James C. Scott Books

Scripture paints a vivid picture of God as gardener and cultivator. This book introduces this imagery to readers ages 5-10 in a lyrical, engaging style to help them understand the story of redemption and see God's creative work in the world.

Set in Southern California during the Golden Age of Aviation, the story follows fifteen-year-old Shannon Donnelly, an orphan on the run from her parents' killers. Inspired by Amelia Earhart, she pursues her dream of flying amidst the glamour of 1930s Hollywood. As she navigates air races and the challenges of the Great Depression, Shannon finds herself in a love triangle and faces a deadly adversary, leading to a thrilling rescue mission in Nazi-occupied France. This fast-paced adventure captures the spirit of the era with romance and danger.

These machines, from smart phones to talking robots to self-driving cars, are remaking the world in the twenty first century in the same way that the Industrial Revolution remade the world in the nineteenth.

A Russian defector, a worldwide dragnet, and a looming assassination bring Max Geller back to Moscow. Former CIA Russia expert Max is enjoying a quiet life in Australia with his new girlfriend, Vanessa, when the CIA ambushes him. He discovers that Vanessa is being used as leverage by his former boss, Rodney, to force him into a dangerous mission: smuggling out a defector with critical knowledge of a secret Kremlin war plan. The Russians want Max, and the defector is bait to lure him into the hands of FSB Colonel Zabluda. With the stakes high, Max decides to take the risk and heads to Moscow. Once there, Zabluda initiates a manhunt, relentlessly pursuing Max and the defector across borders. As they navigate numerous attacks and attempts at capture, Max learns that the defector holds vital information that could threaten U.S. democracy. Racing against time, Max must find a way to evade capture and thwart imminent attacks before it’s too late. This thrilling installment promises to captivate fans of espionage and political intrigue, showcasing the relentless tension and high stakes of the spy world.

An examination and discussion of the public and the hidden discourses (transcripts) of those who wield power and of those who feign deference to it. Examples are drawn from literature, history and politics to illustrate the many guises the interaction of such discourses can take.

Weapons of the Weak is an ethnography by James C. Scott that studies the effects of the Green Revolution in rural Malaysia. One of the main objectives of the study is to make an argument that the Marxian and Gramscian ideas of false consciousness and hegemony are incorrect. He develops this conclusion throughout the book, through the different scenarios and characters that come up during his time of fieldwork in the village. This publication, based on 2 years of fieldwork (1978-1980), focuses on the local class relations in a small rice farming community of 70 households in the main paddy-growing area of Kedah in Malaysia. Introduction of the Green Revolution in 1976 eliminated 2/3 of the wage-earning opportunities for smallholders and landless laborers. The main ensuing class struggle is analyzed being the ideological struggle in the village and the practice of resistance itself consisting of: foot-dragging, dissimulation, desertion, false compliance, pilfering, feigned ignorance and sabotage acts. Rich and poor are engaged in an unremitting if silent struggle to define changes in land tenure, mechanization and employment to advance their own interests, and to use values that they share to control the distribution of status, land, work and grain.

"One of the most profound and illuminating studies of this century to have been published in recent decades."--John Gray, New York Times Book Review Hailed as "a magisterial critique of top-down social planning" by the New York Times, this essential work analyzes disasters from Russia to Tanzania to uncover why states so often fail--sometimes catastrophically--in grand efforts to engineer their society or their environment, and uncovers the conditions common to all such planning disasters. "Beautifully written, this book calls into sharp relief the nature of the world we now inhabit."--New Yorker "A tour de force."-- Charles Tilly, Columbia University

Offering a completely new perspective on the anthropology of the highlands of Southeast Asia, James Scott proposes that far from being remnant populations, the peoples who inhabit the mountain chain between Vietnam and India are the descendants of runaways from lowland state-mking initiatives.

When twelve-year-old Robbie Young comes home and tells his mother "Jerry Houseman's been touching me" the lives of both families fly out of control. Scott Campbell's first novel is a sometime shocking but always the insightful and moving story of a sexual relationship between a young boy and an older man. Told from the points of view of the man, his wife, the boy and his mother, Touched is never sensationalistic or sentimental. Campbell knows how to tell a story, and his innate empathy with all of his characters shines through on every page. Touched might disturb the reader, not because of its subject matter, but because Campbell understands the human heart and its desires all too well.

