This book provides an accessible and detailed examination of the intricate legal frameworks governing maritime security and jurisdiction at sea, systematically exploring the impact of key international law concepts on maritime security.

As maritime security threats increasingly intersect with broader global challenges, including illegal fishing, climate migration and forced labour, this book fills critical gaps in legal understanding. Through clear explanations and real-world examples, it navigates the fragmented landscape of maritime law and enforcement. Divided into three parts, the first section guides readers through maritime zones, from internal waters to the high seas, clarifying the legal rights and responsibilities of coastal and flag states as established in combating maritime crimes. The second part addresses contemporary maritime crimes, such as piracy, drug and human trafficking, migrant smuggling, terrorism and environmental offences, providing practical insights into international legal regulations and enforcement mechanisms. Finally, the third part explores the lawful use of force at sea and examines the increasing overlap between maritime law enforcement and human rights obligations. This book bridges the gap between theoretical maritime law and practical security challenges, offering clarity and actionable insights for safer and legally compliant maritime operations.

The book will be of interest to researchers in the field of maritime law, maritime security and the law of the sea.

In a world marked by shifting paradigms and emergent challenges, The Routledge International Handbook on Social Exclusion and Radicalisation is a ground-breaking compilation that addresses the intricate relationship between social exclusion and radicalisation on a global scale.

In response to the prevailing tendency to examine radicalisation from single-level or individualistic perspectives, this handbook takes a comprehensive approach by embedding radicalisation within the broader context of socio-political, economic, and cultural dynamics of exclusion and marginalisation. It assembles leading scholars from a variety of fields to offer a well-rounded understanding of social exclusion as a precursor to radicalisation on a global scale. Drawing from a diverse array of theoretical frameworks employing both quantitative and qualitative methodologies, this handbook examines processes of radicalisation and social exclusion in the Global North and South, as well as comparative and international trends experienced worldwide.

This handbook will be a comprehensive resource for researchers and policy-makers seeking to understand the dynamics of radicalisation and for crafting evidence-based strategies aimed at fostering inclusion and pluralism. It will be of interest for scholars and students interested in understanding the complex levels of radicalisation and its social contexts from fields including sociology, political science, anthropology, social psychology, criminology, and international relations.

In this incisive and timely book, David Block analyses populist discourse and homes in on 'diagonalism' - the subtle migration of left-wing commentators toward right-wing positions on pandemic policies, free speech and immigration. The text provides a vivid insight into today's fractured political arena, where progressive voices are increasingly aligning with far-right narratives.

In this post-truth world, we see how emotions trump facts and spectacle dominates substance. The attention economy has transformed political discourse into entertainment, with devastating consequences. More than just academic theory, this book is an urgent warning about how diagonalists provide cover for extremist ideologies while appearing moderate. By exclusively criticizing progressive positions, they unwittingly strengthen the far-right forces already dominating our online spaces.

Vital reading for scholars and students of political communication and essential for anyone concerned about the alarming transformation of public discourse in our digital age.

Women's Pathways to Power: Cracking the Glass Ceiling provides an interdisciplinary study of the lingering impediments obstructing women's access to power to attain democratic equality, comprising the work of eminent women scholars from diverse fields and regions.

This book addresses women's inequality within a world shaped by men, while outlining the significant strides in gender equity and presents clear pathways toward achieving equality-highlighting the progress women have made across diverse settings from the Asia Pacific to the Global South-offering bold solutions to shatter the glass ceiling. In documenting both the challenges and achievements in the journey toward women's empowerment, the book makes a significant contribution to the story of women and power in the 21st century. In an era where women have made remarkable strides in education, employment, and politics in democracies, the pervasive gender gaps in key power spheres persist-in politics and leadership, the workplace, and within the home.

This book will appeal not only to scholars and students in disciplines such as politics, sociology, and gender studies, but also to legislators, political leaders, and policymakers looking to understand what is possible and how. It speaks to women, especially women who dare to challenge accepted democratic and societal norms.

This handbook offers a key interdisciplinary reference to advance ideology analysis.

