Genetically engineered agriculture is spreading around the world due to global trade agreements and the aggressive tactics of international financial institutions, governments, and agribusiness corporations. The authors in this survey show how the interplay of trade policy, "development" politics and biotechnology increases dependency and hunger, while compromising the survival of traditional farmers and their communities. [back cover].

Today's global economy was largely established by political events and decisions in the 1980s and 90s, when scores of nations opened up their economies to the forces of globalization. In Free Traders, Malcolm Fairbrother argues that politicians' embrace of globalization was much less motivated by public preferences than by the agendas of businesspeople and other elites. Drawing on over one hundred interviews with decision-makers, and analyses of archival materials from Canada, Mexico, and the U.S., Fairbrother tells the story of how each country negotiated and ratified two agreements that substantially opened and integrated their economies: the 1989 Canada-U.S. and trilateral 1994 North American Free Trade Agreement. Contrary to what many commentators believe, these agreements-like free trade elsewhere-were based less on mainstream, neoclassical economics than on the informal, self-serving economic ideas of business. While the stakes in the globalization debate remain high, Free Traders uses a comparative-historical approach to sharpen our understanding of how globalization arose in the past to provide us with clearer trajectory for how it will develop in the future.

Global trading was once purely the domain of specialists such as George Soros. But the efficiency of electronic trading is opening up this lucrative market to the masses. This book details how the average investor can access the global markets and profit from them.

When you combine nature's efficiency and the computer's speed, thefinancial possibilities are almost limitless. Today's traders andinvestment analysts require faster, sleeker weaponry in today'sruthless financial marketplace. Battles are now waged at computerspeed, with skirmishes lasting not days or weeks, but mere hours.In his series of influential articles, Richard Bauer has shown whythese professionals must add new computerized decision-making toolsto their arsenal if they are to succeed. In Genetic Algorithms andInvestment Strategies, he uniquely focuses on the most powerfulweapon of all, revealing how the speed, power, and flexibility ofGAs can help them consistently devise winning investmentstrategies. The only book to demonstrate how GAs can workeffectively in the world of finance, it first describes thebiological and historical bases of GAs as well as othercomputerized approaches such as neural networks and chaos theory.It goes on to compare their uses, advantages, and overallsuperiority of GAs. In subsequently presenting a basic optimizationproblem, Genetic Algorithms and Investment Strategies outlines theessential steps involved in using a GA and shows how it mimicsnature's evolutionary process by moving quickly toward anear-optimal solution. Introduced to advanced variations ofessential GA procedures, readers soon learn how GAs can be usedto: * Solve large, complex problems and smaller sets of problems * Serve the needs of traders with widely different investmentphilosophies * Develop sound market timing trading rules in the stock and bondmarkets * Select profitable individual stocks and bonds * Devise powerful portfolio management systems Complete with information on relevant software programs, a glossaryof GA terminology, and an extensive bibliography coveringcomputerized approaches and market timing, Genetic Algorithms andInvestment Strategies unveils in clear, nontechnical language aremarkably efficient strategic decision-making process that, whenimaginatively used, enables traders and investment analysts to reapsignificant financial rewards.

First published in 2004. This is Volume V of Postcolonialism part of a series of critical concepts in literary and cultural studies. This edition includes part eleven on Globalization, Transculturation and Neo-Colonialism; and part twelve on Postcolonial Theory and The Disciplines.

Through readings of iconic figures such as the cannibal, the child, the alien, and the posthuman, Gabriele Schwab analyzes literary explorations at the boundaries of the human. Treating literature as a dynamic medium that "writes culture"--one that makes the abstract particular and local, and situates us within the world--Schwab pioneers a compelling approach to reading literary texts as "anthropologies of the future" that challenge habitual productions of meaning and knowledge. Schwab's study draws on anthropology, philosophy, critical theory, and psychoanalysis to trace literature's profound impact on the cultural imaginary. Following a new interpretation of Derrida's and Lévi-Strauss's famous controversy over the indigenous Nambikwara, Schwab explores the vicissitudes of "traveling literature" through novels and films that fashion a cross-cultural imaginary. She also examines the intricate links between colonialism, cannibalism, melancholia, the fate of disenfranchised children under the forces of globalization, and the intertwinement of property and personhood in the neoliberal imaginary. Schwab concludes with an exploration of discourses on the posthuman, using Samuel Beckett's "The Lost Ones" and its depiction of a future lived under the conditions of minimal life. Drawing on a wide range of theories, Schwab engages the productive intersections between literary studies and anthropology, underscoring the power of literature to shape culture, subjectivity, and life.

Transcending the various formal concepts of life, this captivating book offers a unique overview of life's history, essences, and future. "A masterpiece of scientific writing. You will cherish "What Is Life?" because it is so rich in poetry and science in the service of profound philosophical questions".--Mitchell Thomashow, "Orion". 9 photos. 11 line illustrations.