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Due to the financial situation in the professional road peloton, many cycling teams struggle to find their sponsors. This situation is an opportunity for undemocratic politicians to promote their countries via cycling. Thus, some of them decided to create and support their own cycling teams. Generally, four WorldTour teams supported by undemocratic regimes and their governments have existed in professional cycling history. This book focuses on all of them; it reflects the existence of the Kazakh Astana Pro Team, the Russian Team Katusha (financed by the Russian government until the end of the 2015 season), the Bahrain Victorious (formerly called Bahrain Merida and Bahrain McLaren) or the UAE Team Emirates and the way they are/were used as sports diplomacy instruments.

This series focuses on the islands of the North Atlantic archipelago and on the water that surrounds those islands from pre-history through to the eighteenth century. Moving beyond traditional national histories, the series will highlight research that examines localities or regions bounded by geography and transnational studies of the Insular world, and connections between peoples and societies within the archipelago and their neighbours to the south (Brittany, Normandy and beyond) and the north (Norway and beyond). Archipelagic Studies will explore a range of themes (landscape, society, culture, language, religion, trade networks) and incorporate a number of disciplines and approaches (archaeology, heritage, history, literature, historical ecology, environmental, marine, political, social).

Focused on the struggle to survive by the Jewish Poles stranded in the Polish countryside during the Holocaust, case studies collected in this volume are based on research carried out at Poland’s Institute of National Remembrance. Where possible, they are also complemented by Jewish survivors’ testimonies dispersed throughout the world. There are at least two leitmotifs recurring throughout all texts: What are the social correlates of the anti-Jewish violence undertaken by Polish neighbours without German initiative and even knowledge? Are there certain types of social relationships more subject or prone to this kind of violence? What was the role of peasantry, social elites, and Catholic church in inciting and perpetrating it? Was this violence influenced by the Holocaust, or was it a separate form of genocidal violence?

The world has witnessed the rise of China, and there is a sustained debate on the China model. While some scholars believe that the China model is obsolete, others regards the China model as a threat to democracy. This book takes an empirical approach and regards the China model as it is, and looks into different aspects of the China model, ranging from economic growth, social development, central-local relations to the development of internal pluralism, the rise of civil society and rural democracy. Given the fact that China’s reform and opening up since the late Deng Xiaoping has taken place in the context of globalization, the book draws implications of the China model for the world. Particularly, the book attempts to examine the impact of China’s socio-economic development model on democratization.

The Justice and Development Party (AKP), the ruling political Islamists of Turkey since 2002, has been using the doctrine of necessity to legitimize human rights violations. Recep Tayyip Erdogan, president of Turkey, founder of the AKP and leader of the political Islamists, demands unconditional obedience and full control of the state. Under his leadership, the AKP government has shut down all opposing media, schools and universities and put thousands of people in prisons based on a manipulation of the necessity doctrine. In the political context, hardships are interpreted as obstacles on the way of the political Islamists towards holding absolute power in the state. Therefore, they use this "necessity" concept as a means to preserve their political power against all potential threats after taking full control of the state. According to the political Islamists, minority groups can be sacrificed for the benefit of the majority. Their properties can be usurped and their lives can be terminated. In moderate Islamic understanding, the state and the ruler are in the service of Muslims, not the other way around. For political Islamists, the state and the ruler (the caliph) are considered so sacred that they need to be protected against all opponents. In order to protect the state against internal and external "infidels" the caliph can resort to unlawful means because the necessity doctrine makes the forbidden things permissible. In this book, the author analyzes the concept of necessity and its exploitation by the political Islamists.

This book discusses Japan's international relations prior to 1945 with its focus on war and after 1945 during the Cold War era with its focus on globalization and also examines Japan’s international relations as an academic discipline. Part I describes and analyzes (1) how modern Japan coped with the coerced opening of the country, (2) how major powers aspired and alternated their hegemonic positions in East Asia in the extended twentieth century and (3) how global politics has been evolving with the three distinctive paradigms: the Westphalian, Philadelphian and Anti-Utopian. Part II describes and analyzes (1) how Japan foresees the future on the eve of the Cold War: the metamorphosis from Pax Americana Phase II to Pax Consortis, (2) how Japan envisages regionalism in Asia with sub-nationally and functionally articulated ideas for East and Southeast Asia, (3) Japan’s 21st century manifesto of foreign policy is presented as the best mix of classical realism, transformative pragmatism and liberal internationalism and (4) Japan’s manifesto as an Asian state is to deploy manufacturing/technological statecraft on the basis of East Asian peace. Part III focuses on theorizings of international relations from various angles. In light of hyperglobalization, theorizing global politics (as distinguished from international politics) is called for with two latest studies on global quasi-legislative politics and typology of Asian societies given as examples.

Well-known as a pioneer of economic development, Albert O. Hirschman has been the flag-bearer of possibilism and reform-mongering in political science. How Reforms Should Be Passed is an anthology of texts chosen personally by Hirschman on the latter production line—as he was to call it informally—that is rooted in his long and quasi-exclusive concern for development and Latin America. Key essays on the formation and the evolution of Hirschman’s point of view on the subject are collected: from "Ideologies of Economic Development in Latin America" to Journeys (and later "A Return Journey") on policy-making; from "Obstacles to the Perception of Change" to "The Search for Paradigms as a Hindrance to Understanding." They show an extraordinary turn of the mind in the making that will be very useful for the United States and the developed world as well—as the final texts of the book on democracy and Europe (Italy, Germany and France) bear out. This book represents a unique opportunity for becoming familiar with many original and perceptive lenses provided by Hirschman to look at the world we live in, and especially to favor social change—focusing (first of all) on the cultural and political side of the matter.