Browse Results

Select your format based upon: 1) how you want to read your book, and 2) compatibility with your reading tool. To learn more about using Bookshare with your device, visit the Help Center.

Here is an overview of the specialized formats that Bookshare offers its members with links that go to the Help Center for more information.

• Bookshare Web Reader - A customized reading tool for Bookshare members offering all the features of DAISY with a single click of the "Read Now" link.
• DAISY (Digital Accessible Information System) - A digital book file format. DAISY books from Bookshare are DAISY 3.0 text files that work with just about every type of access technology that reads text. Books that contain images will have the download option of ‘DAISY Text with Images’.
• BRF (Braille Refreshable Format) - Digital Braille for use with refreshable Braille devices and Braille embossers.
• MP3 (MPEG audio layer 3) - Provides audio only with no text. These books are created with a text-to-speech engine and spoken by Kendra, a high quality synthetic voice from Ivona. Any device that supports MP3 playback is compatible.
• DAISY Audio - Similar to the DAISY option above; however, this option uses MP3 files created with our text-to-speech engine that utilizes Ivonas Kendra voice. This format will work with Daisy Audio compatible players such as Victor Reader Stream and Read2Go.
• EPUB - A standard e-book format that can be read on many tools, such as iBooks, Readium or others.
• Word - Accessible Word output, which can be unzipped and opened in any tool that allows .docx files

Towards the Local Government’s Integrated Accountability Framework: A Critical Lesson from Socio-Environmental Issues in Indonesia

This book shows the growing phenomenon and the broad impact of socio-environmental conflicts in the grassroots communities—farmers, fishermen and urban poor—in Indonesia, as the effects of government’s development strategies based on neoliberal and New Public Management (NPM) views without a clear accountability system or socio-environmental accountability practices and reports are becoming apparent. Inspired by the emancipatory socio-environmental accounting discourse, which focuses on the socio-local context in developing alternative models of accountability based on local views and people's aspirations, this book uses research methodology based on the principles put forth by Indonesian national hero and critical scholar Tan Malaka to develop a framework of integrated accountability for the local government. This book fills the present gap in English publications that analyse the intents and outcomes of the public management reforms in Indonesia with regard to socio-environmental issues, as a basis for further research at the international level as well as policymaking in Indonesia. As the Indonesian government has recently undertaken key structural and accounting reforms in the public sector, this book is a timely and valuable read for graduate students, researchers,- and policymakers.

Towards the Light: The Story of the Struggles for Liberty and Rights that Made the Modern West (Bloomsbury Revelations Series)

The often-violent conflicts of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries were sparked by the pursuit of freedom of thought. In time, this drive led to bitter fighting, including the English Civil War. Then came revolutions in America and France that swept away monarchies for more representative forms of government and making possible the abolition of slavery, the enfranchisement of women, and the idea of universal human rights and freedoms. Each of these struggles was a memorable human drama, and Grayling interweaves the stories of these heroes, including Martin Luther, Mary Wollstonecraft and Rosa Parks, whose sacrifices make us value these precious rights, especially in an age when governments under pressure find it necessary to restrict rights in the name of freedom.

Towards the Light: The Story of the Struggles for Liberty and Rights that Made the Modern West (Bloomsbury Revelations)

In Towards the Light, A.C. Grayling tells the story of the long and difficult battle for freedom in the West, from the Reformation to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, from the battle for the vote to the struggle for the right to freedom of conscience. As Grayling passionately affirms, it is a story - and a struggle - that continues to this day as those in power use the threat of terrorism in the 21st century to roll-back the liberties that so many have fought and died to win for us.Including an appendix of landmark documents, including the British and American Bills of Rights and the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen, the Bloomsbury Revelations edition also includes a new preface by the author reflecting on developments since the book's original publication.

Towards the Light: The Story of the Struggles for Liberty and Rights that Made the Modern West (Bloomsbury Revelations)

In Towards the Light, A.C. Grayling tells the story of the long and difficult battle for freedom in the West, from the Reformation to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, from the battle for the vote to the struggle for the right to freedom of conscience. As Grayling passionately affirms, it is a story - and a struggle - that continues to this day as those in power use the threat of terrorism in the 21st century to roll-back the liberties that so many have fought and died to win for us. Including an appendix of landmark documents, including the British and American Bills of Rights and the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen, the Bloomsbury Revelations edition also includes a new preface by the author reflecting on developments since the book's original publication.

Towards the Knowledge Society: eCommerce, eBusiness and eGovernment The Second IFIP Conference on E-Commerce, E-Business, E-Government (I3E 2002) October 7–9, 2002, Lisbon, Portugal (IFIP Advances in Information and Communication Technology #105)

Towards the Internet of Things: Architectures, Security, and Applications (EAI/Springer Innovations in Communication and Computing)

This book presents a comprehensive framework for IoT, including its architectures, security, privacy, network communications, and protocols. The book starts by providing an overview of the aforementioned research topics, future directions and open challenges that face the IoT development. The authors then discuss the main architectures in the field, which include Three- and Five-Layer Architectures, Cloud and Fog Based Architectures, a Social IoT Application Architecture. In the security chapter, the authors outline threats and attacks, privacy preservation, trust and authentication, IoT data security, and social awareness. The final chapter presents case studies including smart home, wearables, connected cars, industrial Internet, smart cities, IoT in agriculture, smart retail, energy engagement, IoT in healthcare, and IoT in poultry and farming.Discusses ongoing research into the connection of the physical and virtual worlds;Includes the architecture, security, privacy, communications, and protocols of IoT;Presents a variety of case studies in IoT including wearables, smart cities, and energy management.

