Author: Alice Elizabeth Malavasic File Type: pdf Pushing back against the idea that the Slave Power conspiracy was merely an ideological construction, Alice Elizabeth Malavasic argues that some southern politicians in the 1850s did indeed hold an inordinate amount of power in the antebellum Congress and used it to foster the interests of slavery. Malavasic focuses her argument on Senators David Rice Atchison of Missouri, Andrew Pickens Butler of South Carolina, and Robert M. T. Hunter and James Murray Mason of Virginia, known by their contemporaries as the F Street Mess for the location of the house they shared. Unlike the earlier and better-known triumvirate of John C. Calhoun, Henry Clay, and Daniel Webster, the F Street Mess was a functioning oligarchy within the U.S. Senate whose power was based on shared ideology, institutional seniority, and personal friendship. By centering on their most significant achievement--forcing a rewrite of the Nebraska bill that repealed the restriction against slavery above the 36 degrees 30 parallel--Malavasic demonstrates how the F Street Messs mastery of the legislative process led to one of the most destructive pieces of legislation in United States history and helped pave the way to secession. **

Author: Michael Best File Type: pdf A groundbreaking study that shows how countries can create innovative, production-based economies for the twenty-first centuryAchieving economic growth is one of todays key challenges. In this groundbreaking book, Michael Best argues that to understand how successful growth happens we need an economic framework that focuses on production, governance, and skills.This production-centric framework is the culmination of three simultaneous journeys. The first has been Bests visits to hundreds of factories worldwide, starting early as the son of a labor organizer and continuing through his work as an academic and industrial consultant. The second is a survey of two hundred years of economic thought from Babbage to Krugman, with stops along the way for Marx, Marshall, Young, Penrose, Richardson, Schumpeter, Kuznets, Abramovitz, Keynes, and Jacobs. The third is a tour of historical episodes of successful and failed transformations, focusing sharply on three core elementsthe production system, business organization, and skill formationand their interconnections.Best makes the case that government should create the institutional infrastructures needed to support these elements and their interconnections rather than subsidize individual enterprises. The power of Bests alternative framework is illustrated by case studies of transformative experiences previously regarded as economic miracles Americas World War II industrial buildup, Germanys postwar recovery, Greater Bostons innovation system, Irelands tech-sector boom, and the rise of the Asian Tigers and China.Accessible and engaging, How Growth Really Happens is required reading for anyone who wants to advance todays crucial debates about industrial policy, free trade, outsourcing, and the future of work. **

Author: Daniel Kahneman File Type: epub This book presents the definitive exposition of prospect theory, a compelling alternative to the classical utility theory of choice. Building on the 1982 volume, Judgement Under Uncertainty, this book brings together seminal papers on prospect theory from economists, decision theorists, and psychologists, including the work of the late Amos Tversky, whose contributions are collected here for the first time. While remaining within a rational choice framework, prospect theory delivers more accurate, empirically verified predictions in key test cases, as well as helping to explain many complex, real-world puzzles. In this volume, it is brought to bear on phenomena as diverse as the principles of legal compensation, the equity premium puzzle in financial markets, and the number of hours that New York cab drivers choose to drive on rainy days. Theoretically elegant and empirically robust, this volume shows how prospect theory has matured into a new science of decision making. **Review Daniel Kahneman and the late Amos Tversky have started a new perspective on the traditional economic categories of choice, decision, and value. A series of experimental and empirical studies by them and others have rejected traditional economic assumptions of rationality. Even more importantly, these scholars have developed alternative generalizations with significant predictive power and have found empirical verification for them. This outstanding collection of studies will make these new results widely accessible. Kenneth J. Arrow, Joan Kenney Professor of Economics, Emeritus and Professor of Operations Research, Emeritus, Stanford University Book Description Choices, Values, and Frames presents an empirical and theoretical challenge to classical utility theory, offering prospect theory as an alternative framework. Extensions and applications to diverse economic phenomena and to studies of consumer behavior are discussed. The book also elaborates on framing effects and other demonstrations that preferences are constructed in context, and it develops new approaches to the standard view of choice-based utility. As with the classic 1982 volume, Judgment Under Uncertainty, this volume is comprised of papers published in diverse academic journals. The editors have written several new chapters and a preface to provide a context for the work.

Author: Roy Ascott File Type: pdf From a technological perspective, these essays address current theories of consciousness and subjective experience, embracing new ideas from the physical sciences alongside more spiritual and artistic aspects of human existence. This volume develops from the studies published in Roy Ascotts highly successful Reframing Consciousness, documenting the very latest research from those connected with the CAiiA-STAR centre and its associated conferences. Their work embodies artistic and theoretical research in new media and telematics including aspects of artificial life, robotics, technoetics, performance, computer music and intelligent architecture, to growing international acclaim. **