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2234 results in Cambridge Elements

Page 13 of 112

Climate Adaptation and Conflict Mitigation

Climate Adaptation and Conflict Mitigation
  • The Case of South Sudan
  • Ore Koren, Jerry Urtuzuastigui
  • Published online:
    21 April 2025
    Print publication:
    12 June 2025
  • As climate change intensifies, conflict-prone tropical regions face heightened vulnerabilities, yet little is known about how climate adaptation and food security efforts affect conflict dynamics. Using South Sudan – a country highly susceptible to climate stress and conflict – as a test case, this Element analyzes how international nongovernmental organizations' (INGO) climate adaptation interventions influence civil war and local social conflicts. It develops a theoretical framework linking climate adaptation to conflict, positing both positive and negative externalities. Drawing on original high-resolution data on INGO-driven adaptation and food security efforts, alongside climate, conflict, and development data, findings are substantiated with interviews from policy workers in South Sudan. The results indicate that while adaptation generally does not reduce conflict, interventions that promote preparedness and are implemented during periods of high climate stress can mitigate social conflicts between militias, pastoralists, and farmers. These insights provide guidance for designing climate adaptation strategies that reduce conflict risks.
Philosophy of Mathematics from the Pythagoreans to Euclid

Philosophy of Mathematics from the Pythagoreans to Euclid
  • Barbara M. Sattler
  • Published online:
    21 April 2025
    Print publication:
    22 May 2025
  • This Element looks at the very beginning of the philosophy of mathematics in Western thought. It covers the first reflections on attempts to untie mathematics from its practical usage in administration, commerce, and land-surveying and discusses the first ideas to see mathematical structures as constituents underlying the physical world in the Pythagoreans. The first two sections focus on the epistemic status of mathematical knowledge in relation to philosophical knowledge and on the various ontological positions ancient Greek philosophers in early and classical times ascribe to mathematical objects – from independent and separate entities to mere abstractions and idealisations. Section 3 discusses the paradigmatic role mathematical deductions have played for philosophy, the role of mathematical diagrams, and mathematical methods of interest for philosophers. Section 4, finally, investigates a couple of individual concepts that are fundamental for both philosophy and mathematics, such as infinity.
Gender and Literary Geography

Gender and Literary Geography
  • Elizabeth F. Evans, Matthew Wilkens
  • Published online:
    21 April 2025
    Print publication:
    22 May 2025
  • Our analysis of over 20,000 books published in Britain between 1800 and 2009 compares the geographic attention of fiction authored by women and by men; of books that focus on women and men as characters; and of works published in different eras. We find that, while there were only modest differences in geographic attention in books by men and women authors, there were dramatic geographic differences in books with highly gendered character space. Counter to expectation, the geographic differences between differently gendered characters were remarkably stable across these centuries. We also examine and complicate the power attributed to separate-sphere ideology. And we demonstrate a surprising reversal of critical expectation: in fiction, broadly natural spaces were more strongly associated with men, while urban spaces were more aligned with women. As it uncovers spatial patterns in literary history, this study casts new light on well-known texts and reimagines literature's broader engagement with gender and geography.
Decolonizing Russia?

Decolonizing Russia?
  • Disentangling Debates
  • Adam Lenton
  • Published online:
    21 April 2025
    Print publication:
    22 May 2025
  • Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 radically changed the way many viewed the nature of the Russian state. The centrality of resentment and imperial nostalgia in Russian narratives led many to argue that Russian imperialism was a key force behind the invasion. By extension, this led to the idea that decolonization – largely in scholarship, but also among some policy circles – offered a way to better understanding Russia in this new context. To this end, this Element examines the debates over decolonization in the Russian case. It begins by contextualizing these debates through an examination of Russia's historical development as an empire. It then identifies and disentangles three key focal points: decolonization as domestic Russian politics, the transnational politics of decolonization, and decolonization as a scholarly endeavor. By doing so, this Element shows where decolonization has merit, but also where it is contested or limited.
Family Taxation

Family Taxation
  • Patricia Apps, Ray Rees
  • Published online:
    21 April 2025
    Print publication:
    22 May 2025
  • This Element seeks to provide an in-depth survey of the papers written on the optimal taxation of the incomes of the members of family households, as opposed to households with just a single individual, over the period beginning with the early 1980s and ending in the late 2010s.This literature, solidly within the public finance tradition, is not large, and so the Element gives quite a full exposition and discussion of the main contributions. The papers are grouped according to the type of tax system they have dealt with: linear, piecewise linear and non-linear taxation.
Neo-Aristotelian Metaphysics

