This study by Roksana Bahramitash is an excellent introduction for those wishing to learn more about the significance of gender issues in Southeast Asian economic restructuring. The author has first-hand knowledge of the key aspects of liberalization which place stresses on women, children and men under the guise of ‘globalization’ in Southeast Asia. I recommend this book to academics, activists and policy-makers as a thoroughly researched and fluent analysis relevant across various fields from anthropology, economics, politics and policy studies. - Chris Corrin, Professor of Feminist Politics, University of Glasgow.

In an increasingly integrated, globalised world with new cross-border threats to health, widening disparities in both health and access to health care, and an unacceptable level of human suffering and premature mortality in developing countries, civil society actors are asking, why is so little progress being made by global health actors? Like its critically acclaimed predecessor, the second edition of Global Health Watch covers a comprehensive range of topics, including access to medicines, mental health, water and sanitation, nutrition, and war and conflict. Unlike other reports on global health, it also draws attention to the politics of global health and the policies and actions of key actors. Global Health Watch 2 includes chapters on the United States foreign assistance programme, the Gates Foundation, the World Bank, the World Health Organization and the Global Fund to Fight AIDS,Tuberculosis and Malaria.

The advent of the War on Terror has seen intelligence agencies emerge out of the shadows to become major political players. 'Rendition', untrammelled surveillance, torture and de tention without trial are now fast becoming the norm. Spies, Lies and the War on Terror traces the transfo rmation of intelligence from a tool for law enforcement to a means of avoiding the law – both national and international.

This lively and shocking account is a MUST-READ for anyone who wants to understand the new power of intel

This study is concerned with the problem of poverty in India. It is a problem of low national income and its unequal distribution; of slow pace of development and inequitable distribution of the small gains of development. “It quickly became apparent that knowledge of how the benefits of development have been shared among various segments of the population is crucial to an understanding of many other issues. It also became clear that an effective study of Poverty could only be done by an Indian scholar who had intimate knowledge of India’s total development progress and who is recognised within India as an authority in this field. In our search for such a scholar, discussions with numerous Indian scholars and officials led us to Dr V M Dandekar, Director of Indian School of Political Economy, Poona and the Ford Foundation contracted with the School to prepare such a study under the senior authorship of Dr Dandekar.”

– Ford Foundation, 1970

The economic growth that India has experienced in the past decades has left untouched the traditionally marginalized sections in the country. In addition, new groups are getting more and more marginalised, such as those who migrate for jobs within the country in the large numbers. Discrimination can be based on the caste, ethnicity, gender, age, religion, certain illnesses, physical and mental disabilities as well. Those marginalised have low assets, low education, low income and income earning capacities and accompanying lack of organisation and voice, which prevents them from influencing, policies and assistance programmes in their favour.