Towards the Internet of Services: The Theseus Research Program (Cognitive Technologies)

The Internet of Services and the Internet of Things are major building blocks of the Future Internet. The digital enterprise of the future is based not only on mobile, social, and cloud technologies, but also on se­mantic technologies and the future Internet of Everything. Semantic technologies now enable mass cus­tomization for the delivery of goods and services that meet individual customer needs and tastes with near mass production efficiency and reliability. This is creating a competitive advantage in the industrial econ­omy, the service economy, and the emerging data economy, leading to smart products, smart services, and smart data, all adaptable to specific tasks, locations, situations, and contexts of smart spaces. Such tech­nologies allow us to describe, revise, and adapt the characteristics, functions, processes, and usage patterns of customization targets on the basis of machine-understandable content representation that enables auto­mated processing and information sharing between human and software agents. This book explains the principal achievements of the Theseus research program, one of the central pro­grams in the German government's Digital 2015 initiative and its High-Tech Strategy 2020. The methods, toolsets, and standards for semantic technologies developed during this program form a solid basis for the fourth industrial revolution (Industrie 4.0), the hybrid service economy, and the transformation of big data into useful smart data for the emerging data economy. The contributing authors are leading scientists and engineers, representing world-class academic and in­dustrial research teams, and the ideas, technologies, and representative use cases they describe in the book derive from results in multidisciplinary fields, such as the Internet of Services; the Semantic Web, and semantic technologies, knowledge management, and search; user interfaces, multimodal interaction, and visualization; machine learning and data mining; and business process support, manufacturing, automa­tion, medical systems, and integrated service engineering. The book will be of value to both researchers and practitioners in these domains.

Towards the Integration of IoT, Cloud and Big Data: Services, Applications and Standards (Studies in Big Data #137)

This book discusses integration of internet of things (IoT), cloud computing, and big data. It presents a unique platform where IoT, cloud computing, and big data are fused together and can be foreseen as a perfect solution to many applications. Usually, IoT, cloud computing, and big data are researched separately on the basis of their properties, underlying technologies, and other open issues. Integration of IoT, cloud computing and big data is not that easy and can face key open issues like standardization of interfaces, power and energy efficiency in both data processing and transmission, security and privacy, storage mechanisms for future applications, scalability and flexibility, and QoS provisioning for end user applications. Integration of IoT, cloud computing, and big data represents the next big rise for future industry and business applications. This integration opens new exhilarating directions for research and it is discussed in this book.

Towards the Information Society: The Case of Central and Eastern European Countries (Ethics of Science and Technology Assessment #9)

Information and knowledge play an increasingly important role in the implementation of public policies, in particular those of the Central and Eastern European Countries. They are involved in many respects in the elaboration of scientific programs. They are more and more present in the political decision making process and as topic for scientific conferences. They are often at the centre of international discussions on related topics, for example, differences in approaches to produce and apply knowledge or different responses to social function of information. A major lesson of these past years applies to democracy. Europeans demand more involvement in decisions that concern them. This demand goes weH beyond decision making. For public action to be acceptable and efficient, the whole process should become more democratic, from the defmition of the problems, to the implementation and the evaluation of solutions. In the context of conducting research on the consequences of scientific and technological advance, the Europäische Akademie Bad Neuenahr-Ahrweiler in Germany and the Academy of Science of the Czech Republic organised a conference on the relationship between "democracy-participation-technology assessment" in February 1999. The objective of the workshop was to express and to the problems of transition "from exchange various viewpoints and attitudes information society to knowledge society. " The great response given to the international conference underlines the need not only for Central and Eastern European Countries to take into consideration more common projects like this for the future.

Towards the Implementation of the New Urban Agenda: Contributions from Japan and Germany to Make Cities More Environmentally Sustainable

This book looks at the New Urban Agenda and prospects of its implementation. In 2016, the New Urban Agenda was endorsed by the General Assembly of the United Nations after having been adopted by the United Nations Conference on Housing and Sustainable Urban Development (Habitat III) in Quito, Ecuador. Together with the Sustainable Development Goals, it provides a comprehensive and ambitious roadmap for global debate and action related to sustainable urbanisation during the coming decades. As mature economies and ageing societies, Japan and Germany can make considerable contributions to the implementation of the New Urban Agenda. Both countries share a number of similar challenges for environmentally sustainable and resilient urban development under conditions of social change. Furthermore, they have vast experience in actively promoting urban transformation towards a more sustainable urban future. At the same time the authors are making a contribution towards implementing the New Urban Agenda. Other countries may build up on the experience provided and the 20 examples described in this book. The work is based on a longstanding cooperation between the Graduate School of Environmental Studies of the Nagoya University (Japan), the Leibniz Institute of Ecological Urban and Regional Development (Germany) and the Technische Universität Dresden (Germany).

Towards the Humanisation of Birth: A Study Of Epidural Analgesia And Hospital Birth Culture

This book examines the future of birthing practices, particularly by focusing on epidural analgesia in childbirth. It describes historical and cultural trajectories that have shaped the way in which birth is understood in Western, developed nations. In setting out the nature of epidural history, knowledge and practice, the book delves into related birth practices within the hospital setting. By critically examining these practices, which are embedded in a scientific discourse that rationalises and relies upon technology use, the authors argue that epidural analgesia has been positioned as a safe technology in contemporary maternity culture, despite it carrying particular risks. In examining alternative research the book proposes that increasing epidural rates are not only due to greater pain relief requirements or access but are influenced by technocratic values and a fragmented maternity system. The authors outline the way in which this epidural discourse influences how information is presented to women and how this affects their choices around the use of pain relief in labour.

Towards the Humanisation of Birth: A study of epidural analgesia and hospital birth culture

This book examines the future of birthing practices, particularly by focusing on epidural analgesia in childbirth. It describes historical and cultural trajectories that have shaped the way in which birth is understood in Western, developed nations. In setting out the nature of epidural history, knowledge and practice, the book delves into related birth practices within the hospital setting. By critically examining these practices, which are embedded in a scientific discourse that rationalises and relies upon technology use, the authors argue that epidural analgesia has been positioned as a safe technology in contemporary maternity culture, despite it carrying particular risks. In examining alternative research the book proposes that increasing epidural rates are not only due to greater pain relief requirements or access but are influenced by technocratic values and a fragmented maternity system. The authors outline the way in which this epidural discourse influences how information is presented to women and how this affects their choices around the use of pain relief in labour.

