today than ever before? 
  Not only are we going to dive into these specific topics, but we will also talk about real cults. Cults have existed for a long time. Some even see the relationship between cults and actual religions. But why are cults so dark and scary? 
  Book 3: Psychopaths and sociopaths are everywhere in our society. You may not realize it, but they are out there. Chances are that you know someone who is a sociopath and you don’t even know it. 
  How do they compare? 
  And are they all dangerous? 
  Aside from answering these questions, we will also look into other topics that are related to manipulation. For example, we’ll go deeper into how to see if someone is manipulating you, or which sales tactics people use to make you buy something.

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