Erik Solheim

An overarching exploration of the Indian state's approaches, laws, and organizations that maintain order and contain violence. Maintaining order and containing violence-the core constituents of internal security-are fundamental responsibilities of any government. Yet, developing countries find this task especially challenging. In Internal Security in India, Amit Ahuja, Devesh Kapur, and a cast of leading scholars on the subject focus on India's security and the threats it faces. Since Independence, the Indian state has grappled with a variety of internal security challenges, including insurgencies, terrorist attacks, caste and communal violence, riots, and electoral violence. Their toll has claimed more lives than all of India's five external wars put together. As the contributors in this volume analyze how the Indian State has managed the core concern of internal security over time, they address three broad questions: How well has India contained violence and preserved order? How have the approaches and capacity of the State evolved to attain these twin objectives? And what implications do the State's approach towards internal security have for civil liberties and the quality of democracy? A major reinterpretation of order and internal security in India, this book sheds light on an underanalyzed issue of global import given the changing nature of threats that states face.

Between 1983 and 2009 Sri Lanka was host to a bitter civil war fought between the Government and the Tamil Tigers, which sought the creation of an independent Tamil state. In May 2009 came the war's violent end with the crushing defeat of the Tamil Tigers at the hands of the Sri Lanka Army. But prior to this grim finale, for some time there had been hope for a peaceful end to the conflict. Beginning with a ceasefire agreement in early 2002, for almost five years a series of peace talks between the two sides took place in locations ranging from Thailand and Japan to Norway, Germany and Switzerland. To End a Civil War tells the story of trying to bring peace to Sri Lanka. In particular it tells the story of how a faraway European nation--Norway--came to play a central role in efforts to end the conflict, and what its small, dedicated team of mediators did in their untiring efforts to reach what ultimately proved the elusive goal of a negotiated peace. In doing so it fills a critical gap in our understanding of the Sri Lankan conflict. But it also illuminates in detail a much wider problem: the intense fragility that surrounds peace processes and the extraordinary lengths to which their proponents often stretch in order to secure their progress.

ONE OF BARACK OBAMA’S FAVORITE BOOKS OF 2022 One of Bill Gates’s “5 books to read this summer,” this New York Times and Wall Street Journal bestseller shows us that America’s political system isn’t broken. The truth is scarier: it’s working exactly as designed. In this “superbly researched” (The Washington Post) and timely book, journalist Ezra Klein reveals how that system is polarizing us—and how we are polarizing it—with disastrous results. “The American political system—which includes everyone from voters to journalists to the president—is full of rational actors making rational decisions given the incentives they face,” writes political analyst Ezra Klein. “We are a collection of functional parts whose efforts combine into a dysfunctional whole.” “A thoughtful, clear and persuasive analysis” (The New York Times Book Review), Why We’re Polarized reveals the structural and psychological forces behind America’s descent into division and dysfunction. Neither a polemic nor a lament, this book offers a clear framework for understanding everything from Trump’s rise to the Democratic Party’s leftward shift to the politicization of everyday culture. America is polarized, first and foremost, by identity. Everyone engaged in American politics is engaged, at some level, in identity politics. Over the past fifty years in America, our partisan identities have merged with our racial, religious, geographic, ideological, and cultural identities. These merged identities have attained a weight that is breaking much in our politics and tearing at the bonds that hold this country together. Klein shows how and why American politics polarized around identity in the 20th century, and what that polarization did to the way we see the world and one another. And he traces the feedback loops between polarized political identities and polarized political institutions that are driving our system toward crisis. “Well worth reading” (New York magazine), this is an “eye-opening” (O, The Oprah Magazine) book that will change how you look at politics—and perhaps at yourself.

WINNER: 2023 Goody Business Book Awards - Business - Environment In the face of our climate emergency, we desperately need solutionists working to fix the future. This is your handbook for becoming the leader that the world needs. The Solutionists sets out what it takes to join the new generation of entrepreneurs, CEOs and leaders transforming business to create a more sustainable society. Using a change blueprint, this book coaches you through the steps, mindsets and strategies that will put your organization at the forefront and take personal ownership of sustainability solutions. With an inspiring selection of stories from leading entrepreneurs and organizations, this book illustrates how sustainability solutionists are paving the way to solving the biggest crisis our planet has ever faced whilst driving business innovation and growth. Including plant-based food sources, net-zero technologies and circular platforms, these stories demonstrate how sustainable disruption can transform your business, regardless of size or industry. Solitaire Townsend has been inspiring the world's top brands for over two decades and, along with some of the world's leading solutionists, she invites you to join the answer activists and grow your business while co-creating a better world.