Expert contributors from the social sciences and humanities focus on the sources and construction of ideology and related processes of ideological transmission across time and space in political and social realms. Authors examine diverse forms of ideological activity, focusing on their interplay with institutions, organisations and cultural practices at macro, meso and micro levels. Chapters analyse vectors of ideological creation and transmission such as political parties, social movements, think tanks, organised groups and traditional and social media, as well as historical writing, literature and the visual arts. This volume demonstrates how a variety of complementary methods can aid our understanding of ideological creation, transmission and reception across macro, meso and micro fields.

The Routledge Handbook of Ideology Analysis is an authoritative reference for students and scholars in political and social theory, political science, sociology and anthropology, cultural studies, literature, communications and history.

The Routledge Handbook of Ideology Analysis is part of the mini-series 'Routledge Handbooks on Political Ideologies, Practices and Interpretations' edited by Michael Freeden.

As political science instructors have increasingly turned to games and simulations in the classroom to educate and engage their students, scholars have worked not only to demonstrate their effectiveness, but also to justify their use to occasionally skeptical colleagues. With instructional time always at a premium, this book focuses exclusively on short games and simulations: activities that are limited to one class period. These powerful activities demand less instructional time and deliver substantial pedagogical benefits. Additionally, this book provides ready-to-use activities for teachers to utilize across Political Science subfields. It covers activities that can be categorized in American Politics, International Relations, Comparative Politics, Public Policy and Administration, Political Theory, and activities that are not easily categorized into a field.

Providing a fresh approach to thinking about the big questions around political economy, culture, and power, this book offers a synthetic view of political economic and cultural explanations of how institutions, organizations, and groups operate, cohere, and influence each other, as well as how power works within and across these networks.
The New Political Sociology rethinks the ways societies are built and function in two parts. After delineating a theory of the bargaining process, the first part undertakes a reconstruction of the state, the inordinate influence of business, the weakened position of labor, the variable role of social movements, and the active role of the media. The second part delineates how exploitation and humiliation lead to social movements that reverse values and create new social forces, and the author uses empire in global theory to delineate how globalization affects politics within the now multi-nationstate. Both parts involve structures of power through class (business and labor) and status (race, gender, and religion), and each section discusses how new alternatives emerge for each bargaining group.

Connecting sociology and sociological theory to issues of social and democratic movements, this book shows how political economy and culture need each other as the opposite sides of the same coin. The New Political Sociology redirects theoretical approaches of researchers in political sociology and provides teachers with a classroom resource on theories and practices in political sociology, cultural sociology, social movements, and the media.

This book links the current wave of political polarisation to the polarisation taking place between cosmopolitan and parochial identity discourses and their antagonistic valuation of iconic urban and regional places.

Instead of looking for explanations of polarisation only in left-behind regions, this book analyses how societal changes favouring cities, like globalisation and individualisation, created an urban hubris which is now challenged. A careful analysis of the different valuations of specific iconic places like those linked to borders, waterfront apartments, and livestock farms in different Western European countries shows that this polarisation between cosmopolitan and parochial identity discourses goes deeper and further than the rise in support for national populism. It shows the growing spatial polarisation through the enclavisation of the cosmopolitan new bourgeoisie in cities, further polarising the antagonistic valuation of different iconic urban and regional places as either disgusting examples of urban arrogance or parochial bigotry.

The broader spatial and temporal perspective adopted in this book is of interest to anyone who wants to look beyond the national political headlines. It will help students, researchers, human geographers, political scientists, and sociologists better understand the intricate relation between identities, politics, places, and societal developments.

The Political Economy of Alternative Media provides in-depth insights into media practices used by grassroots projects to organize, produce, and distribute the media that support and report on social movements.

This book is based on five years of participatory research with global intersectional media activist projects. Mapping out the rich and varied textures of the political economy of media activist projects from small to large and from simple to complex, this book considers structures, funding models, media labor, intersectional power, and media imaginaries, foregrounding the voices of global media activists. It reflects on the changes wrought by shifts to digital media ecologies and economies in the contemporary alternative media space.

