Bruce Mazlish

al-Ḥaḍāra wa-maḍāmīnuhā

Jacob Bronowski

Traces the development of thought through historical movements and periods from 1500 to 1830.

The Western Intellectual Tradition

From a distinguished author in the field, The New Global History is a critical inquiry into the historical process of globalization, which is seen as a distinctly twentieth century phenomenon with its roots in the age of expansion of the early modern world. Cutting across disciplinary boundaries, The New Global History offers a fresh, overarching view of the process of globalization that is always empirically based and discusses the most important themes, such as policy, trade, cultural imperialism and warfare. Bruce Mazlish argues that globalization is not something that the West has imposed upon the rest of the world, but the result of the interplay of many factors across continents. Students of history, politics and international studies, will all find this a valuable resource in the pursuit of their studies.

The New Global History

Psychoanalysis and History

Kenneth Weisbrode

Nayan Chanda

The Paradox of a Global USA describes the vexed relationship between the United States and globalization. On the one hand, the U.S. has vociferously promoted modernization and open markets, both central components of the process of globalization. On the other hand, it appears to be resolutely determined not to live within an institutional framework of globalized authority. As the world's only superpower, the United States is often perceived as championing its own narrow national sovereignty—for example, by opposing the Kyoto Protocol and the International Criminal Court, and by taking action in Iraq outside the auspices of the UN. The book treats the paradox of American exceptionalism and globalization as a "local" happening within the broader process of globalization. These essays analyze the ways in which the USA has both played a role in, and reacted against, emerging present-day globalization. Examples are drawn from the fields of history, political science, cultural studies, and economics, making this collection one of the very few to link together so diverse a group of authors and approaches to the subject of global USA.

The Paradox of a Global USA

Who was the real Richard Nixon and why did he behave the way he did? In this innovative work, a distinguished historian, trained in psychoanalysis, unravels the riddle of Nixon's singularly opaque political personality. Neither a political biography, nor a clinical psychoanalysis, at the time of its initial publication, In Search of Nixon launched a new genre of scholarship; the "psycho-historical inquiry." Mazlish offers insight into the subtle interplay between Nixon the man and Nixon the public figure.Why, for example, did Nixon have such personal difficulties in making decisions? Knowing how the young Nixon learned to cope with the problems of his childhood, what can we infer about his unpredictable decisions on Communist China, inflation, and the Supreme Court? Bruce Mazlish applies psychoanalysis to history in order to understand Nixon's behaviour, decisions, and political stance. He explains why Nixon characteristically projected personal crises onto the political arenaas, for example, in the famous Checkers speech, or in the Haynsworth-Carswell affair. And he examines why, conversely, political questions such as pacifism, abortion, and subversion had such a peculiarly personal meaning for him.

A Psychohistorical Inquiry

In Search of Nixon

In this book of absorbing stories, Bruce Mazlish illuminates the lives of intellectual and political leaders with the penetrating light of psychohistory and in doing so illuminates our own lives as well. A pioneer in this field, Mazlish demonstrates that study of the origins of leaders--their personal history--can help us understand their work, and that only in a study of their context, can we grasp their impact on events. Mazlish brings the insights of psychoanalysis to bear on a wide spectrum of leaders, beginning with those who created the theories of psychoanalysis: Darwin, who began to uncover the story of the human species; Freud, whose theory of individual behavior was rooted in Darwin's evolutionary biology; and Nietzsche, whose philosophy can be seen as a precursor to Freud. He studies intellectual leaders whose work stimulated political change: Marx, who inspired a revolution and "a great secular religion"; Thoreau, who fantasized independence within a dependent life; Jevons, whose economic theories reflected a private tension between ambition and duty; and Weber, a man of reason and passion, whose theories emerged from personal traumas. A section on political leadership examines polar opposites: the raging mystic but opportunist Khomeini; and Orwell, whose hatred for totalitarianism was less fierce than his passive fear. A final section on the psychohistory of groups focuses on the United States, exploring the polarities of American life, its light-dark dichotomies. Mazlish finds that these ambivalences explain "the American psyche"--from the Puritan's melancholy conscience and Washington's sense of parental betrayal that compelled a break with the father-mother country to Nixon's uncritical self-righteousness and his conviction of being always under attack.

Essays in Psychohistory

The Leader, the Led, and the Psyche

Alfred D. Chandler

A ground-breaking 2005 exploration of multinational corporations that differs from other books on the subject by offering the reader a totally global perspective of multinationals without portraying them simply as economic entities. Written by experts on various aspects of the history, development, cultural and social implications of the multinational corporation, the book paints a compelling and coherent picture of the way these businesses affect almost all areas of our existence. As we might expect, the multinational company is shown to play a major role in the globalization that is reshaping so much of our lives.

Multinational Corporations and the New Global History

Leviathans

"Civilization" is a constantly invoked term. It is used by both politicians and scholars. How useful, in fact, is this term? Civilization and Its Contents traces the origins of the concept in the eighteenth century. It shows its use as a colonial ideology, and then as a support for racism. The term was extended to a dead society, Egyptian civilization, and was appropriated by Japan, China, and Islamic countries. This latter development lays the groundwork for the contemporary call for a "dialogue of civilizations." The author proposes instead that today the use of the term "civilization" has a global meaning, with local variants recognized as cultures. It may be more appropriate, however, to abandon the name "civilization" and to focus on a new understanding of the civilizing process.

Civilization and Its Contents

The story of James and John Stuart Mill is one of the great dramas of the 19thcentury. In the tense yet loving struggle of this extraordinarily influential father and son, we can see the genesis of evolution of Liberal ideas-about love, sex, and women, wealth and work, authority and rebellion-which ushered in the modern age. The result of more than a decade of research and reflection, this is a study of the relationship between James Mill, the self-made utilitarian philosopher who tried (with only partial success) to shape his son in his own image. Mazlish integrates psychology and intellectual history as part of his larger and continuing effort to spur deeper understanding of the character, limitations, and possibilities of the social sciences.John Stuart Mill's rebellion against a joyless, loveless upbringing, one in strict accordance with the principles of Utilitarianism, was rooted ina powerful Oedipal struggle against his father's authority. Mazlish describes this rebellion as playing an important role in the genesis of classical nineteenth century liberalism. Behind this intellectual development were the women in Mills' life: Harriet the mother, never mentioned by her son in his autobiography, and Harriet Taylor, with whom Mill lived in a scandalous, if chaste, ménage a trois. It was this long relationship which informed his famous essay 'The Subjection of Women,' one of the most eloquent feminist statements ever written. A work of brilliant historical research and psychological insights, James and John Stuart Mill shows how the nineteenth-century struggle of fathers and sons shaped the social transformation of society.

James and John Stuart Mill

Discusses the relationship between humans and machines, pondering the implications of humans becoming more mechanical and of computer robots being programmed to think. He describes early Greek and Chinese automatons and discusses ideas of previous centuries and of individuals on this subject.

Bruce Mazlish

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