Globalization and Armed Conflict addresses one of the most important and controversial issues of our time: Does global economic integration foster or suppress violent disputes within and between states? Here, cutting-edge research by leading figures in international relations shows that expanding commercial ties between states pacifies some, but not necessarily all, political relationships. The authors demonstrate that the pacific effect of economic integration hinges on democratic structu...

Fueled by its surging economic strength, China has been increasingly utilizing economic tools such as trade, foreign aid, foreign direct investment, and sanctions to pursue strategic and security interests on the world stage. This approach, known as economic statecraft, has thus far received mixed policy results and ambivalent reactions from the international community. This book presents a collection of global assessments of China's economic statecraft. The contributors to this volume ans...

Statistical analysis is common in the social sciences, and among the more popular programs is R. This book provides a foundation for undergraduate and graduate students in the social sciences on how to use R to manage, visualize, and analyze data. The focus is on how to address substantive questions with data analysis and replicate published findings. Using R for Data Analysis in Social Sciences adopts a minimalist approach and covers only the most important functions and skills i...

This book offers a critical assessment of governance ideas in the context of Chinese neoliberalism. It argues that the Chinese version of governance has emerged as an important discursive practice in the articulation of the neoliberal spirit of the national reform agenda. The book first examines the institutional and intellectual background of governance ideas, capturing the key features of neoliberalization in transitional China. The main body of investigation is an interpretive analysis ...

For decades, free trade was advocated as the vehicle for peace, prosperity, and democracy in an increasingly globalized market. More recently, the proliferation of foreign direct investment has raised questions about its impact upon local economies and politics. Here, seven scholars bring together their wide-ranging expertise to investigate the factors that determine the attractiveness of a locale to investors and the extent of their political power. Multinational corporations prefer to in...

The chemistry, physics, and applications of liquid crystals beyond LCDsLiquid Crystals (LCs) combine order and mobility on a molecular and supramolecular level. But while these remarkable states of matter are most commonly associated with visual display technologies, they have important applications for a variety of other fields as well. Liquid Crystals Beyond Displays: Chemistry, Physics, and Applications considers these, bringing together cuttin...

This book covers the design, synthesis, properties, and applications of functional photoactive soft materials, including aspects of polymers, block copolymers, elastomers, biomaterials, liquid crystals, chemical and physical gels, colloids, and host-guest systems. It combines, in a unified manner, authoritative accounts describing various structural and functional aspects of photoactive soft materials.Photoactive Functional Soft Materials: Preparation, Properties, and Applications:...

This book presents the unique mechanical, electrical, and optical properties of nanomaterials, which play an important role in the recent advances of energy-related applications. Different nanomaterials have been employed in energy saving, generation, harvest, conversion, storage, and transport processes very effectively and efficiently. Recent progress in the preparation, characterization and usage of 1D, 2D nanomaterials and hybrid architectures for energy-related applications and releva...

The first book to explore the potential of tunable functionalities in organic and hybrid nanostructured materials in a unified manner.The highly experienced editor and a team of leading experts review the promising and enabling aspects of this exciting materials class, covering the design, synthesis and/or fabrication, properties and applications. The broad topical scope includes organic polymers, liquid crystals, gels, stimuli-responsive surfaces, hybrid membranes, metallic, semico...

This book focuses on the exciting topic of nanoscience with liquid crystals: from self-organized nanostructures to applications. The elegant self-organized liquid crystalline nanostructures, the synergetic characteristics of liquid crystals and nanoparticles, liquid crystalline nanomaterials, synthesis of nanomaterials using liquid crystals as templates, nanoconfinement and nanoparticles of liquid crystals are covered and discussed, and the prospect of fabricating functional materials is h...

There has been concerted effort across scientific disciplines to develop artificial materials and systems that can help researchers understand natural stimuli-responsive activities. With its up-to-date coverage on intelligent stimuli-responsive materials, Intelligent Stimuli-Responsive Materials provides research, industry, and academia professionals with the fundamentals and principles of intelligent stimuli-responsive materials, with a focus on methods and applications. Emphasiz...

In this book anisotropic one-dimensional and two-dimensional nanoscale building blocks and their assembly into fascinating and qualitatively new functional structures embracing both hard and soft components are explained. Contributions from leading experts regarding important aspects like synthesis, assembly, properties and applications of the above materials are compiled into a reference book. The anisotropy, i.e. the direction-dependent physical properties, of materials is fascinating an...