This book addresses contemporary geographical issues in the Mediterranean Basin from a perspective that recognizes the physical characteristics and cultural interactions which link the different Mediterranean states as a recognisable geographic entity. Sixteen chapters each deal with a major geographical issue currently facing the Mediterranean, each providing an invaluable summary of the extensive but widely dispersed literature relating to Mediterranean issues. Particular emphasis is placed on the interaction between society and environment in terms of environmental management, differential regional development and its associated political, demographic, cultural and economic tensions.

The width of this problematic is skillfully illustrated in this volume, where scholars (sociologists and psychologists) from countries at the opposite edges of the European continent - Turkey and Sweden - discuss the structural conditions and "moral

In this volume security specialists, peace researchers, environmental scholars, demographers as well as climate, desertification, water, food and urbanisation specialists from the Middle East and North Africa, Europe and North America review security and conflict prevention in the Mediterranean. They also analyse NATO’s Mediterranean security dialogue and offer conceptualisations on security and perceptions of security challenges as seen in North and South. The latter half of the book analyses environmental security and conflicts in the Mediterranean and environmental consequences of World War II, the Gulf War, the Balkan wars and the Middle East conflict. It also examines factors of global environmental change: population growth, climate change, desertification, water scarcity, food and urbanisation issues as well as natural disasters. Furthermore, it draws conceptual conclusions for a fourth phase of research on human and environmental security and peace as well as policy conclusions for cooperation and partnership in the Mediterranean in the 21st century.

Samir Amin explains the complex changes of the late 20th and early 21st centuries, including the transformations in Eastern Europe and in the world economy, the growth of capitalism in China and the West's materialist goals being increasingly questioned.

A particularly trenchant political economy of the Arab world, set within the dual contexts of the historical development of the Middle East and the evolving world economic system. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

This book explores the causes and trends of the current crisis of the domination system in the Arab world. The Member President of the World Forum for Alternatives invites its authors —outstanding academics from the region— to present an approach to the dynamics of social movements, the challenges of an alternative regional integration, political Islam, and the always complex relationships between the Arab world and Europe.