John Dower's War Without Mercy is an attempt to resolve the problem of why the United States fought World War II so very differently in the Pacific and European theaters.
Keith Thomas's classic study of all forms of popular belief has been influential for so long now that it is difficult to remember how revolutionary it seemed when it first appeared.
WITH AN INTRODUCTION, PLUS EXTENSIVE NOTES AND REFERENCES BY HERMIONE LEEThis volume combines two books which were among the greatest contributions to feminist literature this century.
This comprehensive study explores sufism as a form of self-purification, offering a deeper understanding of the sacred acts and a greater knowledge and love of the divine.
Henry Kissinger's 2014 book World Order: Reflections on the Character of Nations and the Course of History not only offers a summary of thinking developed throughout a long and highly influential career-it is also an intervention in international relations theory by one of the most famous statesmen of the twentieth century.
Debt is one of the great subjects of our day, and understanding the way that it not only fuels economic growth, but can also be used as a means of generating profit and exerting control, is central to grasping the way in which our society really works.
Liquidated is a work of anthropology that treats an unusual, despised subculture - that of the Wall Street banker - much as anthropologists have traditionally treated remote 'savage' tribes.
Despite being written between 170 and 180, Marcus Aurelius' Meditations often resonates with modern readers because of its remarkable resemblance to a self-help book.
Mahmood Mamdani's 1996 Citizen and Subject is a powerful work of analysis that lays bare the sources of the problems that plagued, and often still plague, African governments.
With his 1954 book The Nature of Prejudice, American psychologist Gordon Allport displays the crucial skill of reasoning, producing and organizing an argument that was persuasive enough to have a major impact not only in universities, but also on government policy.
Few works of history have succeeded so completely in forcing their readers to take a fresh look at the evidence as Christopher Hill's The World Turned Upside Down - and that achievement is rooted firmly in Hill's exceptional problem-solving skills.
Leon Festinger's 1957 A Theory of Cognitive Dissonance is a key text in the history of psychology - one that made its author one of the most influential social psychologists of his time.
South Korean economist Ha-Joon Chang used his 2003 work Kicking Away The Ladder to challenge the central orthodoxies of development economics, using his creative thinking skills to shine new light on an old topic.
Embark on a Journey to Inner Peace in Our Turbulent TimesIn todays constantly connected and hectic world, finding serenity seems like a quest reserved for the ancient philosophers.
The Accidental Universe and Other Stories begins with a riff on the oldest tale known to man and then takes us from the beginning of the twentieth century up to the present day and beyond.
Michel Foucault is famous as one of the 20th-century's most innovative thinkers - and his work on Discipline and Punish was so original and offered models so useful to other scholars that the book now ranks among the most influential academic works ever published.
Clifford Geertz has been called 'the most original anthropologist of his generation' - and this reputation rests largely on the huge contributions to the methodology and approaches of anthropological interpretation that he outlined in The Interpretation of Cultures.
For those who lived through the Cold War period, and for many of the historians who study it, it seemed self-evident that the critical incidents that determined its course took place in the northern hemisphere, specifically in the face-off between NATO and the Warsaw Pact in Europe.
Qu’il s’agisse de nous-même, de notre famille ou de collègues de travail, nous sommes (ou serons) tous confrontés à la dépression au cours de notre vie.
Burton Malkiel's 1973 A Random Walk Down Wall Street was an explosive contribution to debates about how to reap a good return on investing in stocks and shares.
Peruvian priest Gustavo Gutierrez wanted to solve the problem of how the church could conduct itself to improve the lives of the poor, while consistently positioning itself as politically neutral.
Daniel Goldhagen's study of the Holocaust offers conclusions that run directly counter to those reached by Christopher Browning, whose book Ordinary Men is also the subject of a Macat analysis.
Seven-year-old Che was abandoned by his radical Havard-student parents during the upheaval of the 1960s, and since then has been raised in isolated privilege by his New York grandmother.
The German sociologist Max Weber is considered to be one of the founding fathers of sociology, and ranks among the most influential writers of the 20th-century.
Martin Luther King's policy of non-violent protest in the struggle for civil rights in the United States during the second half of the twentieth century led to fundamental shifts in American government policy relating to segregation, and a cultural shift in the treatment of African Americans.
Eric Hoffer's The True Believer: Thoughts on the Nature of Mass Movements is one of the most widely read works of social psychology written in the 20th-century.
American political scientist Robert Putnam wasn't the first person to recognize that social capital - the relationships between people that allow communities to function well - is the grease that oils the wheels of society.
