Average customer rating:
- A must if you are interested in solar chimneys
- A lucid overview of a potentially interesting technology
|
The Solar Chimney: Electricity from the Sun
Jorg Schlaich
Manufacturer: Edition Axel Menges
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
 General
| Architecture
| Professional & Technical
| Subjects
| Books
Reference
| Architecture
| Professional & Technical
| Subjects
| Books
General
| Building Types & Styles
| Architecture
| Professional & Technical
| Subjects
| Books
General
| Mechanical
| Engineering
| Professional & Technical
| Subjects
| Books
Advanced Mechanics
| Aerospace
| Engineering
| Professional & Technical
| Subjects
| Books
Mechanics
| Civil
| Engineering
| Professional & Technical
| Subjects
| Books
Electricity Principles
| Electrical & Electronics
| Engineering
| Professional & Technical
| Subjects
| Books
General
| Energy
| Engineering
| Professional & Technical
| Subjects
| Books
Geothermal & Solar Energy
| Energy
| Engineering
| Professional & Technical
| Subjects
| Books
General
| Science
| Subjects
| Books
Renewable Energy
| Technology
| Science
| Subjects
| Books
ASIN: 3930698692 |
Book Description
Describes a viable alternative power source. Manzanares, Spain's solar chimney has proven to be effective.
Customer Reviews:
A must if you are interested in solar chimneys.......2005-08-02
A short book describing the research of this German researcher
on the solar chimney concept for generating power from the sun.
His research is the basis for the highly publicized plan to build a large-scale version in Australia.
A lucid overview of a potentially interesting technology.......1998-08-28
Jorg Schlaig, professor at the University of Stuttgart and one of the initial developers of the solar chimney concept, is the author of this concise introduction to solar chimney technology. The work, originally produced in German, is an attractive and well presented argument for an energy source that is non-poluting and inexhaustable, and may solve many of our current energy problems. The ideas and concepts are explained in such a way that both lay person and expert may benefit of the many years of practical and theoretical work on which the book is based.Copiously provided with statistical and financial data, the book is a must-read for energy professionals, decisionmakers and politicians everywhere.
Average customer rating:
|
Composing in Acrylics
Serge Hollerbach
Manufacturer: Watson-Guptill Pubns
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
General
| Architecture
| Professional & Technical
| Subjects
| Books
General
| Instructional & How-To
| Arts & Photography
| Subjects
| Books
Watercolor Painting
| Instructional & How-To
| Arts & Photography
| Subjects
| Books
General
| Painting
| Arts & Photography
| Subjects
| Books
General
| Arts & Photography
| Subjects
| Books
Painting
| Crafts & Hobbies
| Home & Garden
| Subjects
| Books
Similar Items:
-
The 'How-To' of Sketching: Develop your ability to produce expressive, lively line drawings
ASIN: 082300869X |
Book Description
The history of tattooing is shrouded in controversy. Citing the Polynesian derivation of the word âtattoo,â many scholars and tattoo enthusiasts have believed that the modern practice of tattooing originated in the Pacific, and specifically in the contacts between Captain Cook’s seamen and the Tahitians. Tattoo demonstrates that while the history of tattooing is far more complex than this, Pacific body arts have provided powerful stimuli to the West intermittently from the eighteenth century to the present day. The essays collected here document the extraordinary, intertwined histories of processes of cultural exchange and Pacific tattoo practices. Art historians, anthropologists, and scholars of Oceania provide a transcultural history of tattooing in and beyond the Pacific.
The contributors examine the contexts in which Pacific tattoos were âdiscoveredâ by Europeans, track the history of the tattooing of Europeans visiting the region, and look at how Pacific tattooing was absorbed, revalued, and often suppressed by agents of European colonization. They consider how European art has incorporated tattooing, and they explore contemporary manifestations of Pacific tattoo art, paying particular attention to the different trajectories of Samoan, Tahitian, and Maori tattooing and to the meaning of present-day appropriations of tribal tattoos. New research has uncovered a fascinating visual archive of centuries-old tattoo images, and this richly illustrated volume includes a number of thoseâmany published here for the first timeâalongside images of contemporary tattooing in Polynesia and Europe. Tattoo offers a tantalizing glimpse into the plethora of stories and cross-cultural encounters that lie between the blood on a sailor’s backside in the eighteenth century and the hammering of a Samoan tattoo tool in the twenty-first.
