For well over two hundred years we have lived in a western-made world, one where the very notion of being modern is inextricably bound up with being western. The twenty-first century will be different. The rise of China, India and the Asian tigers means that, for the first time, modernity will no longer be exclusively western. The west will be confronted with the fact that its systems, institutions and values are no longer the only ones on offer. The key idea of Martin Jacques's ground-breaking new book is that we are moving into an era of contested modernity. The central player in this new world will be China. Continental in size and mentality, China is a 'civilisation-state' whose characteristics, attitudes and values long predate its existence as a nation-state. Although clearly influenced by the west, its extraordinary size and history mean that it will remain highly distinct, and as it exercises its rapidly growing power it will change much more than the world's geo-politics. The nation-state as we understand it will no longer be globally dominant, and the Westphalian state-system will be transformed; ideas of race will be redrawn. This profound and far-sighted book explains for the first time the deeper meaning of the rise of China.

***

China Digital Times

Book Review: When China Rules the World

“When you’re alone and life is making you lonely, you can always go: downtown.” So warbled the British singer, Petula Clark in the 1960s. However, today if solitude is your constant companion, I would suggest that you purchase a copy of this riveting book and read it on the bus and in airports — as I have been doing in recent days, with the dramatic words on the bright red cover of this weighty tome blaring insistently — and no doubt you will find, as I have, that your reading reverie will be constantly interrupted by a stream of anxious interlopers curious to know what the future may hold.

For like Petula Clark, the author too hails from London, though the startling message he brings decidedly differs from her melancholy intervention. For it is the author’s conclusion that sooner rather than later, China — a nation ruled by a Communist Party — will have the most sizeable and powerful economy in the world and that this will have manifold economic, cultural, psychological (and racial) consequences. Strangely enough, Jacques — one of the better respected intellectuals in the North Atlantic community — does not dwell upon how this monumental turn of events occurred. To be sure, he pays obeisance to the leadership of Comrade Deng Xiaoping, who in 1978, opened China’s economy to massive inward foreign direct investment, which set the stage for the 21st Century emergence of the planet’s most populous nation. Yet, for whatever reason, Jacques — who once was a leading figure in the British Communist Party — does not deign to detail to the gentle reader how Beijing brokered an alliance with US imperialism, that helped to destabilize their mutual foe in Moscow, which prepared the path for the gargantuan capital infusion that has transformed China and bids fair to do the same for the world as a whole.

Still, it is noteworthy that this book’s back-cover carries blurbs from the conservative economic historian, Niall Ferguson of Harvard (Henry Kissinger’s authorized biographer); the leading historian, Eric Hobsbawm; the well-known Singaporean intellectual and leader, Kishore Mahbubani (who has written a book that mirrors Jacques’ earthshaking conclusions); and a raft of Chinese thinkers who do not seem displeased nor surprised by his findings.

With saucy detail on every page, this no-nonsense guide reveals why a strong woman is much more desirable than a “yes woman” who routinely sacrifices herself. Contending that some women are “too nice,” comedian and radio show host Sherry Argov has written Why Men Love Bitches: From Doormat to Dreamgirl—A Woman’s Guide to Holding Her Own in a Relationship.

“I’m not recommending that a woman have an abrasive disposition,” Argov writes, “The woman I’m describing is kind yet strong. She doesn’t give up her life, and she won't chase a man.”

Her sassy book is filled with scenarios and advice aimed at making women subtly stronger and self-empowered. Argov’s principles, which range from the farfetched to the downright absurd, include “If you give him a feeling of power, he'll want to protect you and he'll want to give you the world” and “A little distance combined with the appearance of self-control makes him nervous that he may be losing you.” The book, which has already been featured on The View and The O’Reilly Factor, should make waves with its controversial view of relationships.

“Why is Sex Fun? is the best book on the subject I've read. This lively exploration of our sexual heritage offers fascinating reading for anyone curious about why lovers do what they do.”

— Diane Ackerman, author of A Natural History of the Senses

“I am so jealous of Jared Diamond, for he writes with such an elegant simplicity! Here, he takes a loot at the endlessly fascinating topic of human sexuality His convincing arguments should persuade xm that there are very special reasons why we evolved to use sex for recreation as well as for procreatim whereas most other mammals are denied that pleasure…. It is a great little book, by one of the worlds foremost biological philosophers.”