This book will be of great interest to students and scholars of politics and communication studies interested in the political economy of media, social movements, digital media, alternative media, critical media, citizen media, communication for social change, technopolitics and alternative journalism. It will also appeal to media activists and journalists, providing a roadmap for crucial considerations when developing organizational structures in independent media projects.

This book examines how far-right politics and news media shape one another, exposing, contesting, and at times inadvertently legitimising white supremacist, violent misogynist, and other far-right ideas. It situates these dynamics within the economic and structural transformations associated with the neoliberal restructuring of media industries, demonstrating how commercial imperatives, audience capture, and shifts in journalistic practice intersect with deeper histories of inequality, coloniality, and exclusion to structure contemporary news environments.

Drawing on research from Australia, the United States, Germany, Spain, and Portugal, the book analyses how newsroom routines and editorial practices interact with far-right strategies to influence coverage and, over time, recalibrate the parameters of public political debate. Case studies of the January 6 Capitol insurrection, the Christchurch terrorist attack, electoral breakthroughs in Iberia, and German reporting on "incel" online spaces show how the pursuit of immediacy, spectacle, and a narrow performance of balance can, for susceptible audiences, render far-right narratives increasingly visible and, in some contexts, implicitly legitimate. While the chapters do not offer sustained exemplars of alternative practice, they signpost the potential for a historically informed and critically engaged journalism to disrupt these dynamics and to produce more accurate, accountable, and contextually rigorous reporting on the far right.

Integrating insights from media studies, political communication, and cultural sociology, this volume provides a theoretically grounded and empirically rich resource for scholars, journalists, activists, and policymakers. It offers conceptual and analytical tools for examining how far-right ideas gain traction in contemporary political discourse and how media practices might more effectively respond to and resist the political and social challenges presented by far-right mainstreaming.

When Governments Collide: Competition Within Nations in Quebec and Catalonia offers a comparative analysis of Quebec and Catalonia from the perspective of minority cultures operating within broader states, where their cultures and identities sometimes come in conflict with that of the majority, focusing on language, immigration, and foreign affairs policy.

Since the mid-to-late 20th century, Quebec and Catalonia have been demanding greater powers from their respective federal or central governments. While Quebec has obtained significant powers over key identity policies (language, immigration, and international relations) from Ottawa, Catalonia has faced strong opposition from Madrid. This book looks at how each sub-state navigates its position within its federative context/environment, and how they negotiate and leverage policies in relation to their respective federal governments. It starts by exploring the external factors that have played a large role in allowing Quebec to obtain more powers than Catalonia (such as the impact of Franco's dictatorship on linguistic policy). Also central to the book's analysis is the argument that incremental demands are more likely to be successful than sweeping requests. This "incrementalism" thesis suggests that minority nation governments are more likely to secure concessions from central political authorities by taking smaller, less provocative steps. While this strategy has practical implications, the book also addresses its limitations, noting that incrementalism may not always be feasible or effective.

This book will be of great interest to students and scholars of comparative public policy and politics, and nationalism, providing a timely perspective on forms of minority nationalism.

This book explores the relationship between copyright law's exceptions and limitations and the conflicting interests of rightsholders and users.

Beginning with an overview of the history of permissions culture within photography law, the book discusses the flexibility of fair dealing exceptions and the resulting consequences of the exclusion of photographs within academic activities, projects, and ultimately the avoidance of particular research fields. Discussing the asymmetrical dependencies of stakeholders and photography researchers, the book highlights the issues with permission and fair dealing laws in the UK and offers industry-based solutions to minimise its adverse impact on academic research on photography.

The book will be of interest to researchers in the field of intellectual property law, copyright law, and photography.

This book offers a grounded framework for Peace and Conflict Studies (PACS) that not only analyses conflict but also actively contributes to the well-being of marginalized communities.