Towards the Future of Surgery

Towards the Future of Fuzzy Logic (Studies in Fuzziness and Soft Computing #325)

This book provides readers with a snapshot of the state-of-the art in fuzzy logic. Throughout the chapters, key theories developed in the last fifty years as well as important applications to practical problems are presented and discussed from different perspectives, as the authors hail from different disciplines and therefore use fuzzy logic for different purposes. The book aims at showing how fuzzy logic has evolved since the first theory formulation by Lotfi A. Zadeh in his seminal paper on Fuzzy Sets in 1965. Fuzzy theories and implementation grew at an impressive speed and achieved significant results, especially on the applicative side. The study of fuzzy logic and its practice spread all over the world, from Europe to Asia, America and Oceania. The editors believe that, thanks to the drive of young researchers, fuzzy logic will be able to face the challenging goals posed by computing with words. New frontiers of knowledge are waiting to be explored. In order to motivate young people to engage in the future development of fuzzy logic, fuzzy methodologies, fuzzy applications, etc., the editors invited a team of internationally respected experts to write the present collection of papers, which shows the present and future potentials of fuzzy logic from different disciplinary perspectives and personal standpoints.

Towards the Flame: Empire, War and the End of Tsarist Russia

TLS BOOKS OF THE YEAR 2016FINANCIAL TIMES BOOKS OF THE YEAR 2015WINNER OF THE PUSHKIN HOUSE RUSSIAN BOOK PRIZE 2016 'Magisterial... reveals how much is at stake for world order in Ukraine and Syria.' Rachel Polonsky'As much as anything, World War I turned on the fate of Ukraine'The decision to go to war in 1914 had catastrophic consequences for Russia. The result was revolution, civil war and famine in 1917-20, followed by decades of communist rule. Dominic Lieven's powerful and original book, based on exhaustive and unprecedented study in Russian and many other foreign archives, explains why this suicidal decision was made and explores the world of the men who made it, thereby consigning their entire class to death or exile and making their country the victim of a uniquely terrible political experiment under Lenin and Stalin.Dominic Lieven is a Senior Research Fellow of Trinity College,Cambridge University, and a Fellow of the British Academy. His book Russia Against Napoleon (Penguin) won the Wolfson Prize for History and the Prize of the Fondation Napoleon for the best foreign work on the Napoleonic era.

Towards the First Silicon Laser (NATO Science Series II: Mathematics, Physics and Chemistry #93)

Silicon, the leading material in microelectronics during the last four decades, also promises to be the key material in the future. Despite many claims that silicon technology has reached fundamental limits, the performance of silicon microelectronics continues to improve steadily. The same holds for almost all the applications for which Si was considered to be unsuitable. The main exception to this positive trend is the silicon laser, which has not been demonstrated to date. The main reason for this comes from a fundamental limitation related to the indirect nature of the Si band-gap. In the recent past, many different approaches have been taken to achieve this goal: dislocated silicon, extremely pure silicon, silicon nanocrystals, porous silicon, Er doped Si-Ge, SiGe alloys and multiquantum wells, SiGe quantum dots, SiGe quantum cascade structures, shallow impurity centers in silicon and Er doped silicon. All of these are abundantly illustrated in the present book.

Towards the Ethics of a Green Future: The Theory and Practice of Human Rights for Future People (Routledge Studies in Sustainability)

What are our obligations towards future generations who stand to be harmed by the impact of today’s environmental crises? This book explores ecological sustainability as a human rights issue and examines what our long-term responsibilities might be. This interdisciplinary collection of chapters provides a basis for understanding the debates on the provision of sustainability for future generations from a diverse set of theoretical standpoints. Covering a broad range of perspectives such as risk and uncertainty, legal implementation, representation, motivation and economics, Towards the Ethics of a Green Future sets out the key questions involved in this complex ethical issue. The contributors bring theoretical discussions to life through the use of case studies and real-world examples. The book also includes clear and tangible recommendations for policymakers on how to put the suggestions proposed within the book into practice. This book will be of great interest to all researchers and students concerned with issues of sustainability and human rights, as well as scholars of environmental politics, law and ethics more generally.

Towards the Ethics of a Green Future: The Theory and Practice of Human Rights for Future People (Routledge Studies in Sustainability)

What are our obligations towards future generations who stand to be harmed by the impact of today’s environmental crises? This book explores ecological sustainability as a human rights issue and examines what our long-term responsibilities might be. This interdisciplinary collection of chapters provides a basis for understanding the debates on the provision of sustainability for future generations from a diverse set of theoretical standpoints. Covering a broad range of perspectives such as risk and uncertainty, legal implementation, representation, motivation and economics, Towards the Ethics of a Green Future sets out the key questions involved in this complex ethical issue. The contributors bring theoretical discussions to life through the use of case studies and real-world examples. The book also includes clear and tangible recommendations for policymakers on how to put the suggestions proposed within the book into practice. This book will be of great interest to all researchers and students concerned with issues of sustainability and human rights, as well as scholars of environmental politics, law and ethics more generally.

Towards the End of the Morning

Michael Frayn's classic novel is set in the crossword and nature notes department of an obscure national newspaper during the declining years of Fleet Street, John Dyson, a mid-level editor, dreams wistfully of fame and the gentlemanly life -- until one day his great chance of glory arrives. But does he have what it takes to succeed in the exciting world of television?