Contributors. Peter Brunt, Anna Cole, Anne D’Alleva, Bronwen Douglas, Elena Govor, Makiko Kuwahara, Sean Mallon, Linda Waimarie Nikora, Mohi Rua, Cyril Siorat, Ngahuia Te Awekotuku, Nicholas Thomas, Joanna White
Book Description
This broad-reaching collection of essays constitutes a thorough introduction to the fields and methodologies concerned with studies of textiles and dress of the Middle Ages. New themes and critical viewpoints from many disciplines are brought to bear on the medieval material in the areas of archaeology, art and architecture, economics, law, history, literature, religion, and textile technology. The contributors address surviving objects and artifacts and interpret representations in texts and images. The articles extend in time from the fifth to the sixteenth centuries, and cover Europe from Scandinavia, England, and Ireland in the north, to Italy and the Mediterranean basin in the south. Emphasis is placed on the significant role of trade and cultural exchanges as they impact appearance and its constituent materials.
Customer Reviews:
cohesive & encompassing view of medieval textiles.......2003-07-22
As is the case with many books compiled from excellent work created by diverse authors, this book could warrant a review of each chapter. The book covers the fifth through the sixteenth centuries, from Ireland to Italy and the Mediterranean, and is compiled into three sections based on date(s) covered by the articles.
This tome discusses the distinctions of levels of society as delineated by clothing, the development of the textile industry, and the use of textile analogies in period literature. It examines textile depictions found on monuments, in sculpture, in paintings, and on manuscripts. But in its fourteen chapters this volume manages to convey a cohesive and encompassing view of textiles in the medieval period. It offers the reader not only interesting facts, but the authors' excellent work convincingly connects the dots so as to give clothing a life of its own in the context of the times.
Chapters such as Dressing the Part, From Content to Form and Marie de France's Bisclavret deliver both sides of the coin: we are what we wear as well as wearing what we are entitled due to class structure. Without clothes, Bisclaveret is a wolf, un-recognizable; with clothes he is a nobleman, although Gloria Thomas Gilmore discusses the balance of both sides of the coin. Does form follow function, or is function a result of the form?
In Christ as a Windblown Sleeve, Margarita Yanson explores the changing costumes within Gottried von Strassburg's Tristan where changes in clothing mark the complexity of the main character, Tristan. Simularly, in As Proud as a Dog in a Doublet, Linda Anderson sees costume as an integral part of the play. On the other hand, The Margaret Fitzgerald Tomb Effegy comments on the strong nationalism in the dress of the late 15th and early 16th centuries, when adherance to national norms was seen as akin to patriotic act, and changing one's dress could be seen as treason and situates the effegy within the context of the time.
The chapters written by the editors are pivotal and act to anchor the rest of the book. Snyder's work discusses not only the sculpural forms in the column-figures and document seals in great detail, but in discussing the dress pictured from England to Germany it provides both an overview and excellent detail. Inserted between two chapters that draw from literary sources, the sharp images of the columns offer the mind a break as the detail is made visible to the eye as well as to the mind. Désirée Koslin's chapter touches on materials, dyes, weaving, finishing and meaning of cloth and clothing. Even through its title the final chapter is an overview and a case study. In many ways, it rounds out and sums up the book in a very satisfactory manner.
From art and legal manuscripts to archeological evidence and period documents the authors describe dress and its importance in great detail. The rich description plus the illustrations paint a lucid image of the clothing of the time in detail suitable for recreating the costumes discussed, while the discussion of the meaning of such explores timeless issues regarding the role of clothing and cloth in society and the lives of individuals. Black and white images throughout illustrate the chapters, and a seven page glossary makes terms that may be unfamiliar to some understandable without reaching for the dictionary, and a comprehensive index makes revisiting bits of information a breeze. Although this book is aimed at the student of the medieval period, and specifically at someone interested in the dress of the period, those interested in philosophy and dress in general can see parallels throughout the ages making this a book of value. Reading this book has made me think about dress more closely, not only in a historical context, but also while people-watching, and in movies such as the Matrix trilogy where dress has layers of meaning.
