The overwhelming majority of works on world literature hitherto have been written by Western scholars. The almost endemic neglect of literatures other than European or Western in these writings over the last twenty years or so has drawn heavy critical fire. Usually, such Eurocentrism has been seen as the result of either ignorance on the part of these scholars or on an ingrained cultural bias. However, a deliberate concentration on European literature, or even on a very restricted version of the latter, may also be a strategic choice in particular times and under particular circumstances. A 1929 essay by the German literary scholar Victor Klemperer illustrates my point.

Concluding that even if economists cannot agree why shareholders should have priority, they are nevertheless agreed that this is the case, the chapter goes on to examine the legal position of different stakeholders in the context of the company by referring to the thorough reform process observed in the UK some two decades ago. Noting then that, despite such a comprehensive debate, the enlightened shareholder value solution (ESV) arrived at remains controversial, and recognising that, in any case, such formal statutory provisions by no means exhaust the arrangements in place for corporate governance, the chapter goes on to look at the hugely influential development of essentially self-regulatory, best-practice based arrangements that are now a feature of stock markets throughout the world. Insofar as the experience of the jurisdiction from which this approach emerged has not been uniformly positive, the chapter proceeds to examine the alternative approach of a strict rule-based approach to corporate governance, taking the US as an example. Despite the problems associated with any alternative, these apparent limits perhaps explain the ongoing and indeed intensified interest in the notion of corporate social responsibility. The chapter goes on to seek clarity in a definition of CSR which draws a distinction between what society requires corporations to do and what it is willing to regard as optional. Noting, however, that encouraging legislators to take firm action in the face of the fear of capital flight can be difficult in the absence of some clear evidence of a problem (and even then, in some recent cases), the question is then whether the recent enthusiasm for environmental, social and governance (ESG) reporting is a reasonable way forward.

Though world literature is often considered a modern phenomenon, a range of world literatures developed in cosmopolitan cultures in antiquity, as was already recognized by the early comparatist Hutcheson Macaulay Posnett. This essay discusses examples of world literature created in the Hellenistic and imperial Roman world and the ancient Near East, looking in particular at relations between imperial centers and colonial peripheries.

By examining musical theatre icons and their major collaborations starting from Oklahoma! (1943) and ending with Waitress (2016), this chapter chronicles the evolution of the American musical, as practitioners assembled creative teams in response to shifting economics and the rise of mediated popular culture on television and the internet. Film studios and corporations such as Disney now develop and produce their own musicals, bringing new resources and structures that both support and expand the collaborative creation of musical theatre. At the same time, regional theatres and not-for-profit venues developed new models of their own for participating in musical theatre collaboration. Whether conceived in consultation with a corporate producer or tested through a low-budget laboratory process, what's inside twenty-first-century American musicals remains the product of creative, collaborative relationships.

Recent developments in investment arbitration have reaffirmed that corporations are not only recipients of rights under bilateral investment treaties, but also subjects of international law and can thus bear at least some human rights obligations under international law. Moreover, in a growing number of cases such as Philipp Morris, civil society intervened as third party by relying heavily on human rights arguments, thus enabling affected communities to voice their interests. The present contribution thus investigates the multiple roles of human rights in investment law and arbitration. It argues that human rights play an important role for state parties, foreign investors, and affected communities alike. They are not only conflicting and complementary to investment treaties, but can both expand and restrict the scope of jurisdiction of investment tribunals. For states, investors, and third parties alike human rights can be used as a sword or a shield in international investment law and arbitration. The different roles human rights play in investment law and arbitration very much depend on the underlying concept of human rights.

This chapter provides a critical overview of the UNGPs and its three predecessors: the 1990 Draft Code, the Global Compact, and the Draft UN Norms. The current BHR treaty process, which is dealt with elsewhere in this book, is touched upon briefly because of space constraints. In providing an overview of various attempts at the UN level to regulate corporations, two arguments are made in this chapter. First, we should see the UNGPs as part of a continuing process to develop standards at the UN level, rather than as a complete new start. Second, it is argued that the UN has made too little and too slow progress in putting in place an effective regulatory regime. In making such an assessment about the progress made so far in ‘humanizing business’, the author attempts to step in the shoes of rights holders, because progress could be interpreted differently from the perspective of different stakeholders.

This essay describes how the antipodal turn has impacted upon World Literature in both its geographic and figurative dimensions. It examines the history of the term antipodean in relation to a rhetoric of transposition and also considers it in the context of ecological and Indigenous criticism, as well as the new prominence of the Global South. The essay addresses the specific relevance of Australian culture to this formation, and it concludes by suggesting ways in which this antipodal turn might constitute a productive critical method.

For those with an interest in understanding the evolution of Judaism in the Islamic lands of the Middle Ages, but not necessarily with a specialized knowledge or training as historians, it is necessary to offer a few general words of warning about the nature, variety, and exploitation of the sources from which history is derived. Though now virtually axiomatic for those who research and write about the past in a scientific fashion, such cautions need to be sounded because there are still approaches to the history of medieval religion – perhaps particularly to that area of study – that may, at least sometimes, take it for granted that the circumstances, personalities, and interpretations that are noted in the early and traditional texts of a faith community are to be understood literally. The reality is that what is reflected in such data is not only a view on a particular period but also the notions and commitments of their chroniclers. History is lived forward but written backward so that all assessments have more than a small element of hindsight and bias.

The chapter begins with a brief genealogy of new materialism and inquiry into the significance of the nonhuman stories entangled in the ethical, political, scientific, and theoretical complexities of the Anthropocene. It first explains the convergence of the new materialism(s) and environmental humanities on ecologically engaged collaborative thinking in responding to bioethical, socio-cultural, and scientific questions that arise from the challenges of Anthropocene. It then discusses how new materialism has espoused the postmodern and poststructuralist disclosure of the link between the dualistic conceptions of the world and the traditional realist systems of representation. The broad argument is that the significance of the agentic capacity of matter in producing layers of expressivity has undermined the established credo about storytelling being uniquely all too human. The “nonhuman story” is argued to mark an important shift in the foundational notions of narrative and storytelling. Material ecocriticism re-envisions narrative as the signifying agency of living matter or narrative agency. Material ecocriticism sees the world as a site of narrativity where narrative agencies – the building blocks of storied matter – demonstrate some degree of creative experience.

The history of waste records a relationship that has altered over time, resulting in various literal and symbolic manifestations. Waste Studies crosses conventional disciplines to offer ethical frameworks which pay attention to, understand, and act on bodily, cultural, and societal waste. With examples from novelists Toni Morrison and Wolfgang Hilbig, this chapter illustrates a number of aspects of waste in literature: waste as material agent; waste as metaphor; and narratives structured as waste, with little hope for clarity. The strategy of slow practice through narrative construction can prove a means to inculcate an ecological sensitivity and awareness we carry with us beyond the act of reading. While waste categories often are used to dismiss, deny, and reject certain humans, other-than-human agents, and material items, waste has also been used as a means to provoke compassion and ethical engagement by which we can develop a compassionate commonality with wasted beings to act for them, for us, and for the world. Waste Studies argues that the humanities can vibrantly and dynamically work to improve all of our lives in a concrete and material way.