Towards the emancipation of patients: Patients' experiences and the patient movement

Despite a policy focus on involving patients in health care and increasing patient autonomy, much covert coercion of patients takes place in everyday healthcare. This book, by a leading patient activist, examines for the first time how the patient movement, which works to improve the quality of healthcare, can actually be considered an emancipation movement when led by its radical elements. In this highly original book the author argues that radical patient groups and individual activists who repeatedly challenge or oppose some standards in healthcare, can be seen as working in the direction of freeing patients from coercion and from its associated injustice and inequality. Combining new academic theory with rich empirical evidence, the book explains how looking at healthcare from an emancipatory perspective could improve its quality as patients experience it. It will appeal to health professionals, managers, patient activists, policy makers and others concerned with the quality of healthcare.

Towards the emancipation of patients: Patients' experiences and the patient movement

Despite a policy focus on involving patients in health care and increasing patient autonomy, much covert coercion of patients takes place in everyday healthcare. This book, by a leading patient activist, examines for the first time how the patient movement, which works to improve the quality of healthcare, can actually be considered an emancipation movement when led by its radical elements. In this highly original book the author argues that radical patient groups and individual activists who repeatedly challenge or oppose some standards in healthcare, can be seen as working in the direction of freeing patients from coercion and from its associated injustice and inequality. Combining new academic theory with rich empirical evidence, the book explains how looking at healthcare from an emancipatory perspective could improve its quality as patients experience it. It will appeal to health professionals, managers, patient activists, policy makers and others concerned with the quality of healthcare.

Towards the Elimination of Racism: Pergamon General Psychology Series

Towards the Elimination of Racism reviews the information gained from previous studies that tackle racist attitudes and examines the possible direction of future research that tackle racism. The main emphasis of the selection is on finding ways to change negative racial attitudes. The book first details the trends of research in racial prejudice, and then proceeds to discussing the theories of prejudice acquisition and reduction. Next, the title reviews several studies that deal with attitude and behavior change. In the last part, the text tackles the role of various institutions in addressing the problem of racism. The book will be of great use to researchers and practitioners of behavioral science and its related disciplines, such as sociology, anthropology, and philosophy.

Towards the E-Society: E-Commerce, E-Business, and E-Government (IFIP Advances in Information and Communication Technology #74)

I3E 2001 is the first in a series of conferences on e-commerce, e-business, and- government organised by the three IFIP committees TC6, TC8, and TC11. It provides a forum, where users, engineers, and scientists from academia, industry, and government can present their latest findings in e-commerce, e-business, and- government applications and the underlying technology to support those applications. The conference comprises a main track and mini tracks dedicated to special topics. The papers presented in the main track were rigorously refereed and selected by the International Programme Committee of the conference. Thematically they were grouped in the following sessions: – Sessions on security and trust, comprising nine papers referring to both trust and security in general as well as presenting specific concepts for enhancing trust in the digital society. – Session on inter-organisational transactions, covering papers related to auditing of inter-organizational trade procedures, cross-organizational workflow and transactions in Business to Business platforms. – Session on virtual enterprises, encompassing papers describing innovative approaches for creating virtual enterprises as well as describing examples of virtual enterprises in specific industries. – Session on online communities containing three papers, which provide case studies of specific online communities and various concepts on how companies can build and harness the potential of online communities. – Sessions on strategies and business models with papers describing specific business models as well as general overviews of specific approaches for E- Strategy formulation.

Towards the Dignity of Difference?: Neither 'End of History' nor 'Clash of Civilizations' (Ethics and Global Politics)

The rise of popular social movements throughout the Middle East, North Africa, Europe and North America in 2011 challenged two hegemonic discourses of the post-Cold War era: Francis Fukuyama's 'The End of History' and Samuel Huntington's 'The Clash of Civilizations.' The quest for genuine democracy and social justice and the backlash against the neoliberal order is a common theme in the global mass protests in the West and the East. This is no less than a discursive paradigm shift, a new beginning to the history, a move towards new alternatives to the status quo. This book is about difference and dialogue; it embraces The Dignity of Difference and promotes dialogue. However, it also demonstrates the limits of dialogue as a useful and universal approach for resolving conflicts, particularly in cases involving asymmetric and unequal power relations. The distinguished group of authors suggests in this volume that there is a 'third way' of addressing global tensions - one that rejects the extremes of both universalism and particularism. This third way is a radical call for an epistemic shift in our understanding of 'us-other' and 'good-evil', a radical approach toward accommodating difference as well as embracing the plural concept of 'the good'. The authors strengthen their alternative approach with a practical policy guide, by challenging existing policies that either exclude or assimilate other cultures, that wage the constructed 'global war on terror,' and that impose a western neo-liberal discourse on non-western societies. This important book will be essential reading for all those studying civilizations, globalization, foreign policy, peace and security studies, multiculturalism and ethnicity, regionalism, global governance and international political economy.

Towards the Dignity of Difference?: Neither 'End of History' nor 'Clash of Civilizations' (Ethics and Global Politics)

The rise of popular social movements throughout the Middle East, North Africa, Europe and North America in 2011 challenged two hegemonic discourses of the post-Cold War era: Francis Fukuyama's 'The End of History' and Samuel Huntington's 'The Clash of Civilizations.' The quest for genuine democracy and social justice and the backlash against the neoliberal order is a common theme in the global mass protests in the West and the East. This is no less than a discursive paradigm shift, a new beginning to the history, a move towards new alternatives to the status quo. This book is about difference and dialogue; it embraces The Dignity of Difference and promotes dialogue. However, it also demonstrates the limits of dialogue as a useful and universal approach for resolving conflicts, particularly in cases involving asymmetric and unequal power relations. The distinguished group of authors suggests in this volume that there is a 'third way' of addressing global tensions - one that rejects the extremes of both universalism and particularism. This third way is a radical call for an epistemic shift in our understanding of 'us-other' and 'good-evil', a radical approach toward accommodating difference as well as embracing the plural concept of 'the good'. The authors strengthen their alternative approach with a practical policy guide, by challenging existing policies that either exclude or assimilate other cultures, that wage the constructed 'global war on terror,' and that impose a western neo-liberal discourse on non-western societies. This important book will be essential reading for all those studying civilizations, globalization, foreign policy, peace and security studies, multiculturalism and ethnicity, regionalism, global governance and international political economy.