Neo-Aristotelian Metaphysics
  • Phil Corkum
  • Published online:
    21 April 2025
    Print publication:
    22 May 2025
  • Contemporary metaphysicians who might be classified as 'neo-Aristotelian' tend towards positions reminiscent of Aristotle's metaphysics – such as category theory, trope theory, substance ontology, endurantism, hylomorphism, essentialism, and agent causation. However, prima facie it seems that one might hold any one of these positions while rejecting the others. What perhaps unifies a neo-Aristotelian approach in metaphysics, then, is not a shared collection of positions so much as a willingness to engage with Aristotle and to view this historical figure as providing a fruitful way of initially framing certain philosophical issues. This Element will begin with a methodological reflection on the contribution historical scholarship on Aristotle might make to contemporary metaphysics. It will then discuss as case studies category theory, properties, substance theory, and hylomorphism. The aim of the Element is to make the relevant exegetical questions accessible to contemporary metaphysicians, and the corresponding contemporary topics accessible to historians.
Glazed Ceramics of the Islamic World 700–1600 CE

Glazed Ceramics of the Islamic World 700–1600 CE
  • Moujan Matin, Michael Tite
  • Published online:
    17 April 2025
    Print publication:
    08 May 2025
  • Of all the material culture of the Islamic World prior to the sixteenth century, only ceramics survive in a way which forms a continuous representative visual history. As such, ceramics provide a unique collection of material from which to study the history of technology. The main technological developments associated with glazed Islamic ceramics were the introduction of tin-opacified glazes, stonepaste bodies, and an extended range of colorants. For each of these developments, consideration is given to the reasons why new technologies were introduced, from where the ideas for the new technologies originated, and why particular technological choices were made. In addition, brief consideration is given both to the very different glaze technologies employed in contemporary China, and to the subsequent spread of the glazed Islamic technology into Western Europe.
Kant and Teleology

Kant and Teleology
  • Thomas Teufel
  • Published online:
    17 April 2025
    Print publication:
    08 May 2025
  • Kant's mature teleological philosophy in the Critique of the Power of Judgment is predicated on innovations that address a set of unprecedented challenges arising from within critical philosophy. The challenges are (1) a threat of “transcendental chaos” between sensibility and understanding, emerging from the structure of critical epistemology; (2) a threat of “critical chaos” between determination and reflection, generated by Kant's response to that first threat. The innovations include (a) a transcendental conception of purposiveness, (b) a principle of nature's purposiveness based on that conception, (c) a power of judgment governed by that principle, (d) and so governed in an unusual (self-given and self-governing) way, (e) a view on which nature does make leaps. This Element argues that Kant's mature teleological philosophy – and a fortiori Kant's aesthetics and philosophy of biology – cannot be understood without a fully systematic account of these challenges and innovations, and it presents such an account.
Congressional Expectations of Presidential Self-Restraint

Congressional Expectations of Presidential Self-Restraint
  • Jack B. Greenberg, John A. Dearborn
  • Published online:
    15 April 2025
    Print publication:
    22 May 2025
  • This Element explores how Congress has designed laws reliant on an assumption of presidential self-restraint, an expectation that presidents would respect statutory goals by declining to use their formal powers in ways that were legally permissible but contrary to stated congressional intent. Examining several laws addressing political appointments since the 1970s – statutes involving the FBI director, Office of Personnel Management director, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, director of national intelligence, Federal Emergency Management Agency administrator, inspectors general, Senior Executive Service, vacancies, Social Security Administration commissioner, and Consumer Financial Protection Bureau director – the authors demonstrate lawmakers' reliance on presidential self-restraint in statutory design and identify a variety of institutional tools used to signal those expectations. Furthermore, the authors identify a developmental dilemma: the combined rise of polarization, presidentialism, and constitutional formalism threatens to leave Congress more dependent on presidential self-restraint, even as that norm's reliability is increasingly questionable.
Literary Form in Early Medieval England

Literary Form in Early Medieval England
  • Jennifer A. Lorden
  • Published online:
    14 April 2025
    Print publication:
    08 May 2025
  • The earliest English writers left little comment on their literary forms. In contrast to the grammatical treatises of late antiquity or critical studies of contemporary and modern literature, early medieval English writing offers only sparse contemporaneous self-commentary, often in brief or conventional notes along the way to other things. But Old English and Latin literature had lively and evolving practices of literary form and formal innovation. Literary Form in Early Medieval England examines both more and lesser known forms, considering the multilingual landscape of early medieval England and showing that Old English literary forms do not simply end with the rupture of the Norman Conquest but continue in surprising ways. Literary Form in Early Medieval England offers a concise tour of what we do know of literary forms, both those that have received more attention and those that have been relatively overlooked, across the first six centuries of English literature.
The κ-Statistics Approach to Income Distribution Analysis

