Peter Gallagher – författare

This 2005 compilation of 45 case studies documents disparate experiences among economies in addressing the challenges of participating in the WTO. It demonstrates that success or failure is strongly influenced by how governments and private sector stakeholders organise themselves at home. The contributors, mainly from developing countries, give examples of participation with lessons for others. They show that when the system is accessed and employed effectively, it can serve the interests of poor and rich countries alike. However, a failure to communicate among interested parties at home often contributes to negative outcomes on the international front. Above all, these case studies demonstrate that the WTO creates a framework within which sovereign decision-making can unleash important opportunities or undermine the potential benefits flowing from a rules-based international environment that promotes open trade.

This 2005 compilation of 45 case studies documents disparate experiences among economies in addressing the challenges of participating in the WTO. It demonstrates that success or failure is strongly influenced by how governments and private sector stakeholders organise themselves at home. The contributors, mainly from developing countries, give examples of participation with lessons for others. They show that when the system is accessed and employed effectively, it can serve the interests of poor and rich countries alike. However, a failure to communicate among interested parties at home often contributes to negative outcomes on the international front. Above all, these case studies demonstrate that the WTO creates a framework within which sovereign decision-making can unleash important opportunities or undermine the potential benefits flowing from a rules-based international environment that promotes open trade.

This 2005 book was commissioned by the World Trade Organization (WTO) as a factual account of the first decade of its existence. It aims to cover the principal activities of the WTO as the successor to GATT and the steps taken to establish a global trading system. Peter Gallagher, the author, is an independent trade analyst and consultant, who records what might be regarded as the WTO's main achievements as well as describing the controversies that have arisen in its first ten years. A useful reference book for policy makers, journalists, members of trade delegations and for everyone who requires a detailed understanding of the workings of the WTO.

Bruce Springsteen called him 'one of the great, great American songwriters', Jackson Browne hailed him as 'the first and foremost proponent of song noir', and Stephen King once said that if he could write like him, he 'would be a happy guy'. The list of artists that lined up to appear on his records include Bruce Springsteen, Neil Young, Bob Dylan, Dave Gilmour and Emmylou Harris. So how is it that most people, if they have heard of Warren Zevon at all, know him only as 'that Werewolves' guy'? This book goes beyond that solitary hit single to examine all aspects of Zevon's multifaceted, five-decade career, from his beginnings in the slightly psychedelic folk duo Lyme and Cybelle, through to his commercial breakthrough in the late Seventies with Excitable Boy, his critically acclaimed late Eighties comeback Sentimental Hygiene, his decline into cult obscurity, and his triumphant if heart-breaking final testament, The Wind, released just prior to his death in 2003. Along the way the reader will discover one of rock's consummate balladeers, as well as a cast of characters including doomed drug dealers, psychopathic adolescents, outlaws of the Old West, BDSM fetishists, ghostly gunslingers, an unfeasibly large assembly of apes, and, yes, lycanthropes unleashed on the streets of London.

They pulled on their platform boots and slapped on the makeup when everybody else was discarding theirs. Their albums were subject to poor production, scathing reviews, and commercial indifference. Other bands refused to have them as their opening act. Their record company was up against the wall. By all reasoning, they should have become one of the 'lost' bands of the 1970s, like the Harlots of 42nd Street or the Hollywood Stars. Yet in 1975 Kiss unexpectedly came Alive! and by the following year, they were the biggest rock and roll band - and brand - in America.This is a journey through Kiss's first and most storied decade. It is the story of the four men behind the masks, and the music they made, the studio albums, the legendary live albums, and of one of the greatest rock follies in music history, the four simultaneously released solo album. Along the way, it tells of the costumes and the concerts, the merchandise and the Marvel comic books, the television appearances and the disastrous 1978 movie, Kiss Meets the Phantom of the Park. And having bestrode the 1970s like an unstoppable colossus, it ends with Kiss under siege, beset by changing public taste without, and combustible personalities within.

Alex Harvey was active in the music industry from the very birth of British rock and roll. A Zelig-like figure, he won a contest to become Scotland’s Tommy Steele in the 1950s, followed the Beatles to Hamburg in the early 1960s, dabbled in psychedelic rock during the Summer of Love, and joined the house band of counterculture musical Hair at the close of the decade. By the time 1972 rolled around, he had been there and done that, but had never made it big. He was 37 years old, and thinking of calling it a day. Also thinking of calling it a day were Scottish hard rockers Tear Gas. They had released two albums, each with a different line-up, none of which set the world alight, and now their singer wanted out. In a last-ditch effort to salvage something, Alex Harvey and Tear Gas’s respective managers decided to unite their respective acts. The result was Sensational.This book examines not only the eight albums by The Sensational Alex Harvey Band, but also Harvey’s earlier work with his Soul Band and solo, and his post-SAHB releases. It also reviews those two Tear Gas albums as well as Fourplay, the album SAHB released without Alex.