This book examines China’s bilateral relations with its established suppliers of crude petroleum and on occasion, petroleum gas products including liquefied natural gas (LNG) based on a five- dimensional framework: political-diplomatic relations, economic-trade relations, military- security relations, cultural relations, and petroleum-energy relations. A five-dimensional approach is comprehensive in nature and offers a complete understanding of China’s complex relationships rather than loo...

A diabolically sinister but clownish villain, Joker is a symbolically rich and philosophically fascinating character. With his enigmatic motivations, infectious irreverence, and selfless devotion to evil, Joker never fails to provoke a host of philosophical questions.Bringing together essays by a diverse panel of acclaimed scholars and philosophers, this engaging book delves into the motivations, psychology, and moral philosophy of the character for whom mayhem and chaos are a sour...

China's rise in the global arena is undeniably altering the global status quo. Its rise is closely linked to and reflected in its rising dependence on imported oil, adroit soft power, economic prowess and corresponding impressive economic growth, its military modernization, and its strategic engagement of the world as an alternative model of political and economic development. As the status quo changes, the United States theoretically becomes less influential politically, economically, and...

Future Oil Demands of China, India, and Japan examines how Chinese oil energy will likely shape future Sino-Indian and Sino-Japanese relations under conditions of dependency and non-dependency, and whether competition or cooperation for scarce energy resources will result. The author lists and describes three possible Chinese oil energy futures or scenarios (Competitive Dependency, Competitive Surplus, and Cooperative Surplus) using Scenario Analysis and the PRINCE Method to subsequently e...

**From one of the world’s best-known development economists—an excoriating attack on the tragic hubris of the West’s efforts to improve the lot of the so-called developing world."Brilliant at diagnosing the failings of Western intervention in the Third World." —BusinessWeek**In his previous book, The Elusive Quest for Growth, William Easterly criticized the utter ineffectiveness of Western organizations to mitigate global poverty, and he was promptly fired...

Here is a stunning and provocative guide to the future of international relations—a system for managing global problems beyond the stalemates of business versus government, East versus West, rich versus poor, democracy versus authoritarianism, free markets versus state capitalism. Written by the most esteemed and innovative adventurer-scholar of his generation, Parag Khanna’s How to Run the World posits a chaotic modern era that resembles the Middle Ages, with Asian empires, Weste...

The twenty-first century has seen a rise in the global middle class that brings an unprecedented convergence of interests and perceptions, cultures and values. Kishore Mahbubani is optimistic. We are creating a new global civilization. Eighty-eight percent of the world's population outside the West is rising to Western living standards, and sharing Western aspirations. Yet Mahbubani, one of the most perceptive global commentators, also warns that a new global order needs new policies and a...

G-Zero — \JEE-ZEER-oh\ —nA world order in which no single country or durable alliance of countries can meet the challenges of global leadership. What happens when the G20 doesn’t work and the G7 is history.If the worst threatened—a rogue nuclear state with a horrible surprise, a global health crisis, the collapse of financial institutions from New York to Shanghai and Mumbai—where would the world look for leadership? The United States, with its paralyzed po...

"A concise, comprehensive guide to America's critical policy choices at home and overseas . . . without a partisan agenda, but with a passion for solutions designed to restore our country's strength and enable us to lead." -- Madeleine K. AlbrightA rising China, climate change, terrorism, a nuclear Iran, a turbulent Middle East, and a reckless North Korea all present serious challenges to America's national security. But it depends even more on the United States ad...

Today, nations increasingly carry out geopolitical combat through economic means. Policies governing everything from trade and investment to energy and exchange rates are wielded as tools to win diplomatic allies, punish adversaries, and coerce those in between. Not so in the United States, however. America still too often reaches for the gun over the purse to advance its interests abroad. The result is a playing field sharply tilting against the United States.In a cogent analysis ...

Beijing presents a clear and gathering threat to Washington -- but not for the reasons you think. China's challenge to the West stems from its transformative brand of capitalism and an entirely different conception of the international community. In The Beijing Consensus, a leading expert in international relations presents a coherent integration of the many sides of U.S.-China relations.

From the world’s leading experts on geopolitical risk, a guide to the major global issues and policies sure to dominate headlines in the next few years.In the last four years, the world has suffered a financial market meltdown and subsequent global recession. The eurozone crisis looms, the Middle East is in turmoil, and a shifting power balance between emerging markets and developed economies is reordering the global economy as a whole. Political and economic chall...