The κ-Statistics Approach to Income Distribution Analysis
  • Fabio Clementi, Mauro Gallegati, Lisa Gianmoena, Giorgio Kaniadakis, Simone Landini
  • Published online:
    11 April 2025
    Print publication:
    08 May 2025
  • This Element presents the κ-generalized distribution, a statistical model tailored for the analysis of income distribution. Developed over years of collaborative, multidisciplinary research, it clarifies the statistical properties of the model, assesses its empirical validity and compares its effectiveness with other parametric models. It also presents formulas for calculating inequality indices within the κ-generalized framework, including the widely used Gini coefficient and the relatively lesser-known Zanardi index of Lorenz curve asymmetry. Through empirical illustrations, the Element criticizes the conventional application of the Gini index, pointing out its inadequacy in capturing the full spectrum of inequality characteristics. Instead, it advocates the adoption of the Zanardi index, accentuating its ability to capture the inherent heterogeneity and asymmetry in income distributions.
Ukrainian Literature

Ukrainian Literature
  • A Wartime Guide for Anglophone Readers
  • Marko Pavlyshyn
  • Published online:
    11 April 2025
    Print publication:
    08 May 2025
  • Ukrainian Literature: A Wartime Guide for Anglophone Readers is an introduction for general readers and students to Ukrainian literature in English translation. It takes as its starting point the responses of Ukrainian poets and prose writers to Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022 and the preceding eight-year war. Each of the Element's ten sections describes a key event in Ukrainian cultural history in its literary context, surveying related works and their authors, Ukrainian and international literary and intellectual movements, and developments in political and social life. The Element gives preeminent attention to a theme which the war has foregrounded: the enduringly fraught relationship of Ukraine and Russia. While focussing mainly on texts in Ukrainian, the Element refers to other literary cultures – Polish, Russian, Jewish and Crimean Tatar, among others – whose participants were active on the territory of today's Ukraine.
Logic and Science

Logic and Science
  • An Exploration of Logical Anti-Exceptionalism
  • Filippo Ferrari, Massimiliano Carrara
  • Published online:
    10 April 2025
    Print publication:
    10 April 2025
    • Element
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  • This Element delves into the relationship between logic and the sciences, a topic brought to prominence by Quine, who regarded logic as methodologically and epistemologically akin to the sciences. For this reason, Quine is seen as the forefather of anti-exceptionalism about logic (AEL), a stance that has become prevalent in the philosophy of logic today. Despite its popularity and the volume of research it inspires, some core issues still lack clarity. For one thing, most works in the debate remain vague on what should count as logic and what should count as a science. Furthermore, the terms of the comparison are rarely specified and discussed in a systematic way. This Element purports to advance the debate on these crucial issues with the hope of fostering our understanding of the fundamentals of AEL. This title is also available as Open Access on Cambridge Core.
Family Matters

Family Matters
  • How Romantic Partners Shape Politicians' Careers
  • Olle Folke, Moa Frödin Gruneau, Johanna Rickne
  • Published online:
    10 April 2025
    Print publication:
    10 April 2025
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  • This Element studies how career support from romantic partners affects career patterns and costs in politics. It argues that a lower level of career support from romantic partners leads to a lower likelihood for political promotion among women politicians (the partner support hypothesis), as well as greater stress on women politicians' relationships when they advance (the career stress hypothesis). Both predictions find support in Swedish data for more than 80,000 political careers over a fifty-year period. Women politicians are in relationships that prioritize their male partner's career and where that partner does less unpaid work in the household. This is important in explaining women's career disadvantage. It also explains why promotions double the divorce rate for women but leave men's relationships intact. The analysis sheds light on the role played by romantic partners in gender inequality in politics. This title is also available as Open Access on Cambridge Core.
In Search of National Ancestors

In Search of National Ancestors
  • Heritage, Identity and Placemaking in China
  • Shu-Li Wang
  • Published online:
    08 April 2025
    Print publication:
    08 May 2025
  • This Element examines how international heritage discourses are internalized and reshaped in China, using the Yellow Emperor cults as a lens to explore broader themes of intangible heritage, religious resurgence, and identity construction. The central argument is that cultural heritage serves as a powerful tool for shaping new religious expressions and enabling Chinese localities to assert their uniqueness while redefining historical narratives. Through case studies of several localities across China, this research illustrates how these regions engage in heritage competition by branding themselves with Yellow Emperor culture to shape their identities. This study argues that the cult of the Yellow Emperor-a legendary figure-is empowered by nationalism, a local search for tradition and religious revivals, and is further amplified by international discourses that reinforce national identity through heritage-making. Together, these forces drive the resurgence of ancestral cults and contribute to cultural identity formation in contemporary China.
Israel and its Heirs in Late Antiquity

