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Author: Chris Shilling
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Published: 2016
Total Pages: 145
ISBN-13: 0198739036
DOWNLOAD EBOOK →In this introduction, Chris Shilling considers the social significance of the human body, and the importance of the body to individual and collective identities. He examines how bodies not only shape but are shaped by the social, cultural, and material contexts in which humans live.
Author: Stefano B. Longo
Publisher: Rutgers University Press
Published: 2015-06-25
Total Pages: 275
ISBN-13: 0813565790
DOWNLOAD EBOOK →Winner of the 2017 Paul Sweezy Marxist Sociology Book Award from the American Sociological Association Although humans have long depended on oceans and aquatic ecosystems for sustenance and trade, only recently has human influence on these resources dramatically increased, transforming and undermining oceanic environments throughout the world. Marine ecosystems are in a crisis that is global in scope, rapid in pace, and colossal in scale. In The Tragedy of the Commodity, sociologists Stefano B. Longo, Rebecca Clausen, and Brett Clark explore the role human influence plays in this crisis, highlighting the social and economic forces that are at the heart of this looming ecological problem. In a critique of the classic theory “the tragedy of the commons” by ecologist Garrett Hardin, the authors move beyond simplistic explanations—such as unrestrained self-interest or population growth—to argue that it is the commodification of aquatic resources that leads to the depletion of fisheries and the development of environmentally suspect means of aquaculture. To illustrate this argument, the book features two fascinating case studies—the thousand-year history of the bluefin tuna fishery in the Mediterranean and the massive Pacific salmon fishery. Longo, Clausen, and Clark describe how new fishing technologies, transformations in ships and storage capacities, and the expansion of seafood markets combined to alter radically and permanently these crucial ecosystems. In doing so, the authors underscore how the particular organization of social production contributes to ecological degradation and an increase in the pressures placed upon the ocean. The authors highlight the historical, political, economic, and cultural forces that shape how we interact with the larger biophysical world. A path-breaking analysis of overfishing, The Tragedy of the Commodity yields insight into issues such as deforestation, biodiversity loss, pollution, and climate change.
Author: Collectif
Publisher: Éditions de la Maison des sciences de l’homme
Published: 2017-12-19
Total Pages: 432
ISBN-13: 2735122859
DOWNLOAD EBOOK →Thanks to recent progress in biotechnology, surrogacy, transplantation of organs and tissues, blood products or stem-cell and gamete banks are now widely used throughout the world. These techniques improve the health and well-being of some human beings using products or functions that come from the body of others. Growth in demand and absence of an appropriate international legal framework have led to the development of a lucrative global trade in which victims are often people living in insecure conditions who have no other ways to survive than to rent or sell part of their body. This growing market, in which parts of the human body are bought and sold with little respect for the human person, displays a kind of dehumanization that looks like a new form of slavery. This book is the result of a collective and multidisciplinary reflection organized by a group of international researchers working in the field of medicine and social sciences. It helps better understand how the emergence of new health industries may contribute to the development of a global medical tourism. It opens new avenues for reflection on technologies that are based on appropriation of parts of the body of others for health purposes, a type of practice that can be metaphorically compared to cannibalism. Are these the fi rst steps towards a proletariat of men- and women-objects considered as a reservoir of products of human origin needed to improve the health or well-being of the better-off? The book raises the issue of the uncontrolled use of medical advances that can sometimes reach the anticipations of dystopian literature and science fiction.
Author: Daniel P. Ahn
Publisher: MIT Press
Published: 2019-04-09
Total Pages: 229
ISBN-13: 0262347881
DOWNLOAD EBOOK →A rigorous but practical introduction to the economic, financial, and political principles underlying commodity markets. Commodities have become one of the fastest growing asset classes of the last decade and the object of increasing attention from investors, scholars, and policy makers. Yet existing treatments of the topic are either too theoretical, ignoring practical realities, or largely narrative and nonrigorous. This book bridges the gap, striking a balance between theory and practice. It offers a solid foundation in the economic, financial, and political principles underlying commodities markets. The book, which grows out of courses taught by the author at Columbia and Johns Hopkins, can be used by graduate students in economics, finance, and public policy, or as a conceptual reference for practitioners. After an introduction to basic concepts and a review of the various types of commodities—energy, metals, agricultural products—the book delves into the economic and financial dynamics of commodity markets, with a particular focus on energy. The text covers fundamental demand and supply for resources, the mechanics behind commodity financial markets, and how they motivate investment decisions around both physical and financial portfolio exposure to commodities, and the evolving political and regulatory landscape for commodity markets. Additional special topics include geopolitics, financial regulation, and electricity markets. The book is divided into thematic modules that progress in complexity. Text boxes offer additional, related material, and numerous charts and graphs provide further insight into important concepts.