— Roger Shohl, Professor of Physiology Monash University Australia

“Once again Jared Diamond provides us with answers to questions we may never have stopped to ask, but wish we had. In this long essay Diamond explains that recreational sex, while not unique to humans, is a rare behavior in the animal world. Above all, we learn, sexual activity divorced fron procreation is not only part of what it is to be human, but the very crux of our evolutionary success.”

— Bettyaxn Kevles, author of Naked to the Bonn Medical Imaging in the Twentieth Century

“Why is Sex Fun? is the best book on the subject I've read. This lively exploration of our sexual heritage offers fascinating reading for anyone curious about why lovers do what they do.”

— Diane Ackerman, author of A Natural History of the Senses

“I am so jealous of Jared Diamond, for he writes with such an elegant simplicity! Here, he takes a loot at the endlessly fascinating topic of human sexuality His convincing arguments should persuade xm that there are very special reasons why we evolved to use sex for recreation as well as for procreatim whereas most other mammals are denied that pleasure…. It is a great little book, by one of the worlds foremost biological philosophers.”

— Roger Shohl, Professor of Physiology Monash University Australia

“Once again Jared Diamond provides us with answers to questions we may never have stopped to ask, but wish we had. In this long essay Diamond explains that recreational sex, while not unique to humans, is a rare behavior in the animal world. Above all, we learn, sexual activity divorced fron procreation is not only part of what it is to be human, but the very crux of our evolutionary success.”

— Bettyaxn Kevles, author of Naked to the Bonn Medical Imaging in the Twentieth Century

“Why is Sex Fun? is the best book on the subject I've read. This lively exploration of our sexual heritage offers fascinating reading for anyone curious about why lovers do what they do.”

— Diane Ackerman, author of A Natural History of the Senses

“I am so jealous of Jared Diamond, for he writes with such an elegant simplicity! Here, he takes a loot at the endlessly fascinating topic of human sexuality His convincing arguments should persuade xm that there are very special reasons why we evolved to use sex for recreation as well as for procreatim whereas most other mammals are denied that pleasure…. It is a great little book, by one of the worlds foremost biological philosophers.”

— Roger Shohl, Professor of Physiology Monash University Australia

“Once again Jared Diamond provides us with answers to questions we may never have stopped to ask, but wish we had. In this long essay Diamond explains that recreational sex, while not unique to humans, is a rare behavior in the animal world. Above all, we learn, sexual activity divorced fron procreation is not only part of what it is to be human, but the very crux of our evolutionary success.”

— Bettyaxn Kevles, author of Naked to the Bonn Medical Imaging in the Twentieth Century

Gladwel’'s fourth book comprises various contributions to the New Yorker and makes for an intriguing and often hilarious look at the hidden extraordinary. He wonders what… hair dye tell[s] us about twentieth century history, and observes firsthand dog whisperer Cesar Millan's uncanny ability to understand and be understood by his pack. Gladwell pulls double duty as author and narrator; while his delivery isn't the most dramatic or commanding, the material is frequently astonishing, and his reading is clear, heartfelt, and makes for genuinely pleasurable listening.

Gladwell's fourth book comprises various contributions to the New Yorker and makes for an intriguing and often hilarious look at the hidden extraordinary. He wonders what… hair dye tell[s] us about twentieth century history, and observes firsthand dog whisperer Cesar Millan's uncanny ability to understand and be understood by his pack. Gladwell pulls double duty as author and narrator; while his delivery isn't the most dramatic or commanding, the material is frequently astonishing, and his reading is clear, heartfelt, and makes for genuinely pleasurable listening.

The Project Gutenberg EBook of Write It Right, by Ambrose Bierce

The German concentration camps of World War II, the horrors of the Vietnam war, the prolific rape and brutality during the breakup of the former Yugoslavia and the Hutu massacres of Tutsis in Rwanda. All are abhorrent violations of the laws and customs of war. Yet some of the worst abuses of this century escape this classification, as they were not actually committed during times of armed conflict. Among these are Stalin’s policy of ethnic cleansing and his destruction of the kulaks, the terror of the Khmer Rouge, and Mao’s forced collectivizations.

This book records the worst abominations in history, whether or not classified as war crimes or just acts of pure evil.