Average customer rating:
|
Beauty for the sighted and the blind
Allen Hendershott Eaton
Manufacturer: St. Martin's Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Unknown Binding
General
| Special Education
| Education
| Nonfiction
| Subjects
| Books
Sociology
| Social Sciences
| Nonfiction
| Subjects
| Books
| AIDS
| Abuse
| Adults
| Aging
| Children
| Class
| Communities
| Culture
| Death
| General
| History
| Leisure
| Marriage & Family
| Medicine
| Men
| Occupational
| Race Relations
| Religion
| Research & Measurement
| Rural
| Social Groups
| Social Situations
| Social Theory
| Suburban
| Urban
| Women
Eye Problems
| Disorders & Diseases
| Health, Mind & Body
| Subjects
| Books
ASIN: B0007DOA6U |
Product Description
This study is focused on the interaction of material and symbolic values in the domain of sacred trees in India. By presenting samples from 3,000 years of Indian ritual practice, it is shown that in many sacred geographies trees continue to connect the present with the past, the material with the symbolic, and the contemporary ecological with the traditionally sacred.
Although in India religion may have become very much a temple cult, its embeddedness in the natural world enhances today's 'green' interpretation of religious traditions. That in environmental matters such religious inspiration may be both sucessful and highly ambivalent at the same time is the thought-provoking position taken in the final chapters.
Average customer rating:
- about seeing the world anew
- Invisible Art
|
Invisible Art
Art Brothers
Manufacturer: Darling & Company
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
General
| Design & Decorative Arts
| Arts & Photography
| Subjects
| Books
Pop Culture
| Graphic Design
| Design & Decorative Arts
| Arts & Photography
| Subjects
| Books
General
| Painting
| Arts & Photography
| Subjects
| Books
General
| Arts & Photography
| Subjects
| Books
Themes
| History & Criticism
| Arts & Photography
| Subjects
| Books
ASIN: 1883211166 |
Book Description
This book attempts to show us beautiful things which are not ordinarily thought of as beautiful--to make invisible art visible. Some of the things included in Invisible Art are: coloring book covers, old postcards, cigarette cards, and children's book illustrations. Unusual themes are explored, such as: the number three, men and women in boats, a history of the hammock, personifications of mountains, and artful modes of concealment.
Customer Reviews:
about seeing the world anew.......2000-05-20
An excellent book, this is a set of observations really, spun together by three artists with similar styles, mainly, those of collecting, assembling, and assorting the everyday into powerful, almost shamanistic totems. Unconscious markers of humankind, ones that speak volumes about us.
Take for example, a picture of a man and woman together in a boat. When we see one of these, in a chocolate ad, or in a thrift-store painting, we pass right by it. It speaks to us in a silent and unassuming way, but it is easily ignored as trite, or cliche. But here, we see twenty or so of these painings assembled together, and by their repetition, we start to feel the power of the image. We are all in a little boat in this life, and perhaps it might be nioce to share that little boat with someone.
Such a naive observation, yet one of such humanity!
This alone would make the work worth while, but in addition, you get a section of juxtaposed images, were the ordinary is pasted onto the ordinary to tell a fantastic and incredible story. A striking example is the image of a turn of the century diver, leaping from a waterfall with his heart in his hands. All these images have this same power, as ifthey were illustrations from a story told to us in our sleep, and we've always known it, but we can't recall how it begins, or how it ends. We know the work, and have always knows it.
This is the kind of power you can expect from this book. A must for anyone with a desire to look at the world with amazement and wonder, instead of with cynicism and bile.
Invisible Art.......2000-03-29
Like nothing else I have ever seen bound together! It is more like looking through your (very inventive) friend's scrapbook. The concept of the book is that art is EVERYWHERE, even in simple and overlooked things we see (or don't see according to the authors) everyday. I'm not sure if I think all the examples are "art", but he book sure is - beautiful design and binding. An excellent idea and great for any individual thinker.