Towards the Definition of Philosophy (Continuum Impacts)

Towards the Definition of Philosophy brings together - in their first English translation - two of Heidegger's seminal lecture courses, The Idea of Philosophy and the Problem of Worldview and Phenomenology and Transcendental Philosophy Value, as well as the lecture, On the Nature of the University and Academic Study. The volume also includes a short glossary.

Towards the Critique of Violence: Walter Benjamin and Giorgio Agamben (Bloomsbury Studies in Continental Philosophy)

In the past two and a half decades, Walter Benjamin's early essay 'Towards the Critique of Violence' (1921) has taken a central place in politico-philosophic debates. The complexity and perhaps even the occasional obscurity of Benjamin's text have undoubtedly contributed to the diversity, conflict, and richness of contemporary readings. Interest has heightened following the attention that philosophers such as Jacques Derrida and Giorgio Agamben have devoted to it. Agamben's own interest started early in his career with his 1970 essay, 'On the Limits of Violence', and Benjamin's essay continues to be a fundamental reference in Agamben's work.Written by internationally recognized scholars, Towards the Critique of Violence is the first book to explore politico-philosophic implications of Benjamin's 'Critique of Violence' and correlative implications of Benjamin's resonance in Agamben's writings. Topics of this collection include mythic violence, the techniques of non-violent conflict resolution, ambiguity, destiny or fate, decision and nature, and the relation between justice and thinking. The volume explores Agamben's usage of certain Benjaminian themes, such as Judaism and law, bare life, sacrifice, and Kantian experience, culminating with the English translation of Agamben's 'On the Limits of Violence'.

Towards the Critique of Violence: Walter Benjamin and Giorgio Agamben (Bloomsbury Studies in Continental Philosophy)

In the past two and a half decades, Walter Benjamin's early essay 'Towards the Critique of Violence' (1921) has taken a central place in politico-philosophic debates. The complexity and perhaps even the occasional obscurity of Benjamin's text have undoubtedly contributed to the diversity, conflict, and richness of contemporary readings. Interest has heightened following the attention that philosophers such as Jacques Derrida and Giorgio Agamben have devoted to it. Agamben's own interest started early in his career with his 1970 essay, 'On the Limits of Violence', and Benjamin's essay continues to be a fundamental reference in Agamben's work.Written by internationally recognized scholars, Towards the Critique of Violence is the first book to explore politico-philosophic implications of Benjamin's 'Critique of Violence' and correlative implications of Benjamin's resonance in Agamben's writings. Topics of this collection include mythic violence, the techniques of non-violent conflict resolution, ambiguity, destiny or fate, decision and nature, and the relation between justice and thinking. The volume explores Agamben's usage of certain Benjaminian themes, such as Judaism and law, bare life, sacrifice, and Kantian experience, culminating with the English translation of Agamben's 'On the Limits of Violence'.

Towards the Comprehensive University

Towards the Compassionate University: From Golden Thread to Global Impact (Routledge Studies in Management, Organizations and Society)

This book makes a significant contribution to the need for compassion in the 21st-century neoliberal university. Compassion is a process that involves (i) noticing that suffering is present in an organization; (ii) making meaning of suffering in a way that contributes to a desire to alleviate it; (iii) feeling empathic concern; and (iv) taking action. There is increasing recognition of the crucial role of compassion as a core concern in education, health and social care, and globally to ensure the future sustainability of humankind and the planet. Drawing upon a wide range of interdisciplinary, theoretical, and professional perspectives—including social sciences, modern Darwinism, intersectionality, higher education policy, and organization studies—the book addresses the key challenges facing 21st-century universities. For example, intersectionality and higher education, staff and student health and well-being, and responding to global challenges such as the coronavirus pandemic. The book is relevant to university leaders, policy makers, educators, researchers, university staff, and students aspiring to develop their own understanding of the role of compassion in professional life. It is an important marker of the compassion turn in higher education and what this means for contemporary academic leadership, followership, and pedagogical practice.

Towards the Compassionate University: From Golden Thread to Global Impact (Routledge Studies in Management, Organizations and Society)

This book makes a significant contribution to the need for compassion in the 21st-century neoliberal university. Compassion is a process that involves (i) noticing that suffering is present in an organization; (ii) making meaning of suffering in a way that contributes to a desire to alleviate it; (iii) feeling empathic concern; and (iv) taking action. There is increasing recognition of the crucial role of compassion as a core concern in education, health and social care, and globally to ensure the future sustainability of humankind and the planet. Drawing upon a wide range of interdisciplinary, theoretical, and professional perspectives—including social sciences, modern Darwinism, intersectionality, higher education policy, and organization studies—the book addresses the key challenges facing 21st-century universities. For example, intersectionality and higher education, staff and student health and well-being, and responding to global challenges such as the coronavirus pandemic. The book is relevant to university leaders, policy makers, educators, researchers, university staff, and students aspiring to develop their own understanding of the role of compassion in professional life. It is an important marker of the compassion turn in higher education and what this means for contemporary academic leadership, followership, and pedagogical practice.

Towards the Automatization of Cranial Implant Design in Cranioplasty II: Second Challenge, AutoImplant 2021, Held in Conjunction with MICCAI 2021, Strasbourg, France, October 1, 2021, Proceedings (Lecture Notes in Computer Science #13123)

This book constitutes the Second Automatization of Cranial Implant Design in Cranioplasty Challenge, AutoImplant 2021, which was held in conjunction with the 24th International Conference on Medical Image Computing and Computer-Assisted Intervention, MICCAI 2021, in Strasbourg, France, in September, 2021. The challenge took place virtually due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The 7 papers are presented together with one invited paper, one qualitative evaluation criteria from neurosurgeons and a dataset descriptor. This challenge aims to provide more affordable, faster, and more patient-friendly solutions to the design and manufacturing of medical implants, including cranial implants, which is needed in order to repair a defective skull from a brain tumor surgery or trauma. The presented solutions can serve as a good benchmark for future publications regarding 3D volumetric shape learning and cranial implant design.

