Looking-Glass Wars: Spies on British Screens since 1960

Alan Burton, University of Leicester, UK

Looking-Glass Wars: Spies on British Screens since 1960 is a detailed historical and critical overview of espionage in British film and television in the important period since 1960. From that date, the British spy screen was transformed under the influence of the tremendous success of James Bond in the cinema (the spy thriller), and of the new-style spy writing of John le Carré and Len Deighton (the espionage story). In the 1960s, there developed a popular cycle of spy thrillers in the cinema and on television. The new study looks in detail at the cycle which in previous work has been largely neglected in favour of the James Bond films. The study also brings new attention to espionage on British television and popular secret agent series such as Spy Trap, Quiller and The Sandbaggers. It also gives attention to the more ‘realistic’ representation of spying in the film and television adaptations of le Carré and Deighton, and other dramas with a more serious intent. In addition, there is wholly original attention given to ‘nostalgic’ spy fictions on screen, adaptations of classic stories of espionage which were popular in the late 1970s and through the 1980s, and to ‘historical’ spy fiction, dramas which treated ‘real’ cases of espionage and their characters, most notably the notorious Cambridge Spies. Detailed attention is also given to the ‘secret state’ thriller, a cycle of paranoid screen dramas in the 1980s which portrayed the intelligence services in a conspiratorial light, best understood as a reaction to excessive official secrecy and anxieties about an unregulated security service. The study is brought up-to-date with an examination of screen espionage in Britain since the end of the Cold War. The approach is empirical and historical. The study examines the production and reception, literary and historical contexts of the films and dramas. It is the first detailed overview of the British spy screen in its crucial period since the 1960s and provides fresh attention to spy films, series and serials never previously considered.

Generational Interdependencies: The Social Implications for Welfare

Edited by Beverley A. Searle

The issue of generational transfers is growing in importance. Populations are ageing, placing an increasing burden on provision of pensions, health care and other welfare services. In many nations the imbalance between a growing, older generation, supported by a shrinking younger generation, has fuelled debates about intergenerational justice. The key argument being that political and institutional developments over the last century have been to the advantage of older generations at the expense of current younger and future generations. But this only addresses half of the story, neglecting the flows of resources, through private, family channels. One key response to the growing fiscal problem of ageing societies has been to focus responsibility on self-funding and familial support. The growth of asset values, particularly housing, which are concentrated among the elderly, underpin such strategies. But this exposes new risks as potentially extractable resources are determined by wider fluctuations in the economy, and housing markets in particular. Clearly, these cohort effects, and responses to them, play out differently in different national developmental settings, depending on long-run patterns of economic, social and demographic change. This collection address these issues and provides original insights across different international contexts. The collection focusses on financial and non-financial transfers, generational interdependencies, and the role of labour and housing markets in welfare support, set against the changing economic landscape following the Great Financial Crisis of 2007. Although institutional and national differences exist the key emerging issues are the same: the financial and welfare challenges of supporting aging in societies; inequalities in the availability of assets across individuals, families and nations; and the extent to which private asset accumulation can support families over the life course. Drawing from examples across European countries, this collection will nonetheless be relevant to researchers and policy makers in other nations addressing the complexities of providing welfare across the life course in the face of restricted financial resources.

Migration and the Crisis of the Modern Nation State?

Edited by Frank Jacob, Nord University, Norway and Adam Luedtke, Queensborough Community College (CUNY)

The anthology explores the interrelationship between migration and a supposedly existent crisis of the modern nation state. The argument of such a crisis is mainly used by the New Right to stimulate nationalist feelings and provoke hate and aggression. We, in contrast to this perception, argue that from a historical and current perspective, migration is not endangering the nation state, but rather changing the idea of a nation itself by redefining it. In historical as well as current case studies, the authors determine the political dangers of right wing demagogues, while emphasizing the chances, immigration is offering the progress of the nation state. While it will be discussed how nationalism is impacting on the perception of migration, we also want to emphasize how it is perceived by the people in the specific regions, which are either confronted with migration or those which are not. The authors for the volume come from different fields, namely history and political sciences, and are consequently able to offer the reader a broad insight into the historical roots and the current consequences nationalism had or has on the perception and the local as well as global policies towards migration. The analysis of particular immigrant groups (e.g. North Koreans in post-war Korea, South Asians in the Emirates, Middle Eastern refugees in Europe, Hispanics in the United States) as well as a close reading of crisis related media (newspapers and other media in Europe and the US) will, all in all, establish a broad perspective, due to which the reader will be able to compare and connect the national events to a larger global picture.

The Gavel and Sickle: The Supreme Court, Cultural Marxism, and the Assault on Christianity

Anthony Walsh, Boise State University

This book addresses the benefits of Christianity for all, the degradation of our culture since the 1950s, the pernicious effects that cultural Marxism has had on Western cultures, and the loss of religious freedom as the Founders envisioned it due to a number of Supreme Court rulings. We cannot understand the culture war and cultural debasement until we understand cultural Marxism. Cultural Marxism has been "hiding in plain sight" since the 1930s with the immigration to the United States of a cadre of intellectuals from Germany who brought with them the folderol of critical theory, political correctness, gender neutrality, radical feminism, and moral relativism. This intellectual moonshine is designed to weaken family structure and individual morality, and it has worked. The ultimate purpose of cultural Marxism is to destroy Western civilization from within. This goal is clearly and unambiguously stated in their books and articles. In numerous places in these books and articles, cultural Marxists are adamant that if socialism is ever to come to America the two epicenters of Western morality, the family and Christianity, will have to be destroyed by slow, stealthy, and incremental attacks on them. They have been aided in their efforts by anti-Christian rulings by the United States Supreme Court since the 1940s. I do not claim in any sense that the Supreme Court is engaged in a conspiracy with cultural Marxists. Their rulings have been based on a reading of the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment that its authors would not recognize, and have used this clause to eviscerate the Free Exercise Clause—America’s “first freedom.” The Court has purged Christianity from the public square, and in doing so it has unwittingly helped the cultural Marxist agenda by spiritually disarming America.

The Death Penalty from an African Perspective

Views from Zimbabwean and Nigerian Philosophers

Edited by Jonathan O. Chimakonam, University of Pretoria, South Africa and Fainos Mangena, University of Zimbabwe, Zimbabwe

This book is about an African philosophical examination of the death penalty debate. In a 21st century world where the notion of human right is primed, this book considers the question of the death penalty in two sub-Saharan African countries namely, Zimbabwe and Nigeria, notorious for their poor human right records. This edited collection comprises of 11 essays from Zimbabwean and Nigerian philosophers. As opinions continue to divide over the retention or abolition of the death penalty, these African philosophers attempt to localise this debate by raising the following questions: What is the meaning of life in the African place? Is it proper to take the human life under any guise at all? Who has the right to take the human life? Can the death penalty be justified on the bases of African cultures? Why should it be abolished? Why should it be retained? Indeed, this book is the first of its kind to engage the tumultuous issue of capital punishment in the postcolonial Africa and from the African philosophical point of view.