In response to rising authoritarianism and shrinking democratic spaces, the volume calls for inclusive peacebuilding processes that center the voices, experiences, and agency of those historically excluded, particularly those on the periphery of the global system. The book critically engages with the limitations of traditional, Western-centric PACS frameworks and proposes a decolonial restructuring of the field. It foregrounds the lived experiences, knowledge systems, and aspirations of marginalized communities such as artists, members of the diaspora, and LGBTQIA+, thereby challenging dominant paradigms and positioning the periphery as a vital site of transformative action and knowledge production. Through practical, context-sensitive solutions, the volume seeks to make PACS more responsive, equitable, and capable of fostering sustainable peace in an increasingly complex world.

This book will be of much interest to students and practitioners of peace and conflict studies, social justice, development studies, and international relations.

This book develops and applies the theory of lethal moralism to explain the different types and growth of terrorism over the last half-century, from 1970 to 2020.

Drawing on data from the Global Terrorism Database, supplemented with original research differentiating groups based on their ideological orientations, it delves into the social and cultural forces that influence those who engage in terrorism, including the dynamic processes of "othering" that produce the social polarization crucial for understanding why some groups resort to lethal violence to handle their grievances. It systematically applies the theory of lethal moralism to explain the main types of terrorism rooted in different ideological frameworks, including left-wing terrorism, nationalist and separatist movements, religious terrorism (including a separate chapter on radical Islam), and right-wing extremism and hate groups.

As a theoretically informed study of the main varieties of terrorism and the evolution of terrorism in the digital age, Terrorism as Moralistic Violence will appeal to scholars of sociology, criminology, social theory, and politics with interests in political violence and terrorist movements.

This book is a sociological study of recent international conflicts, from Bosnia and Iraq to Ukraine and Gaza. Its approach is theoretical, applying the framework of sociocide to assess the social consequences of the conflicts in Ukraine and Gaza, through comparisons with previous conflicts that meet these criteria.

Sociocide means the murdering of the social encompassing matters pertaining to human solidarity: family, social institutions, ethnic, and national identity. This study develops and applies the concept to describe the social and human consequences of the war in Gaza, making comparisons to Chechnya, Iraq, Bosnia, and Ukraine. The conflict in Gaza creates an anomic state of nature where force and fraud are the cardinal virtues. This war demolishes houses as well as the prestige of the home. It kills civilians, that is, children, mothers, and entire families. It destroys communities, their invaluable history and collective memory. It eradicates social systems. The war murders a society. The goal of the comparative study is to frame objectively the moral anomie surrounding the violence of war in Gaza and its impact on world order. It also uses the term sociocide to consider the political war in the United States and the social entrapment of the spirit of capitalism as formulated by Max Weber.

This study asks, is there something within society that is resistant to its own demise? Whenever human beings gather, is there an imperishable part of their solidarity? This study takes up these questions concertedly, drawing upon the truisms of important figures in the field of social thought.

This book will therefore be of interest to students and scholars of sociology, conflict studies, genocide studies, and any general reader interested in understanding the extent and impact of contemporary conflicts.

Uniformed Murderers investigates the causes, logistics, motivations, and legal awareness of the Romanian servicemen - both military and gendarmerie - who massacred or otherwise caused the death of more than three thousand Jews, Roma, and others in 1941 and 1942. Vladimir Solonari addresses and revises the framework that Romanian decision makers largely followed in the footsteps of their German counterparts.

Solonari describes how Romanian leaders never completely acceded to the project of total annihilation of European Jewry and that although Romanian fascist dictator Ion Antonescu was viscerally antisemitic, he was determined to avoid making his country and his regime be seen as criminal in the eyes of the Western powers. Consequently, he preferred to avoid commanding his servicemen to kill, and when ordering them to do so, he tried to leave no paper trail. While some officers were reluctant to implicate themselves in criminal behavior, others demonstrated eagerness to kill perceived enemies of the Romanian nation.

Uniformed Murderers integrates these factors and assumptions to reveal how they led to the bewildering inconsistency of the Romanian record of mass murder, which reached its apex earlier than that of the Germans.

Archival Research for International Relations is an indispensable guide to why archival sources can be invaluable for IR scholarship and how to use archives effectively.

