In poems marked by tenderness and mischief, humanity and humor, Yehuda Amichai breaks open the grand diction of revered Jewish verses and casts the light of his own experi­ence upon them. Here he tells of history, a nation, the self, love, and resurrection. Amichai’s last volume is one of medi­tation and hope, and stands as a testament to one of Israel’s greatest poets. Open closed open. Before we are born, everything is open in the universe without us. For as long as we live, everything is closed within us. And when we die, everything is open again. Open closed open. That’s all we are. —from “I WASN’T ONE OF THE SIX MILLION: AND WHAT IS MY LIFE SPAN? OPEN CLOSED OPEN”

This book explains how deep-seated personality traits shape citizens' attitudes toward economic redistribution, and what it means for American democracy. It will be of interest to researchers from across the social sciences, as well as citizens, pundits, political observers, and commentators from across the political spectrum.

Philipp Herzog develops a theoretical framework arguing that Open Innovation and Closed Innovation cultures need to be distinguished. The findings help firms cope with the challenges experienced in implementing the Open Innovation concept.

A history of mainline Protestant responses to immigrants and refugees during the twentieth century Open Hearts, Closed Doors uncovers the largely overlooked role that liberal Protestants played in fostering cultural diversity in America and pushing for new immigration laws during the forty years following the passage of the restrictive Immigration Act of 1924. These efforts resulted in the complete reshaping of the US cultural and religious landscape. During this period, mainline Protestants contributed to the national debate over immigration policy and joined the charge for immigration reform, advocating for a more diverse pool of newcomers. They were successful in their efforts, and in 1965 the quota system based on race and national origin was abolished. But their activism had unintended consequences, because the liberal immigration policies they supported helped to end over three centuries of white Protestant dominance in American society. Yet, Pruitt argues, in losing their cultural supremacy, mainline Protestants were able to reassess their mission. They rolled back more strident forms of xenophobia, substantively altering the face of mainline Protestantism and laying foundations for their responses to today’s immigration debates. More than just a historical portrait, this volume is a timely reminder of the power of religious influence in political matters.

As the Internet diffuses across the globe, many have come to believe that the technology poses an insurmountable threat to authoritarian rule. Grounded in the Internet's early libertarian culture and predicated on anecdotes pulled from diverse political climates, this conventional wisdom has informed the views of policymakers, business leaders, and media pundits alike. Yet few studies have sought to systematically analyze the exact ways in which Internet use may lay the basis for political change. In O pen Networks, Closed Regimes, the authors take a comprehensive look at how a broad range of societal and political actors in eight authoritarian and semi-authoritarian countries employ the Internet. Based on methodical assessment of evidence from these cases—China, Cuba, Singapore, Vietnam, Burma, the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, and Egypt—the study contends that the Internet is not necessarily a threat to authoritarian regimes.

This book examines the fundamental similarities shared by all sculptures, regardless of the culture or time period in which they were created. Focusing on a wide range of British and European examples, of many periods, Penelope Curtis explores crucial sculptural concepts such as the vertical and the horizontal, the open and the closed. In doing so, she elucidates the powerful, and often surprising, properties of objects made in vastly different sociocultural contexts. Sculpture also expands the notion of sculpture to include the objects of everyday life and investigates the ways in which we approach sculpture as an art form. Stressing the fact that sculpture has been historically linked with rites of passage and moments of change and transformation, this revelatory study argues that the experience of sculpture is a universal and primal phenomenon that cuts across particular historical styles and epochs.

Peter Slade examines Mission Mississippi's model of racial reconciliation (which stresses one-on-one, individual friendships among religious people of different races) and considers whether it can effectively address the issue of social justice. Slade argues that Mission Mississippi's goal of "changing Mississippi one relationship at a time" is both a pragmatic strategy and a theological statement of hope for social and economic change in Mississippi.