Synopses & Reviews
"I have no hesitation in describing
Bananas, Beaches and Bases as the most significant book in contemporary feminist International Politics. Each time I re-visit it, I am taken aback by its profound implications for both feminism and International Politics. The deceptively provocative question at its coreand#151;'where are the women?'and#151;irrevocably transforms our views about what the central and important landscape of global politics is. In my view, it is the essential text not only for feminist International Politics courses but for anyone interested in starting to understand just how International Politics really works."and#151;Marysia Zalewski, author of
Feminism After Postmodernism: Theorising Through Practice"A new edition of Bananas, Beaches, and Bases is cause for cosmic good cheer. This trailblazing treatment of the gender politics of global market and military projects is a feminist classic. Always ahead of the curve, before globalization had achieved cache in academic circles Enloe was there, cajoling Western feminists out of our political parochialism. There is no more creative, insightful, engaging feminist guide to international politics. Cynthia Enloe is an international feminist treasure, and Bananas, Beaches, and Bases her signature work."and#151;Judith Stacey, author of Brave New Families
"Bananas, Beaches, and Bases is both a and#145;Pandora's Boxand#8217; and a roadmap: It unleashes questions and insights that many conventional students of International Politics are accustomed to ignoring or overlooking about the dynamic between gender and international political life, and it guides us to see how both are mutually constitutive. As the "magna carta" of Feminist International Relations, it has helped create a new generation of women and men in the world of international relations."and#151;Katharine Moon, author of Sex Among Allies
"Cynthia Enloe writes with passion, conviction, intelligence and verve as she makes such good feminist sense of international politics that the world never looks quite the same again. Innovative and a great read, Bananas, Beaches and Bases continues to be an outstanding example of the difference gender makes in social analysis. This is a book which provokes discussion with students, colleagues, friends and family. It is a book which has set the standard form much that followed. A classic."and#151;Diane Bell, author of Ngarrindjeri Wurrurwarrin: A World That Is, Was, and Will Be
"With this volume, Cynthia Enloe single-handedly carved out a major new field. Combining contemporary political insight and historical sensitivity, Bananas, Beaches and Bases revealed the gendered workings of high politics, without which the entire machinery of war, diplomacy and governance would have long since collapsed. A pioneering tour-de-force."and#151;Philippa Levine, author of Victorian Feminism, 1850-1900
Review
and#8220;What is most interesting in Gordon's analysis is the way in which the renovation of occupation practices are identified as an immanent outcome of the and#8216;excesses and contradictionsand#8217; within the system itself.and#8221;
Review
and#8220;Israeland#8217;s Occupation becomes a must read on my list; and my first question of anyone that wants to argue with any perspectives on Israel would be and#8216;Have you read this book yet?and#8217;and#8221;
Review
and#8220;A must read.and#8221;
Review
and#8220;This book is a significant contribution to our understanding Israeland#8217;s changing methods of rule during the four decades of occupation.and#8221;
Review
and#8220;A unique perspective on the changing dynamics of the Israel-Palestine conflict. . . . The breadth and detail of Gordon's scope provides a powerful systemic framework.and#8221;
Synopsis
Sustaining Conflict develops a groundbreaking theory of political apathy, using a combination of ethnographic material, narrative, and political, cultural, and feminist theory. It examines how the status quo is maintained in Israel-Palestine, even by the activities of Jewish Israelis who are working against the occupation of Palestinian territories. The book shows how hierarchies and fault lines in Israeli politics lead to fragmentation, and how even oppositional power becomes routine over time. Most importantly, the book exposes how the occupation is sustained through a carefully crafted system that allows sympathetic Israelis to "knowingly not know," further disconnecting them from the plight of Palestinians. While focusing on Israel, this is a book that has lessons for how any authoritarian regime is sustained through apathy.
