Michal Osterweil - Böcker

This important new book argues that at the root of the contemporary crisis of climate, energy, food, inequality, and meaning is a certain core presupposition that structures the ways in which we live, think, act and design: the assumption of dualism, or the fundamental separateness of things.The authors contend that the key to constructing livable worlds lies in the cultivation of ways of knowing and acting based on a profound awareness of the fundamental interdependence of everything that exists – what they refer to as relationality. This shift in paradigm is necessary for healing our bodies, ecosystems, cities, and the planet at large.The book follows two interwoven threads of argumentation: on the one hand, it explains and exemplifies the modes of operation and the dire consequences of non-relational living; on the other, it elucidates the nature of relationality and explores how it is embodied in transformative practices in multiple spheres of life.The authors provide an instructive account of the philosophical, scientific, social, and political sources of relational theory and action, with the aim of illuminating the transition from living within seemingly ineluctable ‘toxic loops’ of unrelational living (based on ontological dualism), to living within ‘relational weaves’ which we might co-create with multiple human and nonhuman others.

This book is designed to be a transatlantic introduction to Social Movements studies in the twenty-first century. The authors provide an authoritative account of the development of social movement studies up to and including the emergence of global social movement. A distinctive feature is its sequential treatment of ‘old’, ‘new’ and ‘emergent’ movement forms unavailable in other work of this kind. Introduction to Social Movements includes proven (chapter summaries, textboxes, study questions, glossaries) and innovative pedagogical features,whilst detailed yet concise accounts of specific movements in the North and South provide a wealth of case materials making this a truely international book.The combination of conceptual clarity, comprehensive theoretical approaches and contemporary case studies make this book a compelling resource for teaching, and an excellent learning tool for undergraduate students of politics, political and sociological theory, and cultural studies.