Книга, которая покорила интернет-сообщество полнотой изложения, количеством материала, а также профессионализмом. После чтения данной книги вы станете профессионалом работы на компьютере на Windows 10! Вы узнаете все тонкости и секреты новой операционной системы, поймете, как обезопасить себя при работе в Интернете, узнаете, что такое пароль, который НЕ ВЗЛОМАТЬ, поймете, почему компьютеры одних пользователей работают намного быстрее других. В конце книги вас ждет приятный бонус.

In a little-known episode at the height of World War I, President Woodrow Wilson dispatched thousands of American soldiers to Siberia. Carl J. Richard convincingly shows that Wilson’s original intent was to enable Czechs and anti-Bolshevik Russians to rebuild the Eastern Front against the Central Powers. But Wilson continued the intervention for a year and a half after the armistice in order to overthrow the Bolsheviks and to prevent the Japanese from absorbing eastern Siberia. As Wilson and the Allies failed to formulate a successful Russian policy at the Paris Peace Conference, American doughboys suffered great hardships on the bleak plains of Siberia.

Richard argues that Wilson’s Siberian intervention ironically strengthened the Bolshevik regime it was intended to topple. Its tragic legacy can be found in the seeds of World War II—which began with an alliance between Germany and the Soviet Union, the two nations most aggrieved by Allied treatment after World War I—and in the Cold War, a forty-five year period in which the world held its collective breath over the possibility of nuclear annihilation.

One of the earliest U.S. counterinsurgency campaigns outside the Western Hemisphere, the Siberian intervention was a harbinger of policies to come. Richard notes that it teaches invaluable lessons about the extreme difficulties inherent in interventions and about the absolute need to secure widespread support on the ground if such campaigns are to achieve success, knowledge that U.S. policymakers tragically ignored in Vietnam and have later struggled to implement in Iraq and Afghanistan.

In a little-known episode at the height of World War I, President Woodrow Wilson dispatched thousands of American soldiers to Siberia. Carl J. Richard convincingly shows that Wilson’s original intent was to enable Czechs and anti-Bolshevik Russians to rebuild the Eastern Front against the Central Powers. But Wilson continued the intervention for a year and a half after the armistice in order to overthrow the Bolsheviks and to prevent the Japanese from absorbing eastern Siberia. As Wilson and the Allies failed to formulate a successful Russian policy at the Paris Peace Conference, American doughboys suffered great hardships on the bleak plains of Siberia.

Richard argues that Wilson’s Siberian intervention ironically strengthened the Bolshevik regime it was intended to topple. Its tragic legacy can be found in the seeds of World War II—which began with an alliance between Germany and the Soviet Union, the two nations most aggrieved by Allied treatment after World War I—and in the Cold War, a forty-five year period in which the world held its collective breath over the possibility of nuclear annihilation.

One of the earliest U.S. counterinsurgency campaigns outside the Western Hemisphere, the Siberian intervention was a harbinger of policies to come. Richard notes that it teaches invaluable lessons about the extreme difficulties inherent in interventions and about the absolute need to secure widespread support on the ground if such campaigns are to achieve success, knowledge that U.S. policymakers tragically ignored in Vietnam and have later struggled to implement in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Читатель найдет на страницах этой книги более 200 снимков, иллюстрирующих сражения и кампании Вермахта в период Второй мировой войны. Все иллюстрации снабжены интересными и подробными комментариями. Прежде не публиковавшиеся фотоматериалы были недавно извлечены из закрытых архивов стран — бывших участниц Варшавского договора.

Комментарии и текст написаны доктором Джоном Пимлоттом, признанным специалистом в области военных технологий и вооружений XX столетия.

Книга предназначена для всех интересующихся историей Второй мировой войны и широкого круга читателей.

“In the past, for reasons I try to explain, I’ve often felt I had to be careful in public, like I was up on a wire without a net. Now I’m letting my guard down.”

—Hillary Rodham Clinton, from the introduction of What Happened

For the first time, Hillary Rodham Clinton reveals what she was thinking and feeling during one of the most controversial and unpredictable presidential elections in history. Now free from the constraints of running, Hillary takes you inside the intense personal experience of becoming the first woman nominated for president by a major party in an election marked by rage, sexism, exhilarating highs and infuriating lows, stranger-than-fiction twists, Russian interference, and an opponent who broke all the rules. This is her most personal memoir yet.