Synopsis
This radical analysis of globalization reveals the crucial role of women in international politics today. Cynthia Enloe pulls back the curtain on the familiar scenesand#151;governments promoting tourism, companies moving their factories overseas, soldiers serving on foreign soiland#151;and shows that the real landscape is not exclusively male. She describes how many women's seemingly personal strategiesand#151;in their marriages, in their housework, in their coping with ideals of beautyand#151;are, in reality, the stuff of global politics. In exposing policymakers' reliance on false notions of "femininity" and "masculinity," Enloe dismantles an apparently overwhelming world system, revealing it to be much more fragile and open to change than we think.
Synopsis
This first complete history of Israel's occupation of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip allows us to see beyond the smoke screen of politics in order to make sense of the dramatic changes that have developed on the ground over the past forty years. Looking at a wide range of topics, from control of water and electricity to health care and education as well as surveillance and torture, Neve Gordon's panoramic account reveals a fundamental shift from a politics of lifeand#151;when, for instance, Israel helped Palestinians plant more than six-hundred thousand trees in Gaza and provided farmers with improved varieties of seedsand#151;to a macabre politics characterized by an increasing number of deaths. Drawing attention to the interactions, excesses, and contradictions created by the forms of control used in the Occupied Territories, Gordon argues that the occupation's very structure, rather than the policy choices of the Israeli government or the actions of various Palestinian political factions, has led to this radical shift.
Synopsis
"Covering the four decades since the 1967 war rather than just the current situation,
Israel's Occupation offers a unique perspective on the changing dynamics of the Israel-Palestine conflict."and#151;Timothy Mitchell, author of
Rule of Experts "Interweaving a mountain of documents, reports, and firsthand testimonies, Neve Gordon, one of Israel's bravest intellectuals and activists, details and examines the occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip as no one ever has before. His book will no doubt change the perspective from which the history of the occupation is told."and#151;Eyal Weizman, author of Hollow Land
and#147;Neve Gordon's Israel's Occupation provides a powerful and convincing structural framework for explaining Israel's changing methods of rule in the Palestinian territories from 1967 and until today. The arguments, insights, and supporting evidence are impressive, and the prose is written with a golden pen. This book will change the debate on Israel and its occupation, and I will not be surprised if Gordon's conceptual framework is harnessed to analyze the workings of other occupations, past and present. It's social science at its best.and#8221;and#151;Yinon Cohen, Columbia University
Synopsis
In this collection of lively essays, Cynthia Enloe makes better sense of globalization and international politics by taking a deep and personal look into the daily realities in a range of women's lives. She proposes a distinctively feminist curiosity that begins with taking women seriously, especially during this era of unprecedented American influence. This means listening carefully, digging deep, challenging assumptions, and welcoming surprises. Listening to women in Asian sneaker factories, Enloe reveals, enables us to bring down to earth the often abstract discussions of the global economy. Paying close attention to Iraqi women's organizing efforts under military occupation exposes the false global promises made by officials. Enloe also turns the beam of her inquiry inward. In a series of four candid interviews and a new set of autobiographical pieces, she reflects on the gradual development of her own feminist curiosity. Describing her wartime suburban girlhood and her years at Berkeley, she maps the everyday obstacles placed on the path to feminist consciousnessand#151;and suggests how those obstacles can be identified and overcome.
The Curious Feminist shows how taking women seriously also challenges the common assumption that masculinities are trivial factors in today's international affairs. Enloe explores the workings of masculinity inside organizations as diverse as the American military, a Serbian militia, the UN, and Oxfam. A feminist curiosity finds all women worth thinking about, Enloe claims. She suggests that we pay thoughtful attention to women who appear complicit in violence or in the oppression of others, or too cozily wrapped up in their relative privilege to inspire praise or compassion. Enloe's vitality, passion, and incisive wit illuminate each essay. The Curious Feminist is an original and timely invitation to look at global politics in an entirely different way.