More IR students and scholars than ever are turning to archives to strengthen their research. But for those venturing in for the first time, archives can be intimidating - and with good reason. Despite mounting interest, archival training for IR researchers is limited. This gap leaves researchers not only uncertain about how archives contribute to scholarship, but also how to work with and make the most of them.

Joshua R. Itzkowitz Shifrinson bridges this gap by unpacking archival research from the ground up. Drawing on over two decades of working with archival sources, he first explains how using archival sources can uniquely sharpen theoretical and empirical arguments compared to other data sources. Next, he examines types of archival evidence, what each brings to research projects, and how to navigate methodological concerns - such as bias - when using archival records. Finally, he offers practical strategies for making the most of archive visits, from prioritizing materials to integrating findings into projects.

Comprehensive and practical, Archival Research for International Relations provides the roadmap IR researchers need to unlock the archives.

This book investigates three key frameworks applicable to the protection of asylum seekers and refugees: the Charter of the United Nations, the Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees, and the Responsibility to Protect doctrine. Through rigorous analysis, it reveals how the current international refugee protection regime embodies a narrow, reactive approach and makes a compelling case that protection should also be preventative.

While demonstrating that these three frameworks can work to protect refugee rights adequately, the author identifies significant normative challenges. The research exposes discrepancies and contradictions that potentially undermine the frameworks' effectiveness in protecting vulnerable populations. Building on this, the book advocates for establishing a preventative protection regime grounded in the normative principles of these frameworks. For this, it articulates an R2P Preventative Assessment Tool that integrates the development of protection plans alongside risk assessments. This book posits that shifting the focus of protection towards prevention could assist in minimising the impact of mass atrocities, armed conflict, and/or humanitarian interventions.

This thought-provoking monograph will appeal to academics, researchers, students, practitioners, policymakers, and non-governmental stakeholders, including UN officials. Its interdisciplinary approach spans refugee studies, human rights, international relations, international organisations, and global governance. Readers interested in the development and evolution of international legal norms, the UN's navigation of sovereignty and displacement issues, and atrocity prevention will find this work particularly valuable.

While interconnections between humanitarian actors and military operations are a pervasive feature of contemporary conflicts around the globe today, Military Humanitarianism challenges the idea that these interactions are a recent phenomenon. Instead, this volume offers an alternative interpretation to the traditional framing of military actors as a homogenous group and humanitarian actors as impartial intermediaries between armed groups and aid recipients.

In tracing a longer lineage beyond the post-Cold War period and twenty-first century, Military Humanitarianism uncovers a deeper history of entanglement between "humanitarian" and "military" actors - supposedly distinct categories that have long been mutually constitutive. By examining the malleability of these concepts and bringing different contexts into conversation, both editors and contributors reveal the tensions, ambiguities, and paradoxes of defining "humanitarian" action in practice, particularly in contrast to military operations. As a result, Military Humanitarianism provides timely insight into the understanding and politics of humanitarian operations, on and beyond the battlefield. It asks not just what it means to "help" but who gets to - and why.

Contributors: Cedric Cotter, Maria Cullen, Lewis Defrates, Bronwen Everill, Matilda Greig, Baher Ibrahim, Julia F. Irwin, Norman Joshua, Jonathan McCollum, Justine Meberg, Michelle Moyd, Daniel Palmieri, Elisabeth Piller, Lou Pingeot, Pietro Stefanini, and Jiayi Tao.

In A Post-Liberal Peace, Monalisa Adhikari shows how rising powers like India and China are reshaping global peace governance. Over recent decades, both countries have deepened engagement with institutions built on liberal principles, including those related to peacebuilding. Their growing role raises critical questions about how their approaches diverge from liberal models and their impact on the domestic politics of conflict-affected states.

Focusing on India and China's involvement in peace processes in Nepal and Myanmar, Adhikari demonstrates that these powers advance distinctive, state-centered programs that privilege regional stakeholders, stability, development, and pragmatism. Operating under conditions of "negotiated coexistence" with liberal peacebuilders, their initiatives neither fully align with nor openly contest existing actors, limiting cooperation while avoiding confrontation. This pluralized form of international engagement enables domestic elites to resist external pressures, producing hybrid peace orders that incorporate some liberal elements yet remain largely at the status quo - and often illiberal.

