Globalization and Growth: Case Studies in National Economic Strategies

Book Description

This text contains cases developed for use in teaching international political economy at the Harvard Business School. They represent the major developmental trajectories that have defined the recent history of economic growth. These cases empirically describe the strategies of China, India, Japan, Mexico, South Africa, Poland and the Czech Republic, Europe and the United States. As a group, these countries represent more than half the world's population and nearly two-thirds of its gross domestic product. The cases are as much political and institutional as they are economic and are based on Harvard's way of teaching analytical methodology for managers called "country analysis," which is a method of identifying the economic performance, social and political context, and national development strategy of a country or region. It also assesses each strategy in terms of its effects on the performance and its fit with context.

Customer Reviews:

Gives you the whole picture!.......2007-06-15

I am a part intl relations person but more oriented toward the finance/macroeco type of study and this book is really good for someone who wants to study a certain period in a country - Japan - 1980's for example, the book will give you a thorough before-after scenario of all macro economic, socio economic, political indicators to lead you to why an event took place. They are much clearer about the 'economic' and 'finance' aspects than most other IR books that end up telling you everything surrounding an issue, the kind that dont explain "speculative attacks" or "swaps" or "forign exchange market intervention".

I didnt end up using this for my class but I like reading a case study once in a while!

Globalization and Growth: Case Studies in National Economic Strategies

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Globalization and Growth: Case Studies in National Economic Strategies
Richard Vietor
Manufacturer: South-Western College Pub
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000OUGF3M

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Study Guide - Organizational Behavior: Concepts, Controversies, Applications
Stephen P. Robbins
Manufacturer: Prentice Hall College Div
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000OHAV8A

Book Description

This book presents around 80 briefly described cases, which illuminate accumulated experience in plant genetic resources, both in the South and the North. These experiences illustrate the apparent conflict between crop conservation and crop development, and contribute to the understanding of opportunities that are offered by new approaches and activities in this field. Similarities between problems in the South and the North are apparent. The authors analyze the experiences and perspectives of gene banks, plant breeders, seed programs and NGOs involved in crop development and conservation. They place them in the context of new approaches in local and global Plant Genetic Resource (PGR) management by both the formal and informal sector. This book presents a very diverse and rich array of experiences of conservationists, breeders, seed production and NGOs in relation to crop conservation and development.

Genetics in Sustainable Fisheries Management

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Genetics in Sustainable Fisheries Management

Manufacturer: Fishing News Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

Environmental Science | Earth Sciences | Science | Subjects | Books

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General | Arts & Photography | Subjects | Books
ASIN: 0852382634

Book Description

Mmm-mmm, microbes!

Although we are accustomed to equating the presence of microbes with disease, in fact most microbes play a vital "friendly" role in shaping our lives. It is not just that one hundred million microbes can populate a thimbleful of fertile soil, or that many millions live happily in as much of our saliva. Microbes are everywhere, and we could not survive without them. To emphasize their amazing ubiquity, Jeanette Farrell considers the invisible bugs essential to an everyday event: the eating of a light lunch consisting of a cheese sandwich and a chocolate bar. Microbes create such a lunch, digest it, and, through the alchemy of decomposition, transform it so that the cycle can start all over again. In the course of her eye-opening narrative, Dr. Farrell relates the historical significance of using microbes to preserve foods, our long-standing ambivalence about the microbes that live on and in us, and our growing understanding of their importance.

Interspersed with fascinating anecdotes and illustrations, Invisible Allies will transform the reader's perception of the microcosmic world - around and inside us.

Book Description

This is an essential guide for anyone with an interest in wildlife who visits Africa--from the tourist on safari to the more experienced naturalist. Compact and beautifully illustrated, it is ideal for use in the field, while its coverage is the most comprehensive for any book of its size.

First pocket guide to cover every species of terrestrial African mammal
Adapted from the highly acclaimed Kingdon Field Guide to African Mammals
Fully illustrated with the author's superb color artwork
Easy-to-read distribution maps
Concise text and clear layout for quick, easy reference
Practical format makes it ideal for use in the field

Customer Reviews:

African Mammals Book.......2007-09-29

It is a good book...diagrams are detailed well and descriptions are good of the animals....good guide book for college classes.

If Kingdon or Estes say it, believe it !!.......2007-06-27

Excellent information if studying. Kingdon is an excellent source of CORRECT information when it comes to African animals.

The Best Guide for Field Use in Africa!.......2006-08-05

This compact little guide is a condensed version of The Kingdon Field Guide to African Mammals by the same author. That book is easily the best overview of African mammals, with detailed info on each species/genus, but it is not really practical for use as a field guide (see my review of it).

