The City is Ours accounts how urban politics mediated the rise of Kurdish nationhood and mobilization in Diyarbakır, Turkey. Muna Güvenç elucidates how urban and architectural forms are not merely the backdrop of the cityscape where political struggles unfold; they constitute the very essence of these conflicts. Güvenç posits that urban spaces offer "wiggle room", turning oppression into chances for dissent and resilience and offering opportunities for vulnerable minority groups to create sociopolitical blocs and mobilizations. Güvenç takes readers from municipal halls to the streets and illustrates how, in the early 2000s, pro-Kurdish parties harnessed urban planning to resist coercion and foster Kurdish mobilization in Turkey. Güvenç challenges readers to rethink urban neoliberalism, new forms of nationalisms and mobilizations, and the ways they shape cities and politics. The City is Ours is a profound awakening, an invitation to all architects and urban planners, urging them to rise above the confines of their blueprints and embrace the vast tapestry of the politics of space.

Squatters and autonomous movements have been in the forefront of radical politics in Europe for nearly a half-century—from struggles against urban renewal and gentrification, to large-scale peace and environmental campaigns, to spearheading the antiausterity protests sweeping the continent. Through the compilation of the local movement histories of eight different cities—including Amsterdam, Berlin, and other famous centers of autonomous insurgence along with underdocumented cities such as Poznan and Athens—The City Is Ours paints a broad and complex picture of Europe’s squatting and autonomous movements. Each chapter focuses on one city and provides a clear chronological narrative and analysis accompanied by photographs and illustrations. The chapters focus on the most important events and developments in the history of these movements. Furthermore, they identify the specificities of the local movements and deal with issues such as the relation between politics and subculture, generational shifts, the role of confrontation and violence, and changes in political tactics. All chapters are written by politically-engaged authors who combine academic scrutiny with accessible writing. Readers with an interest in the history of the newest social movements will find plenty to mull over here. Contributors include Nazima Kadir, Gregor Kritidis, Claudio Cattaneo, Enrique Tudela, Alex Vasudevan, Needle Collective and the Bash Street Kids, René Karpantschof, Flemming Mikkelsen, Lucy Finchett-Maddock, Grzegorz Piotrowski, and Robert Foltin.

Manhattan is held for ransom in this “competent and exciting book” from the acclaimed thriller writer of The Predator (The New York Times). It’s New Year’s Eve and Manhattan is rendered motionless by a blizzard of ice and snow. On top of that, there’s a terrorist ultimatum: $130 billion dollars in forty-eight hours, or else . . . The world’s largest supertanker, five-hundred thousand tons of black nitro and steel, is moored near the city. Soon it will ignite in a blast of atomic fury, engulfing Manhattan in a mushroom cloud of searing death and destruction. That is, if no one can stop it. Newly-elected mayor Ben Boyle, ex-plumber, a commonsense man of uncommon courage, takes on the toughest job of all: negotiating with the world’s richest banks for money, and in a city of millions, searching for just one man. Holed up in a sleazy Times Square hotel, the calculating Cherokee terrorist George Mahle waits. With his plan going perfectly, he watches as New York begins to collapse. Follow Boyle’s race against time in this thrilling tale of deadly machinations, detailed drama and political scheming. “A fast-paced thriller.” —The Cincinnati Post “Tense, exciting . . . Expertly and vividly written.” —The Columbus Dispatch “A major work that every city and inhabitant of the city can take a lesson from . . . A well-written, well-developed novel.” —South Bend Tribune

"Here we are on the banks of the Nueces in the grand camp of the army of occupation." So wrote Lt. Napoleon Jackson Tecumseh Dana when in 1845, not many months before the outbreak of the Mexican War, he joined the white-tented encampment of General Zachary Taylor in Texas. And so he continued writing during the uncertain life of camp and campaign for the better part of the next two years. In these letters to his wife, published here for the first time, Dana provides a detailed, firsthand view of the United States' war with Mexico—fighting off the Mexicans from within Fort Brown during the initial attack; hearing the distant thunder of artillery as Taylor's army marched to the rescue of the beleaguered Seventh Infantry; occupying Matamoros; taking Monterrey, street by street with the defenders firing from the housetops. After Monterrey, Dana was at the siege of Veracruz and on the march to Cerro Gordo. Badly wounded in the attack on Telegraph Hill at Cerro Gordo, he was left on the field for dead, but was rescued by a burial party a day and a half later. Following the Mexican War, Dana went on to become a major general during the Civil War and later to have an illustrious career as a railroad executive. Nearly one hundred of his letters about the Mexican War survived and are now in the archives at West Point. From them Robert Ferrell has edited this vivid, eyewitness narrative.

This anthology offers a history of ACT UP for a new generation of activists and students.

"I worry that the patterns in life say I worry that they dictate, that, through the education that should free us, we will all fall in line. So our search for knowledge will eventually turn us all into people willing to be oppressed. We'll even feel good about it. We'll like being oppressed. We have taught this ignorance that is guiding us. We have to smash this." When an acquaintance tells 19 year old Langley Jackson this, Langley is naïve and new to the city of Long Beach. But as time climbs forward Langley learns that it's true: some things need to be smashed. Some things can't be solved, only learned from. And some people-including loved ones-you have to just let them die.