This open access book connects Jane Jacobs's celebrated urban analysis to her ideas on economics and social theory. While Jacobs is a legend in the field of urbanism and famous for challenging and profoundly influencing urban planning and design, her theoretical contributions – although central to her criticisms of and proposals for public policy – are frequently overlooked even by her most…
Why are school systems structured differently across countries? The Politics of Comprehensive School Reform examines this question through an in-depth analysis of school politics in Germany and Norway during the post-war period of educational expansion. Using a Rokkanian theoretical framework, the book argues that school politics can only be understood in light of the cleavages, or political di…
This open access book examines the complex relationship between education, media and power. Exploring the entanglement of education media and power structures, the contributions use various examples and case studies to demonstrate how subjectivation processes and digital structures interact with one another. The book asks which modes of subjectivation can be identified with current media cultur…
Why are school systems structured differently across countries? The Politics of Comprehensive School Reform examines this question through an in-depth analysis of school politics in Germany and Norway during the post-war period of educational expansion. Using a Rokkanian theoretical framework, the book argues that school politics can only be understood in light of the cleavages, or political di…
Nigeria has for long been regarded as the poster child for the ‘curse’ of oil wealth. Yet despite this, Nigeria achieved strong economic growth for over a decade in the 21st century, driven largely by policy reforms in non-oil sectors. This open access book argues that Nigeria’s major development challenge is not the ‘oil curse’, but rather one of achieving economic diversification be…
Nigeria has for long been regarded as the poster child for the ‘curse’ of oil wealth. Yet despite this, Nigeria achieved strong economic growth for over a decade in the 21st century, driven largely by policy reforms in non-oil sectors. This open access book argues that Nigeria’s major development challenge is not the ‘oil curse’, but rather one of achieving economic diversification be…
This revised textbook motivates and illustrates the techniques of applied probability by applications in electrical engineering and computer science (EECS). The author presents information processing and communication systems that use algorithms based on probabilistic models and techniques, including web searches, digital links, speech recognition, GPS, route planning, recommendation systems, c…
This open access book brings together the disciplines of childhood studies, literary studies, and the environmental humanities to focus on the figure of the child as it appears in popular culture and theory. Drawing on theoretical works by Clare Colebrook, Elizabeth Povinelli, Kathryn Yusoff, Donna Haraway and Bruno Latour the book offers creative readings of sci-fi novels, short stories and fi…
This open access book discusses and analyses competing views and social implications of gestational surrogacy, which is making inroads as an option for parenthood as well as a work opportunity for women. It provides a rich account of transnational mobilizations for the abolition and regulation of surrogacy, with focus on United States, Italy and Mexico. The author critically assesses the core n…
Louis Althusser's thinking laid the groundwork for critical educational theory, yet it is often misunderstood in critical pedagogy, sociology of education, and related fields. In this open access book, David I. Backer reexamines Althusser’s educational theory, specifically the claim that education is the most powerful ideological state apparatus in modern capitalist societies. He then present…
In this comprehensive open access book, written for readers from any or no religious background, Leena El-Ali does something remarkable. Never before has anyone taken on every last claim relating to Islam and women and countered it not just with Qur’anic evidence to the contrary, but with easy-to-use tools available to all. How can a woman’s testimony be worth half of a man’s? How can men…
Xochitl Marsilli-Vargas explains how psychoanalytic listening practices have expanded beyond the clinical setting to influence everyday social interactions in Buenos Aires.
This book explores the history of rhetorical thought and examines the gradual association of different aspects of rhetorical theory with two outstanding fourth-century BCE writers: Lysias and Isocrates. It highlights the parallel development of the rhetorical tradition that became understood, on the one hand, as a domain of style and persuasive speech, associated with the figure of Lysias, and,…
Music in Evolution and Evolution in Music by Steven Jan is a comprehensive account of the relationships between evolutionary theory and music. Examining the ‘evolutionary algorithm’ that drives biological and musical-cultural evolution, the book provides a distinctive commentary on how musicality and music can shed light on our understanding of Darwin’s famous theory, and vice-versa.
This first open access volume of the handbook series contains articles on the standard model of particle physics, both from the theoretical and experimental perspective. It also covers related topics, such as heavy-ion physics, neutrino physics and searches for new physics beyond the standard model. A joint CERN-Springer initiative, the “Particle Physics Reference Library” provides revis…
In Europe the social economy employs almost 15 million workers. During the crisis years, unlike other sectors, it has often generated an increase in jobs. The aim of this comparative study is to investigate how to allow the supply and demand for young people to meet in the different types of social economy bodies. In particular, it concentrates on the problem of how to bring into line initial u…
The subsequent volume revolves around the Social-Fields-Approach (SOFIA) as an approach to conceptualization and operationalisation for the purpose of empirical research. It contributes a new perspective and approach in research on innovation. We believe that SOFIA can have implications for both academic research and practical applications in reshaping the existing instruments and governance ar…
This volume, LNAI 13385, constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 11th International Joint Conference on Automated Reasoning, IJCAR 2022, held in Haifa, Israel, in August 2022. The 32 full research papers and 9 short papers presented together with two invited talks were carefully reviewed and selected from 85 submissions. The papers focus on the following topics: Satisfiability, SMT Solving…
Public innovation and digitalization are reshaping organizations and society in various ways and within multiple fields, as innovations are essential in transforming our world and addressing global sustainability and development challenges. This book addresses the fascinating relationship of these two contemporary topics and explores the role of digital transformation in promoting public innova…
Belonging Beyond Borders maps the evolution of cosmopolitanism in Spanish American narrative literature through a generational lens. Drawing on a new theoretical framework that blends intellectual studies and literary history with integrated approaches to Spanish American narrative, this book traces the evolution from aesthetic cosmopolitanism through anti-colonial nationalism to modern politic…