Towards the Automatization of Cranial Implant Design in Cranioplasty: First Challenge, AutoImplant 2020, Held in Conjunction with MICCAI 2020, Lima, Peru, October 8, 2020, Proceedings (Lecture Notes in Computer Science #12439)

This book constitutes the First Automatization of Cranial Implant Design in Cranioplasty Challenge, AutoImplant 2020, which was held in conjunction with the 23rd International Conference on Medical Image Computing and Computer-Assisted Intervention, MICCAI 2020, in Lima, Peru, in October 2020. The challenge took place virtually due to the COVID-19 pandemic.The 10 papers presented together with one invited paper and a dataset descriptor in this volume were carefully reviewed and selected form numerous submissions. This challenge aims to provide more affordable, faster, and more patient-friendly solutions to the design and manufacturing of medical implants, including cranial implants, which is needed in order to repair a defective skull from a brain tumor surgery or trauma. The presented solutions can serve as a good benchmark for future publications regarding 3D volumetric shape learning and cranial implant design.

Towards Teaching in Public: Reshaping the Modern University

Towards Teaching in Public: Reshaping the Modern University explores how the contested relationships between policy, curriculum and pedagogy are reshaping the modern university and examines the impact of conceptualisations of teaching in public on this debate in this age of academic capitalism. It traces the emergence of strategies for open access, with particular reference to the contribution of technology and e-learning, to the emergence of teaching in public as a critique of current educational policy. The contributors combine policy analysis with a consideration of pedagogical issues and an exploration of the student experience.This collection draws together chapters by experienced scholars and practitioners within the field of teaching and learning in higher education.

Towards Teaching in Public: Reshaping the Modern University

Towards Teaching in Public: Reshaping the Modern University explores how the contested relationships between policy, curriculum and pedagogy are reshaping the modern university and examines the impact of conceptualisations of teaching in public on this debate in this age of academic capitalism. It traces the emergence of strategies for open access, with particular reference to the contribution of technology and e-learning, to the emergence of teaching in public as a critique of current educational policy. The contributors combine policy analysis with a consideration of pedagogical issues and an exploration of the student experience.This collection draws together chapters by experienced scholars and practitioners within the field of teaching and learning in higher education.

Towards Tate Modern: Public Policy, Private Vision

Towards Tate Modern provides a new interdisciplinary account of Tate’s shifting position as a national arts institution. The book examines how earlier government directives impacted on Tate, which saw the organisation refocusing its aims and resulted in it pioneering new models for working across the public and private sectors. The decade prior to the opening of Tate Modern witnessed a changing political, economic, cultural and social landscape. As London was rebuilding its own vision, Tate re-configured its role as a public museum and gallery by engaging with the market. Tate re-imagined what a public museum and gallery can do, what it can look like and where it can be and, in doing so, responded to a new kind of audience with a larger appetite than before. Re-cast as a cultural and social forum, Tate Modern turned itself into a popular public event. This research considers how Tate Modern generated a set of new debates and what this might mean for the future role of the public museum and gallery. Towards Tate Modern will be of particular interest to academics and students, art practitioners and policy makers working in the fields of museum studies, policy studies, cultural studies, urban studies, and political and economic history, as well as those involved in archival research. It will also engage those wishing to widen their understanding of how an institution such as Tate Modern was created.

Towards Tate Modern: Public Policy, Private Vision

Towards Tate Modern provides a new interdisciplinary account of Tate’s shifting position as a national arts institution. The book examines how earlier government directives impacted on Tate, which saw the organisation refocusing its aims and resulted in it pioneering new models for working across the public and private sectors. The decade prior to the opening of Tate Modern witnessed a changing political, economic, cultural and social landscape. As London was rebuilding its own vision, Tate re-configured its role as a public museum and gallery by engaging with the market. Tate re-imagined what a public museum and gallery can do, what it can look like and where it can be and, in doing so, responded to a new kind of audience with a larger appetite than before. Re-cast as a cultural and social forum, Tate Modern turned itself into a popular public event. This research considers how Tate Modern generated a set of new debates and what this might mean for the future role of the public museum and gallery. Towards Tate Modern will be of particular interest to academics and students, art practitioners and policy makers working in the fields of museum studies, policy studies, cultural studies, urban studies, and political and economic history, as well as those involved in archival research. It will also engage those wishing to widen their understanding of how an institution such as Tate Modern was created.

Towards System Safety: Proceedings of the Seventh Safety-critical Systems Symposium, Huntingdon, UK 1999

Each year the Safety-critical Systems Symposium brings together practitioners and researchers in a quest to inculcate a higher degree of safety engineering into the development and operation of critical software-based systems. On this, the Symposium's seventh occasion, it explores recent work and experience which lead us further 'towards system safety'. This book of the Proceedings covers the entire event. The first paper is the course text of a tutorial run on the first day of the Symposium, included here to provide readers with a coverage of the entire event. The next fourteen papers were presented, on the second and third days, in six sessions: Safety Cases, Systems Engineering, Safety Analysis and Safety Integrity, Tools for Software Safety, Solving Safety Problems, and Qllestions and Competences. Eight of the fourteen papers were authored in industry, four in universities, and two in other research establishments. Four of them report on work outside the UK: in France, Germany, Norway and Brazil. There are three papers on safety cases, each taking a different perspective. Skogstad from Norway and Boyce and Hamilton of GEC-Marconi both report on experience in the field, the former in attempting to apply European norms to project documentation and the latter in attempting to build up a retrospective safety case. The third paper, by Goodman, takes a more philosophical stance, examining the lack of useful measurement in safety assurance.