Israel and its Heirs in Late Antiquity
  • Andrew Tobolowsky
  • Published online:
    08 April 2025
    Print publication:
    08 May 2025
  • This Element explores constructions of Israelite identity among Jewish, Samaritan Israelites, and Christian authors in Late Antiquity, especially early Late Antiquity. It identifies three major strategies for claiming an Israelite identity between these three groups: a 'biological' strategy, a 'biology plus' strategy, and an 'abiological' strategy, referring to the difference between Jewish claims to Israel premised on exclusive biological descent, Samaritan Israelite acknowledgments of shared descent, and the 'Verus Israel' tradition in Christianity, which disavows the importance of descent. Using this framework, it makes various general conclusions about the construction of ethnic identity itself, including the inadequacy of treating descent claims as the sine qua non of ethnicity and role played in any given vision of ethnic identity by the individual creativity of a given author.
Environment and Society in Soviet Estonia, 1960–1990

Environment and Society in Soviet Estonia, 1960–1990
  • An Intimate Cultural History
  • Epp Annus
  • Published online:
    07 April 2025
    Print publication:
    08 May 2025
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  • Russia's twenty-first-century military aggression has inspired calls for re-thinking the Soviet era and its aftermath – in particular, for drawing attention to the non-Russian parts of the (former) USSR. At the same time, the present era of anthropogenic climate change urges us to consider the global and planetary implications of local actions. This Element combines these two scholarly impulses to consider Soviet Estonian society between the 1960s and the 1980s: it investigates how natural environments and social ideas and circumstances were intertwined in fundamental ways. Estonian intellectuals cared deeply about their local environments, but they also took inspiration from environmentalist works of global importance. Various aspects of Estonian environmental thought and practices are analyzed as tied to local, intimate environments, while being at the same time connected to the global circulation of ideas, sometimes in dialogue with Soviet centers in Russia. This title is also available as open access on Cambridge Core.
Bad Public Policy

Bad Public Policy
  • Malignity, Volatility and the Inherent Vices of Policymaking
  • Michael Howlett, Ching Leong, Tim Legrand
  • Published online:
    07 April 2025
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    08 May 2025
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  • Policy studies assume the existence of baseline parameters – such as honest governments doing their best to create public value, publics responding in good faith, and both parties relying on a policy-making process that aligns with the public interest. In such circumstances, policy goals are expected to be produced through mechanisms in which the public can articulate its preferences and policy-makers are expected to listen to what has been said in determining their governments' courses of action. While these conditions are found in some governments, much policy-making occurs without these pre-conditions and processes. Unlike situations that produce what can be thought of as 'good' public policy, 'bad' public policy is a more common outcome. How this happens and what makes for bad public policy are the subjects of this Element. This title is also available as Open Access on Cambridge Core.
The Aesthetic System of François Delsarte and Richard Wagner

The Aesthetic System of François Delsarte and Richard Wagner
  • Catholicism, Romanticism, and Ancient Music
  • Bradley Hoover
  • Published online:
    07 April 2025
    Print publication:
    08 May 2025
  • On 17 September 1839, Richard Wagner arrived in Paris. Although scholars agree that the composer learned a great deal about aesthetics during his first sojourn in the city, what has not been known is exactly what he learned and from whom. This Element explores the striking similarities between Wagner's early aesthetic writings and François Delsarte's 'Cours d'esthétique appliquée', a theoretical and practical training course for artists which Delsarte began teaching in Paris in May 1839. This Element also details the rise of Delsarte as a celebrated teacher of aesthetics and interpreter of Gluck's repertoire during the same years that Wagner lived in the city. By comparing historical timelines, published documents, and manuscript sources and by analysing Wagner's treatises, Das Kunstwerk der Zukunft and Oper und Drama, and the essay 'Über Schauspieler und Sänger', the author shows that Delsarte's course is the most likely source of Wagner's aesthetic transformation in Paris.
Social Ontology

Social Ontology
  • Brian Epstein
  • Published online:
    07 April 2025
    Print publication:
    08 May 2025
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  • Social ontology is the study of the nature of the social world. This Element aims to provide an overview of this burgeoning field, and also to map the questions that theories in social ontology address. When we encounter a theory of some social thing – groups, law, gender, and so on –how are we to read it? What classes of theories have been explored and abandoned, and what classes are new and promising? The Element distinguishes theories of social construction from theories that characterize the products of social construction. For each, the Element works through a 'toy' theory and then discusses features that more realistic theories ought to include. Three running examples are discussed throughout the Element: (1) property, or ownership; (2) race, or racialized kinds; (3) collective attitudes (i.e., beliefs, desires, knowledge, intentions, etc., of groups and organizations). This title is also available as Open Access on Cambridge Core.

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