This book contains the same illustrations arranged in a format that makes them handier for actual identification in the field.
It is very comprehensive, covering every single species of African mammals with the exception of bats, rodents, insectivores, elephant-shrews and hyrraxes, which are usually represented by one species for each genus. But every single genus is represented, and of rodents, every species of squirrel is dealt with separately.
Maps and brief info on distribution and ecology of each taxon is now to be found on the pages facing the illustrutions.
The latter are a mixed bag, as in the original work: while most are quite good, even excellent and life-like, others are quite awful, either showing animals with stiff, straight limbs/bodies as if drawn with a ruler (like the Crowned Monkey) or in highly unnatural positions (like the Potto with the limbs twisted out, or the Cheetah standing up like a circus horse).

All things considered, this is easily the best field guide to mammals of Africa, though for more in-depth information on each taxon, you may still want to have the original book in addition to this one.

Amazon.com

Perhaps the most fun of a bushel of books about the "new" Las Vegas, 24/7 is as surreal and addictive as a hot game of blackjack at 4 a.m. In this first-person chronicle of a month in Las Vegas, Andrés Martinez whirls through casinos and hotels with his $50,000 book advance, taking notes on characters, nightclubs, and hotel lobbies between wild betting sprees at the blackjack table or roulette wheel.

Part of what makes 24/7 enjoyable is the fact that Martinez is no down-and-out gambler, but a former lawyer with an Ivy League pedigree whose main vice seems to be an addiction to Diet Coke. He takes to his exploits with the intoxication of someone released from dull routine, without ever falling down on the job. As a result, he's never too delirious to note the weirdest details of this desert mirage. It's a city "where buildings themselves perform," lined with such features as a Jules Verne theme park, erupting volcanoes, and battling pirate ships. Early on, the author gets philosophical: "What type of city did we build in the middle of a desert, a metropolis with no reason, beyond our willpower and playful imagination, to exist?" Anyone who's ever asked themselves the same question will satisfy their curiosity with this entertaining, firsthand view of the fastest-growing city in America. --Maria Dolan

Book Description

In April 1998, Andrés Martinez withdrew fifty thousand dollars from the bank--most of the advance he was paid for this book--and boarded a plane to the fastest-growing metropolis in America: Las Vegas. Armed with a wad of traveler's checks, Martinez spent a month within the belly of the beast. 24/7 is the round-the-clock chronicle of his wild ride through America's neon Gomorrah.

Every chapter--each is named after one of the fabled hotels where Martinez holed up with his bankroll--is a fly-on-the-wall view of a different aspect of Las Vegas. From the sumptuous Bellagio to the off-Strip grind joints that cater to local addicts, 24/7 evokes a city that is both human and larger than life.

We are introduced to the people who work in, pass through, and thrive on Vegas: a minister who shines shoes at a topless joint, a school superintendent who must build a new facility every twenty-eight days, and a water czar who covets her neighbors' share of the Colorado River. Martinez hobnobs with conventioneers, befriends a professional sports gambler who raised six kids while losing eight million dollars, and dines with a retired Israeli "security officer" whose lifelong ambition was to move to Vegas and become a blackjack guru. Martinez wanders into the Liberace Museum, attends Easter Sunday mass in the Strip cathedral of the world's most rapidly expanding Catholic archdiocese, and ponders the meaning of it all with Vegas's leading historians.

Interwoven throughout are dispatches from the green-felt front. Martinez laces his blood with adrenaline in an exhilarating all-night session of baccarat with some well-heeled Chinese and idles over slots with an abandoned bride. Above all, he goes mano a mano at blackjack--learning the ropes from his dealer, gathering tricks of the trade from his breakfast companions, and experiencing the angst of Dostoevsky and the sheer ecstasy of the triumphal gambler.

Thought-provoking, hilarious, personal, and journalistically brilliant, 24/7 is a rush of a read, a head-on exploration of a unique American landscape.

Customer Reviews:

Worthwhile but it Could Have Been Better........2006-04-10

24/7 sounds like an adrenaline and hormone ride, but it actually isn't. Andres Martinez is a middle class, stable guy who is given $50,000 by a publisher and told to go to Las Vegas and gamble it up or down. What he makes in profit he gets to keep. I won't ruin the plot for you, but Martinez plays a great deal of baccarat and blackjack along with some slots and a single game of poker. As a narrator, he seems like a kind man whose decency, unfortunately, detracts from the story's value. Everything's pretty tame here, and for those of us who read books as a way to vicariously escape our own moderation, it's more bourgeois than ideal. Martinez is strongest when talking about his own childhood in Mexico or about The World Cup. He's weakest and annoying when talking politics. He appears to have all the usual biases of the mainstream press. Indeed, he views "libertarian" as a pejorative even though a careful study of his former country would prove to him the extent in which socialism impoverishes the masses.