In these pages, she describes what it was like to run against Donald Trump, the mistakes she made, how she has coped with a shocking and devastating loss, and how she found the strength to pick herself back up afterward. With humor and candor, she tells readers what it took to get back on her feet—the rituals, relationships, and reading that got her through, and what the experience has taught her about life. She speaks about the challenges of being a strong woman in the public eye, the criticism over her voice, age, and appearance, and the double standard confronting women in politics.

She lays out how the 2016 election was marked by an unprecedented assault on our democracy by a foreign adversary. By analyzing the evidence and connecting the dots, Hillary shows just how dangerous the forces are that shaped the outcome, and why Americans need to understand them to protect our values and our democracy in the future.

The election of 2016 was unprecedented and historic. What Happened is the story of that campaign and its aftermath—both a deeply intimate account and a cautionary tale for the nation.

“Sebastian Gorka was [President Trump’s] strategist. Dr. Gorka knows Donald Trump and the threats we fact. Buy and read Why We Fight to find how we win and what it means to be an American hero.”

— RUSH LIMBAUGH

WAR. It will happen again. We must be ready.

Sober words from Dr. Sebastian Gorka, a man who has made the unvarnished truth his specialty. And there’s one eternal truth that Americans are in danger of forgetting: the most important weapon in any geopolitical conflict is the will to win.

And we must win.

In this powerful manifesto, Dr. Gorka explains the basic principles that have guided strategists since Sun Tzu penned The Art of War in the sixth century B.C. To defeat your enemy, you must know him. But that’s the last thing liberal elites are interested in. Willful ignorance about our adversary—whether it’s Russia, China, or the global jihadi movement—has been crippling. Tearing off America’s politically correct blindfold, Dr. Gorka clarifies who our foes are and what makes them tick.

An eight-year vacation from geopolitical reality under Obama left our country dangerously weakened. Dr. Gorka addresses the pressing questions we face as we rebuild under President Trump’s leadership:

• What are the most serious threats to American security?

• How are they different from the threats of the past?

• What can we do to counter these threats?

• How can we achieve the “perfect victory” of vanquishing our enemies without mortal combat?

All the money and weapons in the world cannot substitute for the will to fight for our precious country and what she represents. To remind us of what the will to win looks like, Dr. Gorka intersperses the stories of four American heroes—Stephen Decatur, Chesty Puller, “Red” McDaniel, and a warrior who never took up arms, Whittaker Chambers—men who believed in their country and put everything on the line for her.

An Alternative Narrative of Donald Trump’s US and Putin’s Russia, from America’s Most Prominent Russian Scholar

Are we in a new Cold War with Russia? How does a new Cold War affect the safety and security of the United States? Does Vladimir Putin really want to destabilize the West?

America is in a new Cold War with Russia even more dangerous than the one the world barely survived in the twentieth century. The Soviet Union is gone, but the two nuclear superpowers are again locked in political and military confrontations, now from Ukraine to Syria. All of this is exacerbated by Washington’s war-like demonizing of the Kremlin leadership and by Russiagate’s unprecedented allegations. US mainstream media accounts are highly selective and seriously misleading. American “disinformation,” not only Russian, is a growing peril.

In War With Russia?, Stephen F. Cohen—the widely acclaimed historian of Soviet and post-Soviet Russia—gives readers a very different, dissenting narrative of this more dangerous new Cold War from its origins in the 1990s, the actual role of Vladimir Putin, and the 2014 Ukrainian crisis to Donald Trump’s election and today’s unprecedented Russiagate allegations.

Cohen’s views have made him, it is said, “America’s most controversial Russia expert.” Some say this to denounce him, others to laud him as a bold, highly informed critic of US policies and the dangers they have helped to create.

War With Russia? gives readers a chance to decide for themselves who is right: are we living, as Cohen argues, in a time of unprecedented perils at home and abroad?

Cases of sexual violence against men have been documented in a great number of conflicts and wars, both ancient and contemporary. Despite this growing empirical evidence, there is still a dearth of analyses on this type of violence, which stands in stark contrast with the abundant literature dealing with sexual violence against women.

