The myth of judicial activism

making sense of Supreme Court decisions

This carefully considered book is a welcome addition to the debate over 'judicial activism'. Constitutional scholar Kermit Roosevelt offers an elegantly simple way to resolve the heated discord between conservatives, who argue that the Constitution is immutable, and progressives, who insist it is a living ...

Imagining Spain

historical myth and national identity

This book, the latest contribution by eminent historian Henry Kamen, is a unique analysis of the myths that Spaniards have held, and continue to hold, about themselves and about their collective past. Kamen discusses how perceptions of key aspects of early modern Spain, such as ...

India

the rise of an asian giant

With growing economic might, new political influence, and changing social dynamics, India has emerged as a major world power in the twenty- first century. This book charts the important features of India's development since its independence in 1947, assessing those forces that have contributed ...

Stem cell century

Law and policy for a breakthrough tecnology

The explosion of interest in stem cell research raises a raft of controversial policy questions. When should human embryos be used to create stem cells? Should cloning be outlawed? Should egg and tissue donors be paid? Should we allow stem cells to be patented? Is ...

The future of the Internet and how to stop it

This extraordinary book explains the engine that has catapulted the Internet from backwater to ubiquity - and reveals that it is in danger precisely because of its runaway success. With the unwitting help of its users, the Internet and PC are on a path to a ...

Nudge

improving decisions about health, wealth, and happiness

Every day, we make decisions on topics ranging from personal investments to schools for our children to the meals we eat to the causes we champion. Unfortunately, we often choose poorly. The reason, the authors explain, is that, being human, we all are susceptible to ...

Bound together

how traders, preachers, adventures, and warriors shaped globalization

Since humans migrated from Africa and dispersed throughout the world, they have found countless ways and reasons to reconnect with each other. In this entertaining book, Nayan Chanda follows the exploits of traders, preachers, adventurers, and warriors throughout history as they have shaped and reshaped ...

All can be saved

religious tolerance and salvation in the Iberian Atlantic World

It would seem unlikely that one could discover tolerant religious attitudes in Spain, Portugal, and the New World colonies during the era of the Inquisition, when enforcement of Catholic orthodoxy was widespread and brutal. Yet this groundbreaking book does exactly that. Drawing on an enormous ...

Vatican secret diplomacy

Joseph P. Hurley and Pope Pius XII

In the corridors of the Vatican on the eve of World War II, American Catholic priest Joseph Patrick Hurley found himself in the midst of secret diplomatic dealings and intense debate. Hurley's deeply felt American patriotism and fixed ideas about confronting Nazism directly led ...

The ilusions of enterpreneurship

the costly myths that entrepreneurs, investors, and policy makers live

There are far more entrepreneurs than most people realize. But the failure rate of new businesses is disappointingly high, and the economic impact of most of them disappointingly low, suggesting that enthusiastic would-be entrepreneurs and their investors all too often operate under a false set ...

Grand scale

monumental prints in the age of Dürer and Titian

Grand Scale" brings to light rare surviving examples of mural-size prints - a Renaissance art form nearly lost from historical record. The most famous sixteenth-century woodcuts, engravings, and etchings were those done on an intimate scale. Yet artists also worked in an entirely different category of ...

The Hell-Fire Clubs

sex, satanism and secret societies

The Hell-Fire Clubs scandalized eighteenth- century English society. Rumors of their orgies, recruitment of prostitutes, extensive libraries of erotica, extreme rituals, and initiation ceremonies circulated widely at the time, only to become more sensational as generations passed. This thoroughly researched book sets aside the exaggerated ...

Fighting for the cross

crusading to the Holy Land

In a series of massive military undertakings that stretched from 1095 to 1291, Christendom#s armies won, defended, and lost the sacred sites of the Holy Land. Many books have been written about the Crusades, but until now none has described in detail what is ...

Reading matters

five centuries of discovering books

It is easy to forget in our own day of cheap paperbacks and mega-bookstores that, until very recently, books were luxury items. Those who could not afford to buy had to borrow, share, obtain secondhand, inherit, or listen to others reading. This book examines how ...

The Arts of Intimacy

christians, jews, and muslims in the making of castilian culture

Auts., Jerrilynn D. Dodds, María Rosa Menocal, Abigail Krasner Balbale. Gran formato con ilustraciones This lavishly illustrated book explores the vibrant interaction among different and sometimes opposing cultures, and how their contacts with one another transformed them all. It chronicles the tumultuous history of Castile ...

King Hussein of Jordan

a political life

Illustrated A towering figure in the history of Jordan, King Hussein reigned for nearly half a century, from his grandfather#s assassination in 1953 to his own death in 1999. In this fascinating biography, Nigel Ashton recounts the eventful life of the king who not ...

A little history of the world

Translated by Caroline Mustill; Illustrated by Clifford Harper In 1935, with a doctorate in art history and no prospect of a job, the 26-year-old Ernst Gombrich was invited by a publishing acquaintance to attempt a history of the world for younger readers. Amazingly, he completed ...

Paracelsus

medicine, magic and mission at the end of time

Theophrastus von Hohenheim (1493#1541), better known as Paracelsus, was a physician, natural magician, radical activist of the early Reformation, and commentator on the social and religious issues of his day. This elegantly written book is the defining account of the man known as #Paracelsus ...

Haunted city

Nuremberg and the Nazi past

Includes bibliographical references and index. Nuremberg#a city associated with Nazi excesses, party rallies, and the extreme anti-Semitic propaganda published by Hitler ally Julius Streicher#has struggled since the Second World War to come to terms with the material and moral legacies of Nazism. This ...

Honor and violence in Golden Age Spain

Early modern Spain has long been viewed as having a culture obsessed with honor, where a man resorted to violence when his or his wife#s honor was threatened, especially through sexual disgrace. This book#the first to closely examine honor and interpersonal violence in ...