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"The past decades witnessed a powerful return of struggles against what economic historian Karl Polanyi termed the commodification of social life. This book explores how organized workers in two metropolises of the late nineteenth century responded to the commodification of labor. In doing so, it reveals a striking continuity in collective opposition against the unfettered power of free markets. Drawing on contemporary feminist revisions of Polanyian thought, this book illustrates the ambiguous potential of movements for social protection"--Back cover.

How technological advances and colonial fears inspired utopian geoengineering projects during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries From the 1870s to the mid-twentieth century, European explorers, climatologists, colonial officials, and planners were avidly interested in large-scale projects that might actively alter the climate. Uncovering this history, Desert Edens looks at how arid environments and an increasing anxiety about climate in the colonial world shaped this upsurge in ideas about climate engineering. From notions about the transformation of deserts into forests to Nazi plans to influence the climates of war-torn areas, Philipp Lehmann puts the early climate change debate in its environmental, intellectual, and political context, and considers the ways this legacy reverberates in the present climate crisis. Lehmann examines some of the most ambitious climate-engineering projects to emerge in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Confronted with the Sahara in the 1870s, the French developed concepts for a flooding project that would lead to the creation of a man-made Sahara Sea. In the 1920s, German architect Herman Sörgel proposed damming the Mediterranean in order to geoengineer an Afro-European continent called “Atlantropa,” which would fit the needs of European settlers. Nazi designs were formulated to counteract the desertification of Eastern Europe and Central Asia. Despite ideological and technical differences, these projects all incorporated and developed climate change theories and vocabulary. They also combined expressions of an extreme environmental pessimism with a powerful technological optimism that continue to shape the contemporary moment. Focusing on the intellectual roots, intended effects, and impact of early measures to modify the climate, Desert Edens investigates how the technological imagination can be inspired by pressing fears about the environment and civilization.

This study focuses on the ancient commentaries on Plato’s Phaedo by Olympiodorus and Damascius and aims to present the relevance of their challenging and valuable readings of the dialogue to Neoplatonic ethics.

In Natural and Political Conceptions of Community, Christoph Haar examines the role of the household community in Jesuit political thought. Introducing a fresh perspective on the early modern Jesuit academic discourse, the book explores how leading Jesuit thinkers drew on their theologically inspired conceptions of the family community to determine the usefulness as well as the limitations of the political realm. Natural and Political Conceptions of Community is about the place of the household in Scholastic theoretical works. The book demonstrates that Jesuits considered the human being as a household being when they determined the origin and purpose of the political community, producing a notion of politics that integrated their account of human nature with the sphere of law, rights, and virtues.

Die Zahlen sind ernuchternd: 33% der Entwicklungsprojekte in Deutschland werden ernsthaft verzogert, 19% sind durch zu hohe Kosten belastet, knapp 20% werden nach der Konzeptphase nicht weiterverfolgt, 66% gelangen nie zur Marktreife. Um den Produktentwicklungsprozess (PEP) dennoch zielgerichtet und effizient zu steuern, setzen viele Unternehmen Quality Gates ein. Sie beinhalten die Unterteilung des PEP in handhabbare Phasen, an deren Ende jeweils ein Gate steht. Am Quality Gate wird anhand festgelegter Kriterien entschieden, ob das Entwicklungsprojekt reif" genug fur die nachste Phase ist, Arbeitspakete nachgebessert werden mussen oder ein vollstandiger Projektstopp notwendig wird. Eingesetzt werden Quality Gates insbesondere dann, wenn viele Menschen aus unterschiedlichen Funktionsbereichen uber einen langen Zeitraum hinweg an einer Entwicklung beteiligt sind. Also immer dann, wenn zahlreiche Schnittstellen existieren, die permanent synchronisiert werden mussen. Quality Gates werden viele Erfolge nachgesagt. So sollen sie die Qualitat der Zwischenergebnisse verbessern, eine starkere Marktorientierung begunstigen und funktionsubergreifende Teamarbeit befordern. In der Realitat finden sich jedoch immer wieder prominente Beispiele, in denen das vorhandene Quality Gates Management versagt hat und der erhoffte Nutzen nicht eingetreten ist. Vor diesem Hintergrund fallt auf, dass in der Literatur kein Soll-Modell beschrieben ist, anhand dessen ein Unternehmen die Gute des eigenen Quality Gates Managements selbst bewerten konnte. Ein solches Selbstbewertungsmodell konnte die Praxis in die Lage versetzen, das eigene Quality Gates Management zu analysieren und zu optimieren. Die grosse Mehrheit der Veroffentlichungen beschaftigt sich jedoch ausschliesslich mit einzelnen Aspekten der Methode und verpasst dabei, sie in einen Zusammenhang zu stellen. Hinzu kommt, dass die Literatur grosstenteils auf Einzelfallen basiert oder uberhaupt keine empirische Grundlage fur ihre Erk