Average customer rating:
|
Objects of Beauty (Autograph)
Joy Gregory
Manufacturer: Chris Boot
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
African American
| Regional
| History & Criticism
| Arts & Photography
| Subjects
| Books
Collections, Catalogues & Exhibitions
| Photography
| Arts & Photography
| Subjects
| Books
General
| Photography
| Arts & Photography
| Subjects
| Books
Photographers, A-Z
| Photography
| Arts & Photography
| Subjects
| Books
| Adams, Ansel
| Avedon, Richard
| Bourke-White, Margaret
| Brady, Mathew
| Bubley, Esther
| Callahan, Harry
| Capa, Robert
| Caro, Anthony
| Carroll, Lewis
| Cartier-Bresson, Henri
| Clark, Larry
| Cunningham, Imogen
| Doisneau, Robert
| Eisenstaedt, Alfred
| Evans, Walker
| Feininger, Andreas
| Gatewood, Charles
| Geddes, Anne
| General
| Goldin, Nan
| Goldsworthy, Andy
| Hamilton, David
| Haskins, Sam
| Hine, Lewis Wickes
| Hurrell, Geoerge
| Jackson, William Henry
| Kenna, Michael
| Kern, Richard
| Kinsey, Darius
| Lange, Dorothea
| Leibovitz, Annie
| Leonard, Herman
| Mann, Sally
| Mapplethorpe, Robert
| Mark, Mary Ellen
| Miller, Lee
| Modotti, Tina
| Muybridge, Eadweard
| Newton, Helmut
| Orkin, Ruth
| Ray, Man
| Ritts, Herb
| Seymour, David
| Sherman, Cindy
| Steichen, Edward
| Stieglitz, Alfred
| Sturges, Jock
| Uelsmann, Jerry
| Wegman, William
| Weston, Edward
| Wiggins, Myra Albert
General
| Arts & Photography
| Subjects
| Books
African-American Studies
| Special Groups
| Social Sciences
| Nonfiction
| Subjects
| Books
ASIN: 0954281349 |
Book Description
Born in Oxfordshire in 1959 and trained at the Royal College of Art, Gregory has been producing "objects of beauty" since the early 1980s. But beneath the surface of her seductive images lies a powerful engagement with the themes of race, gender and identity. The Handbag Project, for instance, features images of 1950s women's purses-beautiful and seemingly innocent. These are items found in Johannesburg junkshops that take on depth and power as symbols of white privilege. Gregory's photos are featured, each previously collected and shown by museums worldwide, with a short essay by Deborah Willis, curator of exhibitions at the Center for African American History and Culture in Washington, DC.
Average customer rating:
- I miss sample sales!
- The Seduction of a Shoe
|
Shoes: Objects of Art and Seduction
Paola Buratto Caovilla
Manufacturer: Skira
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
General
| History & Criticism
| Arts & Photography
| Subjects
| Books
Fashion Design
| Commercial
| Graphic Design
| Design & Decorative Arts
| Arts & Photography
| Subjects
| Books
Textile & Costume
| Design & Decorative Arts
| Arts & Photography
| Subjects
| Books
Fashion
| Photography
| Arts & Photography
| Subjects
| Books
General
| Photography
| Arts & Photography
| Subjects
| Books
Photo Essays
| Photography
| Arts & Photography
| Subjects
| Books
General
| Fashion
| Arts & Photography
| Subjects
| Books
Commercial
| Fashion
| Arts & Photography
| Subjects
| Books
General
| Arts & Photography
| Subjects
| Books
Retailing
| Industries & Professions
| Business & Investing
| Subjects
| Books
General
| Beauty & Fashion
| Health, Mind & Body
| Subjects
| Books
General
| Social Sciences
| Nonfiction
| Subjects
| Books
Social History
| Historical Study
| History
| Subjects
| Books
Accessories:
-
philosophy hope in a jar daily moisturizer
ASIN: 8881184702
Release Date: 1999-07-01 |
Book Description
200 color and black-and-white illustrations
Customer Reviews:
I miss sample sales!.......2002-10-10
Like most fashionistas, I have a thing for shoes. I wanted a book on the aforementioned subject, and I found Shoes by Paola Buratto Caovilla. Caovilla illustrates the shoes created by great designers -- Manholo Blanik, Gucci, Prada, etc. -- while supplying insightful information on how to design shoes. This is one of the best coffee table books I have ever purchased. Now, if only I could find a sample sale...