One problem that I should mention is that the book is now dated. Oh, it wouldn't be if it were written about any other city, but 1999, in Vegas years, was four decades ago. Many of his observations, such as those about the former mayor, have little application to the present. Much has changed since 2000 and the changes will continue ad infinitum. I do have to say though that the sections on baccarat were educational and very entertaining. It's a game of which most of us small timers know absolutely nothing. Another reason for my mild recommendation is that the role of casino host, such as the one he had at the Luxor, is really fleshed out. We see their tremendous dedication their clients here. The hosts, like the high stakes gaming areas, are another side to Vegas which most of us rarely see.

Love it!!.......2006-01-23

I read this when I need a Vegas fix. If you like Vegas or casino gambling you will love this book. This is the reality show of books. Martinez go head to head with the casinos and experiences the up and downs of a real gambler. Enjoying the high of winning and the despair of losing.

Very enjoyable........2005-01-16

Its a cliche but the phrase "A great read" is applicable. Book is entertaining throughout, one that I reread a few years later and enjoyed equally the second time around. Mr Martinez is one of the few writers that captures the adrenaline of Las Vegas, the feeling of non-stop action.
You won't be disappointed.

Great Premise, great Writing, but story drags on............2005-01-13

I just read this book after it being recommended by a dealer. I play pretty high stakes baccarat and BJ and when in Vegas live those crazy hours. I was extremely excited when I first bought the book and read the plot outline and the first few pages. However it begins to drag on far too long when he spends time with people like conventioneers. It is pretty surprising that he had such wild swings in his bankroll, at times he'd be down 10-20 grand and come back with a couple thousand dollars left. There wasn't enough about a "wild time" in Vegas in my opinion, it seems his stay while nice because his free bankroll, was fairly dull in many ways.

Engaging but dated material.......2004-09-08

The obvious question is "Why didn't I think of this first?" I guess the answer to that question is my lack of hubris to ask a publisher for a $50,000 advance to go casino hopping for a month. However, one lucky author did ask and subsequently produce a very engaging work describing the people, the casinos, and the city of Las Vegas.

As I booked my next trip to Las Vegas (this time for New Year's Eve), my next moves were, in this order, purchasing the newest edition of Bob Sehlinger's indispensable Unofficial Guide to Las Vegas and picking up this book for a re-read. As with the first reading, this book is hard to put down. You truly become involved in the work, cheering on the author during his gambling escapades, feeling empathy for the characters he meets, and trying to conjure up mental pictures of the experience.

Unfortunately, due to the fast growth and pace of Las Vegas, the book is dated. In a way, Chapter 2 doesn't exist anymore, as it's setting, the Desert Inn, was imploded October 23, 2001. His trip was before some of the Strip's defining megaresorts (Bellagio, Venetian, Mandalay Bay) were opened. (He does include a postscript about attending the opening weekend of the Bellagio.) An updated version is out of the question, as the book depends so much on the twist that he is making is very first pilgrimage to the city.

Therefore, the years have moved my current rating of this book from five to four stars. The book was written in a speculative time in the city's history, immediately before the rush of the forementioned megaresorts onto the scene, and Martinez reflects this uncertainty through open-ended writing. However, we now know the answers to his questions, leaving this work on the brink of irrelevancy. Nonetheless as the years pass, this book will be an interesting description of a moment in the city's history, even as more chapters of the book are imploded.

Book Description

Discover the poet within! You've read poetry that has touched your heart, and you'd like to improve your own writing technique. But even though you have loads of inspiration, you're discovering that good instruction can be as elusive as a good metaphor. The Complete Idiot's Guide to Writing Poetry will help you compose powerful, emotion-packed poems that you can be proud of. You'll learn simple explanations of poetry building blocks such as metaphor, imagery, symbolism and stanzas; steps to the poetic process; easy-to-follow guidelines for writing sonnets, sestinas, narrative poems and more; fun exercises to help you master the basics of poetry writing; cliches and other poetry pitfalls to avoid; advice on writers' conferences and workshops; tips on getting your poetry published; good poems that will inspire your own work; strategies to beat writer's block.

Customer Reviews:

Good book for beginning poets.......2005-09-27

Every poets needs to begin somewhere and this book is a good beginning. It is easy to read and gives some good advice for those who are interested in writing poetry but aren't sure where to start. I recommend it.