Synopsis
"The book is a sensitive gendered analysis of interlocking developments from globalized economic markets to war and post-conflict dynamics. While Enloe's book brings out the complexities of women's positions in a very immediate way as they play out in large scale platforms of power, survival, politics, and profit, she also convincingly shows the links between and importance of women's everyday lives."and#151;Carolyn Nordstrom, author of
Shadows of War: Violence, War, and International Profiteering in the Twenty-First Century"With an unwavering gender optic Cynthia Enloe examines a number of themes and issues bearing on what a feminist curiosity can show you in international relations and political studies. Throughout this collection of essays, Enloe both articulates and exemplifies her philosophy that knowledge comes out of ordinary people's experiences, and that it's important to pay attention to what the marginal and silent can tell us."and#151;Cynthia Cockburn, author of The Space Between Us: Negotiating Gender and National Identities in Conflict
"Enloe's knack of laying out simply the tangled webs of connection that link the poor and the rich, the marginal and the privileged, masculine enterprise and female exploitation, is unsurpassed. This is feminist scholarship at its very, very best: fresh, lively, uncompromising and tremendously readable."and#151;Philippa Levine, author of Prostitution, Race and Politics: Policing Venereal Disease in the British Empire
"Brilliant, funny, and energizing, these essays take us on a whirlwind and solidarity-building tour of the world of women today. En route, Enloe reveals the intellectual and political benefits of being relentlessly curious, open-minded, and humble. The confidence of the powerful and the naturalness of a world with men in charge will not seem the same after reading this book.and#8221;and#151;Catherine Lutz, author of Homefront: A Military City and the American 20th Century
"At the heart of this book is a challenge to patriarchal systems that privilege masculinity and marginalize critical feminist voices. Enloe encourages all of us to consider not just what we study, but how we study the world in this new age of empire and to pay attention to not just the powerful, but to 'the bottom rungs'."and#151;Steven Lamy, Director, School of International Relations, University of Southern California
Synopsis
Meticulously researched and tightly argued, Beyond Chutzpah points to a consensus among historians and human rights organizations on the factual record of the Israel-Palestine conflict. Norman G. Finkelstein exposes the corruption of scholarship and the contrivance of controversy shrouding human rights abuses, and interrogates the new anti-Semitism. This paperback edition adds a preface analyzing recent developments in the conflict, and a new afterword on Israel's construction of a wall in the West Bank.
Synopsis
"A very solid, important, and highly informative book. Norman Finkelstein provides extensive details and analysis, with considerable historical depth and expert research, of a very wide range of issues concerning Israel, the Palestinians, and the U.S."Noam Chomsky, author of
Hegemony or Survival "The most comprehensive, systematic, and well-documented work of its kind. It is one of the harshestrational and nonemotionaltexts about the daily practices of the occupation and colonization of the Palestinian territories by Israel, and it is an excellent demonstration of how and why the blind defenders of Israel, by basing their arguments on false facts and figures, actually bring more damage than gains to their cause."Baruch Kimmerling, George S. Wise Professor of Sociology, Hebrew University of Jerusalem
"A brave and daring challenge, meticulously researched. Must reading for anyone committed to a just and enduring peace in the Middle East."Amy Goodman, host of Democracy Now!
Beyond Chutzpah is a brilliantly illuminating study of the lengths to which some American Jews will go to present Israel in a favorable light. On display are all the sterling qualities for which Finkelstein has become famous: erudition, originality, spark, meticulous attention to detail, intellectual integrity, courage, and formidable forensic skills.”Avi Shlaim, Professor of International Relations, Oxford University
The scholarship is simply superb. Finkelstein has clearly done his homework, and consulted and mastered a breathtaking range of material: primary sources and documents, scholarly works, reports old and new, correspondence with relevant individuals, and numerous other sources too. He has left no stone unturned.”Mouin Rabbani, Contributing Editor, Middle East Report
Synopsis
In this long-awaited sequel to his international bestseller
The Holocaust Industry, Norman G. Finkelstein moves from an iconoclastic interrogation of the new anti-Semitism to a meticulously researched exposand#233; of the corruption of scholarship on the Israel-Palestine conflict.