The Seduction of a Shoe.......2000-07-28
For as long as I can remember I have had a fascination with shoes. I own a collection of books on the subject but in compairson, I must say this is the book that now has my full attention. "Shoes, Objects of Art and Seduction" has earned a coveted place on my coffee table for two reasons. The first is simply the visual treat of beautiful photography. Secondly and more important for me, the book qualifies as a design manual for creating shoes. The author, wife of Italian master cobbler Rene Caovilla, shares secrets from the inside of an industry typically shroud in mystery. The Caovilla family trademark is to collect memomentos from their travels and translate them into exquisitly wearable objects. I have heard it said that exceptional styling comes from designer's with unusual sources. This book shows you how they do it! As a recent student in the art of shoe making, I found the section on the process of creating a designer shoe invaluable. I can't wait to get my hands on this book again!
Book Description
In this entertaining and informative book, Walter Friedman chronicles the remarkable metamorphosis of the American salesman from itinerant amateur to trained expert. From the mid-nineteenth century to the eve of World War II, the development of sales management transformed an economy populated by peddlers and canvassers to one driven by professional salesmen and executives.
From book agents flogging Ulysses S. Grant's memoirs to John H. Patterson's famous pyramid strategy at National Cash Register to the determined efforts by Ford and Chevrolet to craft surefire sales pitches for their dealers, selling evolved from an art to a science. "Salesmanship" as a term and a concept arose around the turn of the century, paralleling the new science of mass production. Managers assembled professional forces of neat responsible salesmen who were presented as hardworking pillars of society, no longer the butt of endless "traveling salesmen" jokes. People became prospects; their homes became territories. As an NCR representative said, the modern salesman "let the light of reason into dark places." The study of selling itself became an industry, producing academic disciplines devoted to marketing, consumer behavior, and industrial psychology. At Carnegie Mellon's Bureau of Salesmanship Research, Walter Dill Scott studied the characteristics of successful salesmen and ways to motivate consumers to buy.
Full of engaging portraits and illuminating insights, Birth of a Salesman is a singular contribution that offers a clear understanding of the transformation of salesmanship in modern America.
Customer Reviews:
A fascinating history of selling .......2005-11-15
A must-read for anyone interested in the veiled history behind what is the modern salesman and marketing force of today. Witty and intelligent writing with straight-shooting facts about the brave, enigmatic, sometimes scandalous but consistently innovative world of sales and marketing. A well researched book serving as a treasure trove of interesting facts that accumulatively sketch out the industrious nature of our human soul and the engine of the business culture powering our society. Highly recommended.
Great book with real good historical perspective........2004-08-09
I have been involved in every aspect of the selling profession for the last 20 years, coporate sales, consulting, new business development, sales relationship management and sales training. I worked for three years for one of the greatest sales trainer in the market, and as I was finishing this book, I kept telling myself how little the general public knows about the PROFESSION of selling. For all sales person, who on the daily basis, tries to make a living, this book will be a great supporting tool. You will be able to finally be really proud of the historical aspects of the selling profession, knowing that our profession is one of the hardest to pick up as a career.
Walter Friedman captures the real picture behind the daily struggles that sales people go through on a daily basis.
Great read and very entertaining.
Read it!.......2004-05-08
This is a terrific book, entertaining, informative, and well written. Highly recommended!
Entertaining AND scholarly!.......2004-03-25
This is the first serious historical study of salesmanship that I know of, and it's terrific. Whether you're an academic, a college student, or someone who just likes history, this is the book for you. It intelligently and entertainingly charts the development of selling from 19th century bible and lightning rod hucksters to the 20th century professional, and discusses why this way of making a living continues to have a bad reputation (the author talks about how there was a post-WWII survey of mothers asking what they hoped their "sons" would grow up to be, and salesman always placed last!). The book is full of entertaining anectdotes and great illustrations-- it isn't often that a serious work of history is also humorous. This one is, and will also inform you about the changes in American society over the past 200 years.
Book Description
Contents
Foreword by Jeremy Brecher
Introduction
Chapter 1 The Bloom off the Boom
Chapter 2 Deconstructing the Neoliberal Myth
Chapter 3 The Latest Bust
Chapter 4 Understanding the Crisis
Chapter 5 How Asia Caught the Flu
Chapter 6 The IMF to the Rescue
Chapter 7 What Should We Want? What Should We Fear?