Surprisingly worthwhile........2005-04-27

Nikki Moustaki, The Complete Idiot's Guide to Writing Poetry (Alpha, 2001)

Some books' titles just beg for bad reviews. And I admit, I took this out of the library expecting I'd skim it quickly and give it the bad review it so richly deserved. I was somewhat surprised (and, I admit, a little nonplussed; sometimes you just need to give SOMETHING a bad review, no matter what it is) to discover that The Complete Idiot's Guide to Writing Poetry is actually a pretty decent stab at sticking a writing course between two covers. There are some pieces of text where I wanted to cringe (the idea that line breaks are arbitrary, the idea that haiku is a 5-7-5 strict form), and a few that seem to contradict one another (mostly having to do with meaning and message), but overall not a bad little book. Take it with a grain of salt, and question everything, but definitely recommended for aspiring poets who are sick of getting rejected whenever they submit something for publication. *** ½

if you can keep it in perspective...........2004-09-26

I'm completely new to the world of writing poetry; in fact, it's one of those things I never thought I'd be picking up a book for, let alone an Idiot's guide. I'd like to learn the basics because not only am I a big word nrrd whose idea of an exciting night in is hunkering down and learning what "iambic pentameter" really means, I know darn well that all those economy of words and lyrical language skills are really going to come in handy on the fiction writing tip, too. Overall, the other reviewers here are right on the money: this book does a great job of explaining the basics, is an excellent reference for all those poetry terms you never learned, and is packed with fun exercises that are sure to get you writing. I've been very happy with this book -- I carry it around on the subway and whip it out when I have a free minute, and always have a good time when I do.

However.

There's one thing that really sticks in my craw about this book, so much so that I'm sitting down to type out this review. And that's the unrelenting admonishments designed to steer us humble students in the direction of writing "good" poetry. I'm thinking that anyone who is picking up a Complete Idiot's Guide to Poetry has probably got a heck of a long way to go before their work is what you would consider "good". I'm also pretty confident that, for anyone picking up said Complete Idiot's Guide, writing "good" poetry is probably a little further down the list of priorities, perhaps nestled somewhere between "adapting all of MOBY DICK as a fixed-form ballad" and "writing ''Twas The Night Before Christmas 2: Electric Boogaloo'".

One thing that really troubles me, here, is that the author never misses the opportunity to bring up the "good poetry" issue. Perhaps she's just had to read a lot of bad poetry, in the course of teaching or editing literary journals or whatever, and is just plain sick of it. I can appreciate that. Here's the thing, though: bad poetry is just a fact of life for beginning writers. And beginning writers, especially those who have been traumatized into not writing for one reason or another, don't need yet another negative voice in their head to concern themselves with, no matter how well-meaning. They've probably got images of their horrid seventh grade English teacher in there already, the one who humiliated them in front of the entire class or sucked all the joy out of putting words together. A concern for "good" too early in the game is misplaced, in my opinion, and I found all the comments on it to be condescending distractions that just served to get my dander up.

All in all, this book is excellent, but gosh darn it all, it would have done well with a little less schoolmarming and a little more cuddling.

Fast, Clear, and Helpful.......2004-05-10

One of the most important things about this book was that it really helped me put a rudder in the water when it comes to poetry. I've always written here and there but my poems always sounded like greeting cards. The exercises and poems in this book have really helped me grow and to feel like I'm finally starting to write poems that sound like they could only come from me.

A Poetry Fan.......2004-05-10

I always wanted to write poems but I never could complete a poem -- I either got discouraged or just went on to something else. I bought this book and I was skeptical. After just a few chapters I began to do the exercises in it and found it to be very useful. It's also well-written and extremely funny. I would recommend this book to anyone. In fact, I bought a copy for my neighbor's daughter. I'm sure she's going to love it.

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Complete Idiots Guide to Writing Poetry
Nikki Moustaki
Manufacturer: Alpha
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000O96MG8

Book Description

Cowboys, Roman warriors and even a Norse God are some of the horny, hairy, beefy guys you will encounter in this new collection of erotic fiction, featuring writers such as Jeff Mann, R.E. Neu, Hank Edwards and Simon Sheppard.

Ron Sureshais the editor of Bears on Bears and Bearotica. He lives in Providence, R.I.

Customer Reviews:

Bear Lust is a Must.......2004-11-10

This second erotic anthology, featuring the Bear genre is a wonderful, lusty romp throught the woods of bear fiction. the stories are varied and captivating and hot and ironic and funny and well written literature.
This book answers the question: What would Anais Nin have written if she were a bear.
Bravo and thanks and a big bearhug for Mr. Suresha and his latest accomplishment.

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