An Economist Best History Book 2017 "History as it should be written."--Barry Cunliffe, Guardian "Scott hits the nail squarely on the head by exposing the staggering price our ancestors paid for civilization and political order."--Walter Scheidel, Financial Times Why did humans abandon hunting and gathering for sedentary communities dependent on livestock and cereal grains, and governed by precursors of today's states? Most people believe that plant and animal domestication allowed humans, finally, to settle down and form agricultural villages, towns, and states, which made possible civilization, law, public order, and a presumably secure way of living. But archaeological and historical evidence challenges this narrative. The first agrarian states, says James C. Scott, were born of accumulations of domestications: first fire, then plants, livestock, subjects of the state, captives, and finally women in the patriarchal family--all of which can be viewed as a way of gaining control over reproduction. Scott explores why we avoided sedentism and plow agriculture, the advantages of mobile subsistence, the unforeseeable disease epidemics arising from crowding plants, animals, and grain, and why all early states are based on millets and cereal grains and unfree labor. He also discusses the "barbarians" who long evaded state control, as a way of understanding continuing tension between states and nonsubject peoples.

Max Geller: Target of the Kremlin, MI6, and the CIA Fired for bias against the U.S. president, ex-CIA Russia expert Max Geller gets a chance to redeem his reputation and make a fortune when he is hired to investigate the president's incriminating ties to Moscow. Jill Rucker, an undercover CIA agent, is assigned to work with him--and she does--when she's not pursuing her own conflicting goals. The search takes them to England, Russia, Panama, and Switzerland. Along the way, Max runs afoul of British intelligence by inadvertently compromising two of its operations. He gets help from an anti-Russian underground cell in Moscow, is assisted and threatened by the Russian mafia, exposes a massive Russian-American money laundering scheme in Panama, and uncovers a plot to protect the president from mounting accusations threatening his presidency. Close behind is Zabluda, a Kremlin assassin, who means to kill them and their sources and destroy evidence incriminating the president. Max discovers that he has been betrayed by his former boss, his current employer, and his girlfriend. Seeking revenge, he takes on a powerful Washington law firm, the CIA, and the Russians. Max Geller is the spy who went out in the cold--and no one wants him to come in and tell what he knows. Perfect for fans of Daniel Silva and Nelson DeMille

"'Scott is a master of mood' New York Times Book Review b> b>How far would you go for your family, for love, for revenge? In the winter of 1897, a trio of killers descends upon an isolated farm in upstate New York. b> lspeth Howell returns home to find her family brutally murdered. The only survivor is her twelve-year-old son who witnessed it all. Wounded, frightened and with retribution in their hearts, mother and son set out into the frozen wilderness to track down the red-scarfed men who killed their loved ones in cold blood. Their journey leads them to a rough-hewn settlement on the edge of ice-filled Lake Erie, a merciless place where violence abounds. Here, forced into a brutal adulthood, Caleb begins to discover truths about his mother he could never have anticipated and Elspeth must finally confront the terrible urges that envelop her. All the while, the memory of Caleb's brothers and sisters presses him onwards. Big skies, deep snow, open wounds: The Kept delves deep into what it means to be a mother and to be a son. It asks us how far we would go for our family, for love and, ultimately, for revenge?"

The biography explores James Brown's extraordinary life, tracing his rise from the segregated South to global stardom. It highlights his significant contributions to the civil rights movement and his influence on music, particularly the emergence of funk. With exclusive insights into his struggles and successes, the narrative captures the essence of a musical icon whose timeless hits continue to resonate. This captivating account offers a profound look at Brown's relentless journey and enduring legacy in American culture.

The narrative follows a young couple in a small Mississippi town as they establish their family, which flourishes and expands across the country. It captures the essence of the Page-Paige family's legacy, emphasizing the importance of heritage and identity. The story is crafted to connect future generations with their roots, ensuring that they understand their origins and the journey of their ancestors.

The Women Who Shaped Modern Art in Britain tells the stories of determined women like Helen Sutherland, Margaret Gardiner, Myfanwy Piper and others, who helped to change the course of British art in the middle of the last century.