Chapter 8 Mainstream Reform Proposals
Chapter 9 Progressive Reform Proposals
Conclusion Lilliputian Luddites Until Globalization Can Be Built from Below
An Excerpt from Panic Rules! By Robin Hahnel
Boom and Bust
Among economic systems, capitalism is the manic-depressive patient. Exuberance, unbridled optimism, and euphoria are followed by gloom, listlessness, and depression. But no matter how often the cycle is repeated the patient always believes the latest boom will last forever, only to feel foolish again when the bubble bursts. And no matter how often the patient reverts to manic behavior when taken off medication, the economic "psychiatric" establishment eventually succumbs to the patient's pleas to be taken off medication during the "ups"-freeing the exuberant economy from policy restraints-only to insist on placing the patient back on meds-re-application of necessary policy protections-when the unmedicated patient "crashes."
The Latest Boom
The truth is that neither part of capitalism's manic-depressive boom-and-bust cycle is "healthy." Like most capitalist booms, the benefits of global liberalization during the 1980s and 1990s were not all they were made out to be. In fact, most people in the world were worse off economically at the end of the latest boom than they had been when it began-that is, even before the over-hyped boom metamorphosed into the global economic crisis of 1997-98. How is this possible, you ask? We were told "the world economy grew at 3 percent a year in the 1980s and 2 percent in the first half of the 1990s," and that "low- and middle-income economies grew more rapidly, averaging 3.4 percent growth in the 1980s and 5 percent in the 1990s." We were assured that "growth in trade from increased trade liberalization that has gone hand-in-hand with increased private capital flows and financial integration,"
Customer Reviews:
Fine small book!.......2006-02-21
I'll be brief - I concur with the other positive reviews. I came across this three or four years ago and I've really remembered it. Having given to a friend, I thought it was important enough to get a replacement copy recently. Another book in the vein is Joseph Stiglitz (Nobel economist), "Globalization and its discontents". Hahnel gives the better job of pointing out WHY some of the discontents happen - like water flowing down hill or balls falling downward through a pinball machine.
Gives a pretty solid understanding of the global economy.......2001-01-14
Professor Robin Hahnel of the American University in Washington D.C. presents some interesting statistics. He notes that from the early 80's until the Asian economic crises hit in July 1997, much of the world economy was said to be in the midst of an economic "boom" caused by the implementation of neoliberal policies (deregulation, removal of tarrifs and restrictions on capital flows,etc.). Well, according to figures compiled by the Organization for Economic and Commercial Development (OECD), from 1950 to 1973, the year the Bretton Woods system was dismantled and the process of neoliberalization (globalization)began, the average annual gross domestic product per capita of Western European countries was 3.8 percent. From 1973 until 1992, their average annual per capita Gross Domestic product was 1.8 percent. From 1950 until 1973, the average annual per capita gross domestic product in the U.S.A., New Zealand, Australia and Canada was 2.4 percent. From 1973 until 1992 their average annual per capita GDP was 1.4 percent. In Latin America from 1950 to 1973, the average annual per capita GDP was 2.4 percent. From 1973 to 1992 it was .4 percent. The only countries that increased economic efficiency between 1973 and 1992 were the East Asian "tigers" who combined harsh repression of labor, with tax credits and subsidies to export-oriented industries and severe restrictions on inflow and outflow of capital and foreign ownership.
Another statistic. He shows that the annual flow of capital around the world has vastly increased by a large margin since the beginning of neoliberalization in the early 70's; he also shows that whereas before that time, capital was largely used for investment and other long term activities, international capital is now largely used for speculative purposes.
So he shows very clearly that the Bretton Woods period was far more productive for the world economy than the period since 1973. He notes that in the U.S. wages have been stagnant or declining and that while a relatively large number of Americans own stocks, most of it is concentrated in 401k and other retirement accounts, pretty small stuff and that the wealth from the stocks is overwhelmingly concentrated in the top ten percent of the population.