Towards Synthesis of Micro-/Nano-systems: The 11th International Conference on Precision Engineering (ICPE) August 16-18, 2006, Tokyo, Japan (Jspe Publications #No. 5)

This collection of papers, presented at the 11th International Conference on Precision Engineering, offers a broader global perspective on the challenges and opportunities ahead. The discussion encompasses leading-edge technologies and forecasts future trends. Coverage includes advanced manufacturing systems; ultra-precision- and micro-machining; nanotechnology for fabrication and measurement; rapid prototyping and production technology; new materials and advanced processes; computer-aided production engineering; manufacturing process control; production planning and scheduling, and much more.

Towards Sustainable Welfare States in Europe: Social Policy and Climate Change

This seminal book addresses the critical and urgent question of ‘what makes welfare states sustainable?’ in the era of climate change. Expert authors challenge traditional perspectives on questions of sustainability which have focused on population ageing, global economic turbulence and on containing current and future public social spending.The chapters present new empirical evidence in the form of in-depth comparative country studies from across Europe, offering an insight into how political actors, social partners and civil society organisations in countries associated with different welfare models address questions of sustainability and the extent to which they balance social, ecological and economic considerations. The editors conclude by mapping out ways in which welfare states can address these increasingly urgent and complex issues and facilitate an eco-social transition towards true sustainability.This book will be an invaluable resource for scholars and students of comparative social policy, environmental politics and policy and climate change. Highlighting the political and structural challenges European societies face in the transition to low carbon economies, this book will also be beneficial for policymakers and practitioners in these areas.

Towards Sustainable Use of Rangelands in North-West China

Towards Sustainable Use of Rangelands in China’s North West is based on the program of the International Conference Implementing GEF Objectives in a Systems Framework held in Lanzhou, Gansu, China in October 2008. This collection reviews the extent of resource debasement in China’s pastoral zones and offers solutions for their sustainable use. The five parts deal with ran- lands, and the people who manage them, and assess prospects for implementation of more sustainable rangeland/livestock production systems. Topics include Livestock husbandry development and agro-pastoral integration in Gansu and Xinjiang; Ecological restoration and control of rangeland degradation. Despite widespread degradation, the articles reveal the approaches that are likely to lead to recovery of these rangelands and better livelihoods for the local herders and farmers. Two chapters are devoted to the achievement of global environmental objectives. Carbon sequestration and biodiversity conservation in mountain grasslands are just a few of the covered subjects. This portion of the book pays special attention to the successful results in Gansu and Xinjiang – major regions of China’s pastoral lands. The final division addresses measures to improve the profitability and susta- ability of herding and farming in the pastoral areas of north-west China There are fifteen chapters on subjects that include: Livestock management, Rangeland management interventions, Agro-pastoral integration, Improved animal husbandry practices as a basis for profitability. Land tenure and access, Environmental education, Ecological Restoration and New Management approaches for China’s northwest pastoral areas.

Towards Sustainable Society on Ubiquitous Networks: The 8th IFIP Conference on e-Business, e-Services, and e-Society (I3E 2008), September 24 - 26, 2008, Tokyo, Japan (IFIP Advances in Information and Communication Technology)

The massive growth of the Internet has made an enormous amount of infor- tion available to us. However, it is becoming very difficult for users to acquire an - plicable one. Therefore, some techniques such as information filtering have been - troduced to address this issue. Recommender systems filter information that is useful to a user from a large amount of information. Many e-commerce sites use rec- mender systems to filter specific information that users want out of an overload of - formation [2]. For example, Amazon. com is a good example of the success of - commender systems [1]. Over the past several years, a considerable amount of research has been conducted on recommendation systems. In general, the usefulness of the recommendation is measured based on its accuracy [3]. Although a high - commendation accuracy can indicate a user's favorite items, there is a fault in that - ly similar items will be recommended. Several studies have reported that users might not be satisfied with a recommendation even though it exhibits high recommendation accuracy [4]. For this reason, we consider that a recommendation having only accuracy is - satisfactory. The serendipity of a recommendation is an important element when c- sidering a user's long-term profits. A recommendation that brings serendipity to users would solve the problem of “user weariness” and would lead to exploitation of users' tastes. The viewpoint of the diversity of the recommendation as well as its accuracy should be required for future recommender systems.

Towards Sustainable Security: Oxford Research Group International Security Report 2007

The Iraq War shows no sign of ending, NATO is progressively more mired in conflict in Afghanistan, and the al-Qaida movement has established safe havens in western Pakistan while being seen once again as a major threat.*BR**BR*In light of this, the new Oxford Research Group international security report questions current policies and argues for the adoption of sustainable security as the underlying approach.*BR**BR*Tackling events in chronological order over the key 2006-07 period, the report offers a clear and compelling account of a 'war on terror' that has gone wrong in every major respect and is in urgent need of a comprehensive re-thinking of the entire outlook.*BR**BR*Comments on earlier editions of the Oxford Research Group International Security Report:*BR*"Incisive, elegant, profound: if you want to understand what happened and why, you should start here." GEORGE MONBIOT*BR*"Paul Rogers is a secular prophet for our trouble age. This analysis should be required reading in the Pentagon." DAVID LLOYN, BBC*BR*"Paul Rogers has proved himself, time and again, to be a dispassionate analyst of events in Iraq … this is a must-read." TOM WALKER, SUNDAY TIMES

Towards Sustainable Natural Resources: Monitoring and Managing Ecosystem Biodiversity

Natural resources not only contribute to overall growth of the economy but also help reduce poverty by providing employment and food security to populations on the continent, and is thus the most inclusive growth sector of the economy of Asian countries. Global weather and climate studies are also increasingly being considered a vital source of information to understand the earth’s environment, in particular in the framework of weather and climate studies, land use transformation and human influence across these areas. Satellite earth observing systems provide a unique tool to monitor these changes. This book includes significant and up to date contributions in the field of sustainable natural resources conservation across the globe. While the range of applications and innovative techniques is constantly increasing, this book provides a summary of key case studies where satellite data offers critical information to help understand the causes and effects of those environmental changes, allowing us to reflect on how to minimize their negative impacts. This book is of interest to researchers and practitioners in the field of remote sensing, geographical information, meteorology, and environmental sciences. Scientists and graduate to post-graduate-level students in environmental science will also find valuable information in this book.

