A Global Observatory Must-Read Book in Peace and Security! How do ordinary people, neither pacifists nor peace activists, come to decide collectively to eschew violent conflict and then develop strategies for maintaining their region as a nonwar area despite myriad pressures to the contrary? Mary Anderson and Marshall Wallace analyze the experiences of thirteen nonwar communities that made    More >

The stories in Oranges in the Sun capture a distinctly unique vision of the world, embodying the range of emotional and material concerns of the peoples of the Arab Gulf region. The introduction to the collection provides historical context, as well as a broad overview of the selections.    More >

It is estimated that there are some 140 million orphans worldwide, most of them in transition countries such as Russia and Brazil or poorer regions of the developing world. In Orphan Care, contributors from Botswana, Brazil, China, Russia, Thailand, and Zimbabwe provide insider, on-the-ground perspectives on orphan care in their respective countries, covering the historical and socioeconomic    More >

Privacy, mobility, dignity—living in a vehicle offers many advantages over life in a shelter or on the street. Michele Wakin broadens our understanding of homelessness by exploring the growing phenomenon of vehicle living and how it differs from other forms of makeshift housing.     Incorporating both quantitative data and ethnographic work in California, Wakin takes us into    More >

A collection of forty-two poems that depict the pain and pathos, the political and personal struggles that marked South Africa during apartheid. House is acutely sensitive to the sometimes subtle, sometimes explosive tensions of her homeland—and to the hope that must accompany any movement toward liberation. Eighteen full-page drawings by Selma Waldman are presented as visual responses to    More >

Do pretrial release programs, initiated and now operated by a range of nonprofit organizations to redress the inequalities of the bail system, affect the administration of justice? Specifically, do they lessen the barriers to justice often faced by poor and minority defendants? Ursula Castellano's ethnographic study of four pretrial release programs reveals the often unintended consequences of    More >

Every year, the US Department of Defense allocates more than $400 billion to for-profit firms. Which raises the question: Where does the money go? Thomas Bruneau takes a deep dive into the murky waters of national defense outsourcing to answer that question. Moving beyond the issue of private military contractors, Bruneau investigates the scope, legality, and implications of the private    More >

Ludwig Ritter von Höhnel lived a fascinating life—he was an Austrian subject who achieved distinction as an African explorer, a naval officer, and a courtier. The turbulent years preceding the fall of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy in 1918 are revived through Höhnel's vibrant memoir. An explorer of East Africa in the era of Livingstone and Stanley, Höhnel mapped vast    More >

Opinion leaders in government and business routinely tout the Internet's power as a force for economic and social development, and programs designed to bridge the digital divide are springing up across the developing world. Many questions remain, however, about the effectiveness of such programs in fostering greater productivity and improving quality of life. Overselling the Web? offers a much    More >

What does democracy look like in Pacific Asia? Can democratic governance in the region survive the challenges of corruption, violence, and soft authoritarianism? What impact are economic pressures likely to have? These are among the broad questions tackled in Pacific Asia in Quest of Democracy, a comparative study of democratic structures and practices in Indonesia, the Philippines, South Korea,    More >