He analyzes what caused the East Asian crises. The East Asian "tigers," under Western pressure, removed restrictions on capital flows, and cut back environmental and labor laws in the late 80's and early 90's and Western capital, mostly speculative, flowed in. Western banks made short term loans to the banks in these countries who made high interest long term loans to export-oriented local businesses. But as one "tiger" deregulated, cut environmental regulations,etc. to compete for Western capital, so did all the others and the boom that many businesses felt was relatively short lived as they faced increasing competition in other countries and were forced to lower prices. They began to have trouble repaying their loans to their local banks who in turn had trouble repaying international creditors. Then Thailand began to wobble and investors, following what Hahnel says is rule one of international finance ",panic first," rapidly sold off its currency, then investors in Malaysia panicked and did the same and then Indonesia and then South Korea..... The economies plumetted and foreign companies were allowed, as a condition for IMF rescue packages, unrestricted access to rush in and buy up local businesess and bargain basement prices. Hahnel presents a particularly interesting article from the New York Times alleging that Robert Rubin and Larry Summers blocked Japanese efforts to create a sort of Asian monetary fund to try to avert the crises at its beginning on the ground that it would interfere with U.S. "influence and interests" and that Japan would not insist on the draconian IMF-style reforms.
He also makes some good points about how the true health of a nation can hardly be measured by the common economic efficiency numbers, noting for instance that a small farmer in the third world ussually lives very poorly and contributes almost no value to the overall economy but still manages to feed himself and his family and is protected by the social safety net of his village. But when his landlord kicks him off the land because the landlord wants to grow expensive export crops and he is pushed into a diseased infested slum in the big city, this will probably increase the GDP.
Unlike the other reviewer, to some extent I really didn't find this book "easy-to-read" and certainly didn't understand everything the learned professor wrote but I feel I have a much more solid grasp of the fundamentals of the economy.
Superb treatment of globalization.......2000-04-08
This is an excellent, easy-to-read, and compelling account of the role international finance played in the Asian Financial Crisis. Hahnel also demonstrates the deficiencies in the IMF response to the crisis. Overall, a superb introduction to globalization, the destructive nature of unregulated capital flows, and the irrationality and instability of the current global economy.
Remarkably comprehensive.......1999-12-25
In a little more than 100 pages Hahnel does an astonishingly impressive job in setting out global economic theory and its current political situation. This is a very informative work.
Hahnel gives us his view of how the global economy works, who benefits from the rules as they currently are, and who loses. He goes on to suggest solutions to what many people perceive as terrible inequality, not only between rich countries and poor countries, but between the wealthy and the not so wealthy across the globe.
He spends some time explaining how the current economic order came about, and what's been happening since "globalization" (as we currently understand it) started about 25 years ago. He explains the Asian financial crisis of 1997/98 and shows how it could happen again.
This book starts with the supposition that one of the primary concerns of those that are wealthy is figuring out ways to hold on to their wealth and increase it if possible.
He does a very lucid job of transitioning from economics to politics and explaining the motivations behind financial and economic political decisions, the effects of which most of us don't understand or see as unimportant.
In short this is a wonderful book for figuring out how globalization effects us, why it's important in our everyday lives and what we can do to make it work for us, the people.
The most engaging book on economics in years, up-to-date and an eye-opening read
Books:
- The Urban Image of Augustan Rome (Contemporary South Asia)
- The Wanderers: Masters of Nineteenth-Century Russian Painting : An Exhibition from the Soviet Union
- The Wonderful Towers of Watts (Reading Rainbow Books)
- They All Fall Down: Richard Nickel's Struggle to Save America's Architecture
- Tips & Traps for Remodeling Your Kitchen (Tips & Traps)
- Tropical Minimal
- Turn-of-the-Century Houses, Cottages and Villas: Floor Plans and Line Illustrations for 118 Homes from Shoppell's Catalogs
- Untitled
- Urban Utopias in the Twentieth Century: Ebenezer Howard, Frank Lloyd Wright, Le Corbusier
- Victorian Dwellings for Village and Country (1885) (Dover Books on Architecture)
Books Index
Books Home
Recommended Books
- United States History: Preparing for the Advanced Placement Examination
- Warlord
- Thin Cell Layer Culture System: Regeneration and Transformation Applications
- Voysey, C.F.A.
- WACK!: Art and the Feminist Revolution
- Wikinomics: How Mass Collaboration Changes Everything
- Visions of sugarplums: A cookbook of cakes, cookies, candies & confections from all the countrie
- Victorian: American Restoration Style
- Tropical Style: Private Palm Beach
- Welding with Children: Stories
