Geoffrey Best - Böcker

One of the most approachable and useful books on the period.Life in the two decades after the Great Exhibition.

One of the glorious triumvirate of World War II and founder of the strong Anglo-American friendship that is still apparent today, Winston Churchill stands out in history as a man who led his country through one of its most difficult times, with all of the steadfastness of a fierce and loyal bulldog. Churchill was already recognized as the most diversely gifted man in British politics before, at the ripe old age of 66, he suddenly emerged as a figure of world importance. Becoming Prime Minister on the very day in 1940 that Hitler invaded France and the Low Countries, he braced the British people to continue fighting and even to counterattack the, up to that point, all-victorious Germans. A clever and confident statesman, with an obvious love for the people he served, for years Churchill's character went unchallenged and his inspiring leadership left him above criticism. Recently, however, his record has come under attack. In Churchill: A Study in Greatness, one of Britain's most distinguished historians makes sense of this extraordinary man, and his long, controversial, colorful, contradictory and heroic career.Geoffrey Best illuminates both his strengths and his weaknesses, looking past the many received versions of Churchill, in a biography that balances the private and the public man and offers a clear insight into what made him truly great.

Civilization has long sought to limit the violence and ugliness of war. This book traces the recent history of these efforts and explores important contemporary issues in the area. Geoffrey Best shows how the Second World War prompted reconstruction of international law, and charts the fortunes of its relations with war since then. He critically surveys the whole range of contemporary armed conflicts - high-tech international wars, wars of national liberation, revolutionary risings and civil wars. Far more than a litany of the trouble-spots and tragedies of the second half of the twentieth century, this book offers an original and thought-provoking approach to contemporary history, law, politics and ethics, and will be essential reading for anyone concerned with war. Reviews of the hardback edition: `a magnificent exposition of the modern pursuit of legal restraint on warfare ... The lawyers of war and the international humanitarians would be well advised to ponder Bests Laws of War for its scholarly realism and its humanity.' London Review of Books `He writes with enormous authority and at times, for such a heavy subject, a delightfully light touch ... In obliging us to take the very notion of the ethical conduct of war so seriously, Geoffrey Best has performed an enormous service.' Lawrence Freedman, History Today `This is an important book, which the specialists in this subject will refer to for decades to come.' Noel Malcolm, Sunday Telegraph `To write a book of this character, which is scrupulous in never overstating success, and not lose faith in the process, you have to remain an optimist. Geoffrey Best has succeeded in doing this in his impressive study.' A.W. Brian Simpson, Times Literary Supplement `...ambitious, highly significant and courageous ... Interdisciplinary in approach, it is an important text for teachers, students and the practitioners of international relations alike ... Its conclusions, so relevant to the latter part of this century, should not be ignored.' Dermot Keogh, Irish Times `...affords new insights into war and its limits as defined by the law ... an interesting read ... Geoffrey Bests new book gives much food for thought to anyone interested in humanitarian law. It is well worth reading.' Hans-Peter Gasser, International Review of the Red Cross `Geoffrey Best does a signal service to lawyers, and to all students of the law of war, in his most recent examination of this field ... Dr Best has made an important contribution.' James J. Busuttil, International Relations `a sympathetic, intellectually tough and absolutely outstanding account of the contemporary role of the laws of war ... His writing is full of vivid imagery, enlivening what in other hands is often an arid landscape.' Adam Roberts, Survival

Originally published in 1976, this book explores the relationship between European society and the military institutions it fostered from 1815–1918. In the period from the fall of Napoleonic imperialism to the outbreak of the First World War armies and navies grew in complexity, cost and size. The first half of this book investigates these institutions from within, and looks at some of the factors which held them together in an increasingly difficult and hostile world, at their self-image, and at the pressures upon them from society at large.As the role of military institutions within society increased in importance, analysts began to look for the effects which this interpenetration had on society. Part 2 is concerned with the effects of this growing dominance of society by its defenders. By the end of period covered by this book, the age of total mobilisation for the war effort was upon us. In a sense this second part of the book reinforces the conclusions of the first, that military institutions are separate from the societies which surround them, and between the two a growing gap of misunderstanding and incomprehension yawned.

Originally published in 1976, this book explores the relationship between European society and the military institutions it fostered from 1815–1918. In the period from the fall of Napoleonic imperialism to the outbreak of the First World War armies and navies grew in complexity, cost and size. The first half of this book investigates these institutions from within, and looks at some of the factors which held them together in an increasingly difficult and hostile world, at their self-image, and at the pressures upon them from society at large.As the role of military institutions within society increased in importance, analysts began to look for the effects which this interpenetration had on society. Part 2 is concerned with the effects of this growing dominance of society by its defenders. By the end of period covered by this book, the age of total mobilisation for the war effort was upon us. In a sense this second part of the book reinforces the conclusions of the first, that military institutions are separate from the societies which surround them, and between the two a growing gap of misunderstanding and incomprehension yawned.

This book contains essays within a common theme by a group of distinguished historians (some of them acknowledged world leaders in their fields) in honour of the just-retired Regius Professor of Modern History at the University of Cambridge, whose contribution to religion, education and history has been recognised by the award of a knighthood and, more recently, by the Order of Merit. Their common interest is the same one that has marked Professor Chadwick's life and work: the centrality of religious history to the history of Europe and, through that, to world history as a whole.

The histories of Queen Anne's Bounty, created in 1704, and the Ecclesiastical Commissioners, established in 1836, run so closely together, and their functions, until their amalgamation in 1948 as the Church Commissioners, were so similar, that it would be impossible to study them separately. In this account of their foundation and growth, which was originally published in 1964, Dr Best shows how much they had to do with the great changes in the administration and political relations of the Church of England, which transformed the Church from the virtually medieval institution it was in the early eighteenth century, to the recognizably modern one it had become by the end of the nineteenth. Although Dr Best's book is primarily a study of two ecclesiastical bodies and of the Church reform movement, it is also an important and unusual contribution to English social and political history.

Armed force was used to make and prevent revolution in modern Europe, and as it spread it came to determine the affairs and fates of all the European nations. Beginning with the eve of the French Revolution, Geoffrey Best explains in lively detail the vast armed forces and militarized societies of the Napoleonic age. He then proceeds to analyse the contest between Europe's continuing revolutionary underground and the armies of reactionary and alien governments that culminated with the revolutions and wars of national liberation of 1848?66. Under the banners of Napoleon Bonaparte and other warrior heroes of the epoch, a military stamp was set on the European mind, the consequences of which Best critically assesses.

To no group subject to sociological and political analysis has honour seemed to matter more than to the military. Their idea of it has commonly been accepted as the most superior, open to emulation to the limited extent that different circumstances and purposes in non-military life permit.The degeneration of this concept and of the public realm in which honour’s obligations have to be observed is the subject of this book, based on the 1981 Joanne Goodman Lectures at the University of Western Ontario.Best begins with the discovery, in the age of the American and French revolutions, of the nation as the supreme object of honourable service. He discusses how nationalism and democracy marched together through the nineteenth century to harden this creed and broaden its base, so that what had previously been a code for noblemen became a popular code for patriots.He finds that, in spite of the historical naturalness, even inevitability, of nationalism, its ensuing and corrective counter-current, internationalism, is a much more appealing principle. In internationalism, a tradition of cosmopolitan, transnational thought and activity, unmoved by the passions of nationalism and critical of them on the grounds of humanity and peace, he perceives a greater field for honourable service-honour’s obligation to the service of mankind.Best casts new light upon some familiar historical episodes and values and suggests fruitful fields for future study.