Joseph Wright Books

How remittances―money sent by workers back to their home countries―support democratic expansionIn the growing body of work on democracy, little attention has been paid to its links with migration. Migration and Democracy focuses on the effects of worker remittances―money sent by migrants back to their home countries―and how these resources shape political action in the Global South. Remittances are not only the largest source of foreign income in most autocratic countries, but also, in contrast to foreign aid or international investment, flow directly to citizens. As a result, they provide resources that make political opposition possible, and they decrease government dependency, undermining the patronage strategies underpinning authoritarianism.The authors discuss how international migration produces a decentralized flow of income that generally circumvents governments to reach citizens who act as democratizing agents. Documenting why dictatorships fall and how this process has changed in the last three decades, the authors show that remittances increase the likelihood of protest and reduce electoral support for authoritarian incumbents.Combining global macroanalysis with microdata and case studies of Senegal and Cambodia, Migration and Democracy demonstrates how remittances―and the movement of people from authoritarian nations to higher-income countries―foster democracy and its expansion.

From Eve to Snakes on a Plane, snakes have seduced and terrorized humans in equal measure, their mythological status creating real-world problems for this misunderstood animal--

Paradigms and Sand Castles demonstrates the relationship between thoughtful research design and the collection of persuasive evidence in support of theory. It teaches the craft of research through interesting and carefully selected examples from the field of comparative development studies.

An eerie Appalachian town. A fatal fire. Three women whose fates intertwine . . . Essa Montgomery and her brother Clyde were brought up in New Hope, a serpent-handling church in Vintera, West Virginia, until the shocking deaths of both their parents closed the church down. Now twenty, reclusive Essa lives alone in her childhood home in the shadow of New Hope, which to her horror has been taken over by a new charismatic, unsettling pastor who continues the dangerous practice. So when the church burns down, she's glad - until she learns that two people died in the blaze, and her brother's the prime suspect . . . Life has made Juliet Usher, who scratches a living as a psychic medium, both assertive and ruthless. With a baby on the way, it's the worst possible time for her partner Clyde to be arrested. She'll do anything to survive and keep him out of prison - no matter what it takes! Merrit Callahan has always been ambitious. A striving news reporter, she's willing to go the extra mile and break the rules to get the big scoop. And in small-town Vintera, she thinks she might have found the story that will be the making of her career. Fans of Angie Kim's Miracle Creek and Eli Cranor's Ozark Dogs will love this gripping and creepy mystery novel inspired by Shakespeare's Measure for Measure using a contemporary setting filled with shocking twists and turns!

When ghost-hunter Chloe seeks an answer to the current spectral epidemic, all clues point to one very famous face: Helen of Troy, whose motives are more complicated than history suggests and whose charms few can resist.