Author: Nancy Scheper-Hughes
Publisher: SAGE
Published: 2002-10-18
Total Pages: 208
ISBN-13: 9780761940340
DOWNLOAD EBOOK →With rapid developments in reproductive medicine, transplant ethics and bioethics, a new `ethic of parts' has emerged in which the body is increasingly seen as a commodity which can be bartered, sold or stolen. This book combines perspectives from anthropology and sociology to offer compelling new readings of the body.
Author: Photis Lysandrou
Publisher: Routledge
Published: 2018-11-02
Total Pages: 102
ISBN-13: 0429806515
DOWNLOAD EBOOK →The 21st century marks a watershed in the history of the human economic condition. Income and wealth inequalities are now greater than ever before – and their role in the global financial crisis is one of the burning issues of today. Commodity looks at the great financial crisis from an entirely original perspective – that of the global commodity system as a newly operational totality. In the 19th century, the commodity system as defined by Karl Marx was limited to a few regions and embraced only the labour and capital capacities and their outputs. By the end of the 20th century, it encompassed the entire planet and embraced government capacity as well as private capacities, financial securities and material goods and services. This book shows how the financial crisis and its causes can only properly be understood as a result of this vast, unprecedented extension of the commodity system – a system which benefits the rich. The author makes the watertight case that it is only through the creation of a global tax authority – to coordinate national tax regimes and to implement a tax on global wealth – that we can avoid another crisis and create a fairer and more equitable world. Addressing a broad range of themes, Commodity offers a new perspective which will be of interest to political economists as well as researchers specialising in other related fields of social enquiry. Written in a clear and engaging way, the book’s concise nature also makes it accessible for the non-specialist reader, and it will especially appeal to all those who want a more just society.
Author: Margaret Jane Radin
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Published: 2001-11-05
Total Pages: 296
ISBN-13: 0674007166
DOWNLOAD EBOOK →This work looks at ethical and moral questions surrounding certain economic "commodities" such as body parts and babies. It argues that commodification should remain incomplete, with some contested things being bought and sold only under strict regulation.
Author: Jim Rogers
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
Published: 2014-10-17
Total Pages: 272
ISBN-13: 0470015322
DOWNLOAD EBOOK →The next bull market is here. It’s not in stocks. It’s not in bonds. It’s in commodities - and some smart investors will be riding that bull to record returns in the next decade. Before Jim Rogers hit the road to write his best-selling books Investment Biker and Adventure Capitalist, he was one of the world’s most successful investors. He co-founded the Quantum Fund and made so much money that he never needed to work again. Yet despite his success, Rogers has never written a book of practical investment advice - until now. In Hot Commodities, Rogers offers the low-down on the most lucrative markets for today and tomorrow. In late 1998, gliding under the radar, a bull market in commodities began. Rogers thinks it’s going to continue for at least fifteen years - and he’s put his money where his mouth is: In 1998, he started his own commodities index fund. It’s up 165% since then, with more than $200 million invested, and it’s the single-best performing index fund in the world in any asset class. Less risky than stocks and less sluggish than bonds, commodities are where the money is - and will be in the years ahead. Rogers’s strategies are simple and straightforward. You can start small - a few thousand dollars will suffice. It’s all about putting your money into stuff you understand, the basic materials of everyday life, like copper, sugar, cotton, corn, or crude oil. Once you recognize the cyclical and historical trading patterns outlined here, you’ll be on your way. In language that is both colourful and accessible, Rogers explains why the world of commodity investing can be one of the simplest of all - and how commodities are the bases by which investors can value companies, markets, and whole economies. To be a truly great investor is to know something about commodities. For small investors and high rollers alike, Hot Commodities is as good as gold . . . or lead, or aluminium, which are some of the commodities Rogers says could be as rewarding for investors.
Author: Eva Illouz
Publisher: Routledge
Published: 2017-09-28
Total Pages: 222
ISBN-13: 1351810596
DOWNLOAD EBOOK →Capitalism has made rationality into a pervasive feature of human action and yet, far from heralding a loss of emotionality, capitalist culture has been accompanied with an unprecedented intensification of emotional life. This raises the question: how could we have become increasingly rationalized and more intensely emotional? Emotions as Commodities offers a simple hypothesis: that consumer acts and emotional life have become closely and inseparably intertwined with each other, each one defining and enabling the other. Commodities facilitate the experience of emotions, and so emotions are converted into commodities. The contributors of this volume present the co-production of emotions and commodities as a new type of commodity that has gone unseen and unanalyzed by theories of consumption – emodity. Indeed, this innovative book explores how emodity includes atmospherical or mood-producing commodities, relation-marking commodities and mental commodities, all of which the purpose it is to change and improve the self. Analysing a variety of modern day situations such as emotional management through music, creation of urban sexual atmospheres and emotional transformation through psychotherapy, Emotions as Commodities will appeal to scholars, postgraduate students and postdoctoral researchers interested in fields such as Sociology, Cultural Studies, Marketing, Anthropology and Consumer Studies.