Bringing to bear the latest findings on the conflict and recasting the scholarly debate, Finkelstein points to a consensus among historians and human rights organizations on the factual record. Why, then, does so much controversy swirl around the conflict? Finkelsteinand#8217;s answer, copiously documented, is that apologists for Israel contrive controversy. Whenever Israel comes under international pressure, another media campaign alleging a global outbreak of anti-Semitism is mounted.
Finkelstein also scrutinizes the proliferation of distortion masquerading as history. Recalling Joan Petersand#8217; book From Time Immemorial, published to great fanfare in 1984 but subsequently exposed as an academic hoax, he asks deeply troubling questions here about the periodic reappearance of spurious scholarship and the uncritical acclaim it receives. The most recent addition to this genre, Finkelstein argues, is Harvard Law Professor Alan Dershowitzand#8217;s bestseller, The Case for Israel.
The core analysis of Beyond Chutzpah sets Dershowitzand#8217;s assertions on Israeland#8217;s human rights record against the findings of the mainstream human rights community. Sifting through thousands of pages of reports from organizations such as Amnesty International, Band#8217;Tselem, and Human Rights Watch, Finkelstein argues that Dershowitz has misrepresented the facts.
Thoroughly researched and tightly argued, Beyond Chutzpah lifts the veil of controversy shrouding the Israel-Palestine conflict.
About the Author
Cynthia Enloe is Research Professor of Women's Studies and International Development at Clark University. She is the author of
Bananas, Beaches and Bases: Making Feminist Sense of International Politics (2001),
Maneuvers: The International Politics of Militarizing Women's Lives (1999), and
The Morning After: Sexual Politics at the End of the Cold War (1993), all from California.
Cynthia Enloe won the Howard Zinn Lifetime Achievement in Peace Studies Award from the Peace and Justice Studies Association (PJSA).
Table of Contents
Introduction: Being Curious about Our Lack of Feminist Curiosity
Part 1. Sneakers, Silences, and Surprises
1. The Surprised Feminist
2. Margins, Silences, and Bottom Rungs: How to Overcome the Underestimation of Power in the Study of International Relations
3. The Globetrotting Sneaker
4. Daughters and Generals int he Politics of the Globalized Sneaker
5. Whom Do You Take Seriously?
6. Feminist Theorizing from Bananas to Maneuvers: A Conversation between Cynthia Enloe and Marysia Zalewski
Part 2. Wars Are Never and#147;Over Thereand#8221;
7. All the Men Are in the Militias, All the Women Are Victims: The Politics of Masculinity and Femininity in Nationalist Wars
8. Spoils of War
9. Masculinity as a Foreign Policy Issue
10. and#147;What If They Gave a War . . . and#147;: A Conversation between Cynthia Enloe, Vivian Stromberg, and the Editors of Ms. Magazine
11. Sneak Attack: The Militarization of U.S. Culture
12. War-Planners Rely on Women: Thoughts from Tokyo
13. Feminists Keep Their Eyes on Militarized Masculinity: Wondering How Americans See Their Male Presidents
14. Becoming a Feminist: Cynthia Enloe in Conversation with Three British International Relations Scholars
Part 3. Feminists after Wars--Itand#8217;s Not Over Til Itand#8217;s Over
15. Women after Wars: Puzzles and Warnings from Vietnam
16. Demilitarization--Or More of the Same? Feminist Questions to Ask in the Postwar Moment
17. A Feminist Map of the Blocks on the Road to Institutional Accountability
18. When Feminists Look at Masculinity and the Men Who Wage War: A Conversation between Cynthia Enloe and Carol Cohn
19. Updating the Gendered Empire: Where Are the Women in Occupied Afghanistan and Iraq?
Part 4. Six Pieces for a Work in Progress: Playing Checkers with the Troops
20. War without White Hats
21. Playing Guns
22. Hitler Is a Jerk
23. Leaden Soldiers
24. Gurkhas Wear Wool
25. The Cigarette
Notes
Index