Applaus dem Anarchismus ist kein Manifest, es ist das lebhafte, oft amüsante Plädoyer für eine anarchistische Sicht auf die Welt. Der renommierte Politologe und Anthropologe James C. Scott hat – nach mehreren theoretischen Schriften zum Thema – für sein neues Buch bewusst eine andere Form gewählt: Engagiert erzählt er Beispiele und Anekdoten aus dem sozialen und politischen Alltag und der Geschichte von Massenprotesten und Revolutionen, die den gesunden Menschenverstand, das Urteilsvermögen und die Kreativität der Leute feiern. Scotts Beispiele sind so überzeugend, dass sie uns herausfordern, den Wert von Hierarchien im öffentlichen und privaten Leben radikal in Frage zu stellen – von der Schule über den Arbeitsplatz bis hin zum Altersheim – und uns in eine Reihe zu stellen mit den Renitenten, den Aufmüpfigen, die sich gegen „verordneten Unsinn“ mit konstruktiver Anarchie zur Wehr zu setzen.

Prowokująca książka podważająca przyjętą narrację o początkach ludzkiej cywilizacji. Choć życie w obrębie państw uznajemy dziś za coś oczywistego, ten model organizacji społeczeństwa pojawił się dopiero w okresie obejmującym ostatnie pięć procent historii Homo sapiens. Jak do tego doszło? Wbrew powszechnie przyjętej interpretacji historii, powstanie pierwszych państw rolniczych nie było jednoznacznym sukcesem ludzkiej współpracy i wielkim cywilizacyjnym krokiem naprzód. Autor niniejszej książki dowodzi, iż początkowo było wręcz odwrotnie. Opierając się na najnowszej wiedzy archeologicznej i historycznej, James C. Scott szkicuje autorską interpretację historii powstania społeczeństw państwowych jako opartych na mechanizmach przymusu, zawłaszczania i kontroli. Przekonuje, że proces analogiczny do udomowienia roślin i zwierząt przez człowieka dokonał się również na nim samym za sprawą instytucji pierwszych państw – i z reguły nie był to proces dobrowolny. Choć książka świadomie nie wyczerpuje tematu, będąc raczej próbą wskazania nowych wątków dyskusji niż definitywnego opracowania zagadnienia, skutecznie kwestionuje powszechnie przyjętą narrację o początkach państwowości, prowokując do refleksji także nad naturą dzisiejszych instytucji państwowych.

Kinder gibt es hier nicht mehr. Im Himmalaja verschollen. Der Schrei der Möwe. Elefanten - mein Leben

Kniha Dvakrát sláva anarchismu, inspirována základním anarchistickým přesvědčením v možnosti dobrovolné spolupráce bez hierarchie, je poutavou, odvážnou a často velmi zábavnou obranou anarchistického nahlížení na svět. Antropolog James C. Scott si v této knize nasazuje „anarchistické brýle“ a skrze ně se dívá na svět kolem sebe: počínaje každodenními interakcemi mezi lidmi a konče velkými protesty a revolucemi. Na celé řadě nezapomenutelných příkladů popisuje anarchistickou citlivost, která oslavuje místní znalosti, uvažování a kreativitu obyčejných lidí. Výsledkem je jakási příručka konstruktivního anarchismu, která nás vybízí k tomu, abychom přehodnotili hierarchie ve veřejném a soukromém životě. Jakmile si se Scottem nasadíte anarchistické brýle a pustíte se do čtení, pravděpodobně již nic nebude jako dřív. České vydání je doplněné rozsáhlou studií antropologa Boba Kuříka, který Scottovo dílo přibližuje v širších souvislostech jeho celoživotního antropologického bádání, stejně jako urgentních politických výzev dneška.

V zimě roku 1897 se porodní bába Elspeth Howellová vrací domů na odlehlou farmu. Místo přivítání však nachází brutálně zavražděného manžela a své čtyři děti. Jediným přeživším je dvanáctiletý Caleb, který kromě rodné farmy nic jiného nezná. Matka a syn se rozhodnou rodinu pomstít a vydají se zamrzlou divočinou po stopách vrahů do městečka u jezera Erie. Zatímco Caleb odhaluje děsivou pravdu o své rodině, Elspeth musí čelit dávným tajemstvím.