Towards Sustainable Livelihoods and Ecosystems in Mountain Regions (Environmental Science and Engineering)

Sustainable livelihoods and ecosystems are far-reaching and burning issues in the wake of high growth of population, low production and per ha yield of crops and depletion of biodiversity resources. Mountainous regions of the world are facing the menace of poverty, food insecurity and malnutrition. Further, tremendous growth in population and slow pace of development have together forced most of the population to live below poverty line. Traditionally depending upon cultivating subsistence crops for food requirement, the people living in mountainous region are unable to produce sufficient food grains to run their livelihood smoothly. The Himalayas is one of the world’s biodiversity hotspots and has an abundance of natural resources: land, water and forest – life sustaining factors. The geo-environmental conditions – climate and landscape further enhance the possibility of sustainable livelihoods through eco-tourism, harnessing water resources and utilizing forests and their products sustainably. Diversifying agricultural practices through cultivating cash and cereal crops and enhancing livelihood options through extensive use of timber and non-timber based forestry products can help to eradicate poverty and provide food security. This book consists of an introduction and nine chapters, covering geo-environmental setting, socio-economy and population profile, sustainable livelihoods: diversification and enhancement, livelihood analysis, development of tourism and hydroelectricity, case studies, mountain ecosystems, sustainable mountain development and also presents a conclusion.

Towards Sustainable Futures: The Role of Evaluation (Comparative Policy Evaluation)

Towards Sustainable Futures serves as a guide to better understand what roles evaluation can play in sustainability. Rather than proposing a single definition of sustainability or methodological approach, this book gives us the tools to improve the quality and relevance of evaluation of sustainability. Divided into two parts, the first part introduces the reader to key debates and challenges related to evaluation of sustainability. Part Two provides examples of methods and applications. By combining a stellar line up of specialists, theorists, and practitioners in the field of development evaluation with expert, accessible and engaged analysis of key issues, Towards Sustainable Futures is a must-read source for re-tooling and re-focussing evaluation towards the green transition imperative. It should be essential reading for scholars and practitioners of evaluation.

Towards Sustainable Futures: The Role of Evaluation (Comparative Policy Evaluation)

Towards Sustainable Futures serves as a guide to better understand what roles evaluation can play in sustainability. Rather than proposing a single definition of sustainability or methodological approach, this book gives us the tools to improve the quality and relevance of evaluation of sustainability. Divided into two parts, the first part introduces the reader to key debates and challenges related to evaluation of sustainability. Part Two provides examples of methods and applications. By combining a stellar line up of specialists, theorists, and practitioners in the field of development evaluation with expert, accessible and engaged analysis of key issues, Towards Sustainable Futures is a must-read source for re-tooling and re-focussing evaluation towards the green transition imperative. It should be essential reading for scholars and practitioners of evaluation.

Towards Sustainable Food Production in Africa: Best Management Practices and Technologies (Sustainability Sciences in Asia and Africa)

This edited book is focused on Sustainable Development Goal 2. It offers a comprehensive and topical collection of practices, technologies and innovations in the field of sustainable food production and security under a changing climate. It is a one-stop handbook for farmers, researchers, extensionists, policy makers and other stakeholders seeking to identify and disseminate best fit technologies for local and regional landscapes. It offers an understanding of the challenges, risks and uncertainties as well as opportunities to foster productive and sustainable food production. Smallholder farming and agriculture in general is facing a serious threat from climate change that has resulted in erratic and unpredictable rainfall and increased temperatures, among other abiotic stresses. These climate change induced pressures have reduced productivity mainly among the smallholder farmers, who are critical in driving the attainment of sustainable development goals like SDG 2, 12 and 13. The objective of the book is to document effective and practicable practices and technologies that can be adopted by smallholder African farmers as mitigation measures against the effects of climate change. This book is of interest to researchers, agricultural scientists, climate change scientists, capacity builders and policymakers.

Towards Sustainable Development in Central America and the Caribbean

Since the economic decline in the early 1980s, most countries in Central America and the Caribbean have returned to positive growth rates. The recovery often coincided with or followed extensive neoliberal reforms. The contributors to this book address the crucial question of whether these growth rates are sustainable. Several aspects of sustainability are assessed, in particular macroeconomic, social, and ecological aspects. The book includes both comparative analyses focusing on one of these aspects of sustainability, and country case studies. The conclusion is that these countries have not yet arrived at a sustainable growth path due to, for example, high levels of foreign and domestic debt, worrisome trade gaps, a lack of social integration and irresponsible exploitation of natural resources. In sum, the analysis points to serious weaknesses in the current neoliberal model, the implications of which go far beyond this particular region.

Towards Sustainable Development: On the Goals of Development - and the Conditions of Sustainability

The book brings together twelve original essays on the meaning and implications of sustainable development. The collection assesses the theoretical debate over the concept of sustainable development, and looks at the unique experiment in applying this practically which has taken place in Norway to discover how the concept can illuminate practical policy across a wide range of fields. Topics covered include sustainable development as a global ethics; the concept of need; global and generational equity; the limits of nature; implications for economics; and the role of technology. The editors outline the logic of the approach and draw together the implications of the individual studies for a more focused and consistent application of the concept.