Rich with archival and interview evidence, A Post-Liberal Peace sheds light on alternative forms of peacebuilding and their on-the-ground effects in an increasingly multipolar world.

Heritage Forensics introduces a new framework for investigating cultural heritage caught up in war, ethnic cleansing, and secrecy. The book combines satellite-based spatial analysis with humanistic research and humanitarian concern to document the impact of the protracted conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan on the medieval and modern heritagescape of the South Caucasus. Drawing on the findings of Caucasus Heritage Watch, the authors demonstrate how cultural erasure, looting, and violence have inflicted harm on historical sites and the descendant communities for whom they hold enduring significance.

Out of the forensic materials provided by the Nagorno-Karabakh wars, Lori Khatchadourian, Adam T. Smith, Ian Lindsay, and Husik Ghulyan offer a reflexive approach for bearing witness to abuses of cultural heritage that emphasizes historical and political context and the careful use of powerful technologies in an era of post-truths. Heritage Forensics establishes a model for investigating cultural heritage threatened by political violence and is an invaluable resource for scholars, journalists, activists, and policymakers alike.

This book challenges the asymmetries in dialogues between the Global South and Global North.

The book considers how the literature on reparative politics in itself often perpetuates Western-centric models which risk leading to paternalistic approaches, as well as undermining the agency of thinkers, activists, and victims within the Global South. Encouraging a dialogue between the Global North and South, the book considers questions of affirmative action, collective memory, and alternative frameworks for dialogue on reparations. Authors also explore whether reparative policies should aim solely to repair past wrongs, or to also address ongoing structural inequalities and systemic injustices, including symbolic and affective dimensions.

Interdisciplinary by design, this book will be an important read for researchers across the fields of political science, international relations, global studies, and sociology.

Why fifty years of changemaking and reform haven't fixed Congress-and what that reveals about American democracy.

Congress, the central democratic institution in the United States, is hanging on by a thread. On January 6, 2021, a violent attack on the Capitol Building left five people dead, and threats and attacks against politicians are on the rise. In Stuck, Maya Kornberg chronicles the efforts of congressional reformers over the last fifty years and documents the mounting forces that have kept their reforms from creating meaningful change.

The "Watergate babies" of 1974, the Contract with America conservatives of 1994, and the historic 2018 class fueled by backlash to Donald Trump all represent younger, more diverse, and less entrenched members who arrived in Washington energized and idealistic. Kornberg reveals the ways Congress has become increasingly inhospitable to change. Political violence, astronomical campaign costs, relentless fundraising demands, shrinking staff, and centralized party leadership all constrain the ability of new members to legislate and represent their constituents. Social media, while offering new platforms for political expression, has also heightened harassment and fed a performative culture that rewards spectacle over substance.

Bolstered by dozens of interviews, congressional records, and the voices of lawmakers past and present-including Henry Waxman, Toby Moffett, Phil English, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, and Lauren Underwood-Stuck offers a sobering portrait of a legislative body paralyzed by its own internal dynamics. Kornberg outlines tangible reforms that could restore Congress's capacity to function and amplify the power of its newest members. At a time when Americans are losing faith in democracy's most representative institution, Stuck makes the case for how it could be saved.

This book offers a creative re-reading of Frantz Fanon as an affirmative proponent of radical democracy. It is the discovery of a Fanon who is occupied with creation, not destruction, and who urges people to retain their power and use it to manage their lives together. This aspect of Fanon is usually overlooked, lost in a sea of anti-colonial and anti-racist readings. This book begins the project of recovering the desire for democracy in Fanon as a crucial contribution to social thought and action in the face of democratic erosion today. It proposes democracy as a new, creative way forward. But it insists that we understand democracy radically, as a way of life in which we do not destroy what we are against. Instead, we create, together, new democratic lives in common. As such, this book will be an important resource not only for researchers, students, and instructors in cultural and postcolonial studies but also for social and political theory, contemporary sociology, geography, politics, and race and ethnicity studies.