Based on a fieldwork conducted primarily in the Great Lakes Region of Africa, this book proposes to look at wartime sexual violence against men as a performative gendered act that, stemming from the same logic underpinning sexual violence against women, (re-)affirms a gendered social hierarchy.

The book explores patterns of wartime sexual violence against men, and presents survivors’, but also perpetrators’ stories. The book proceeds to analysing the context in which this type of violence can be understood, narrated, but also addressed, either through support programs for survivors, or through legal means.

Cases of sexual violence against men have been documented in a great number of conflicts and wars, both ancient and contemporary. Despite this growing empirical evidence, there is still a dearth of analyses on this type of violence, which stands in stark contrast with the abundant literature dealing with sexual violence against women.

Based on a fieldwork conducted primarily in the Great Lakes Region of Africa, this book proposes to look at wartime sexual violence against men as a performative gendered act that, stemming from the same logic underpinning sexual violence against women, (re-)affirms a gendered social hierarchy.

The book explores patterns of wartime sexual violence against men, and presents survivors’, but also perpetrators’ stories. The book proceeds to analysing the context in which this type of violence can be understood, narrated, but also addressed, either through support programs for survivors, or through legal means.

Ваби-саби – это стиль жизни, вдохновленный многовековой японской мудростью. Хотя жители Страны восходящего солнца редко говорят о нем вслух, именно ваби-саби пронизана вся жизнь японца.

Ваби-саби – альтернатива современному ритму жизни и ценностям, основанным на потреблении и стремлении к идеалу. Видеть красоту в несовершенстве, ценить простоту и радость момента, ощущать связь с природой и принимать мимолетность жизни, отбросить лишнее и сосредоточиться на важном – основные принципы этой вневременной концепции.

Эта книга – предложение расслабиться и ощутить красоту собственного бытия в каждом моменте, избавить его от всего напускного и открыть то, что внутри. Впустите ваби-саби в свою жизнь и найдите счастье прямо там, где вы находитесь.

В формате PDF А4 сохранен издательский дизайн.

A The Times best book of 2019

‘In fewer than 150 pithy pages, Galeotti sketches a bleak, but convincing picture of the man in the Kremlin and the political system that he dominates’ – The Times

Meet the world’s most dangerous man. Or is he?

Who is the real Vladimir Putin? What does he want? And what will he do next?

Despite the millions of words written on Putin’s Russia, the West still fails to truly understand one of the world’s most powerful politicians, whose influence spans the globe and whose networks of power reach into the very heart of our daily lives.

In this essential primer, Professor Mark Galeotti uncovers the man behind the myth, addressing the key misperceptions of Putin and explaining how we can decipher his motivations and next moves. From Putin’s early life in the KGB and his real relationship with the USA to his vision for the future of Russia – and the world – Galeotti draws on new Russian sources and explosive unpublished accounts to give unparalleled insight into the man at the heart of global politics.

Кое-кому кажется, что анус не таит в себе никаких загадок. Но любой медик подтвердит, что это несусветная чушь. Кто-то скажет, что не существует серьезных анальных заболеваний. И это утверждение так самонадеянно, что даже опасно. Другие полагают, что анус имеет элементарное анатомическое строение. Однако это не так. Кто-то может считать себя экспертом по анальному сексу. Но это не соответствует действительности, ведь большая часть человечества не умеет даже пользоваться ректальными свечами.

Двое норвежских врачей без стеснения расскажут о самом важном и самом смешном отверстии человеческого тела и ответят на все вопросы, которые вы боялись задать (если они и вовсе приходили вам на ум).

Книга для всех поклонников медицины и черного юмора, которые любят себя без остатка!

Кое-кому кажется, что анус не таит в себе никаких загадок. Но любой медик подтвердит, что это несусветная чушь. Кто-то скажет, что не существует серьезных анальных заболеваний. И это утверждение так самонадеянно, что даже опасно. Другие полагают, что анус имеет элементарное анатомическое строение. Однако это не так. Кто-то может считать себя экспертом по анальному сексу. Но это не соответствует действительности, ведь большая часть человечества не умеет даже пользоваться ректальными свечами.

Двое норвежских врачей без стеснения расскажут о самом важном и самом смешном отверстии человеческого тела и ответят на все вопросы, которые вы боялись задать (если они и вовсе приходили вам на ум).

Книга для всех поклонников медицины и черного юмора, которые любят себя без остатка!