United Kingdoms

The United Kingdom is weakening, and this book helps to explain why. Alvin Jackson examines the UK in the light of the experience of similar union states elsewhere, offering the first sustained comparative study across the long nineteenth century and beyond. The UK was not in fact the only self-styled 'united kingdom' of the time: Jackson argues strikingly and originally that Britain exported the idea of union through the advocacy or encouragement of other multinational united kingdoms at the beginning of the nineteenth century. The work is distinctive in its geographical breadth. Jackson draws together the histories of Ireland, Scotland, Wales, and England and explores the links between them and Sweden-Norway, the United Netherlands, Austria-Hungary and the United Canadas - and many other polities across the globe. United Kingdoms looks too at the institutions and agencies affecting the condition of union - from monarchy, aristocracy, and religion through to class, money, and violence. Jackson offers new overarching arguments about the origins, survival, and fall of all union states, and in doing so, sheds new light on the particular history, condition, and fate of the UK.

Research Paper (postgraduate) from the year 2013 in the subject Business economics - Economic Policy, , language: English, abstract: What would be the economic consequences of the United Kingdom leaving the European Union? This paper begins by investigating the current economic situation of the EU and the UK. then it evaluates the benefits and the drawbacks associated with the UK’s membership in the European Union, to conclude on whether the economic situation of the UK would be better if it left the EU. Although, for economic reasons, the UK has consistently shown interest in a deeper European single market, on many occasions, it has demonstrated discomfort with the politics and efforts of other EU members to implement members’ obligations. For the same reason, the country did not adopt euro as its currency in 1999. In addition, and to maintain and control its borders, it did not become a member of the Schengen area and cooperation. The economy of the UK is mainly services-based with a concentration on financial services although it also maintains capacity in high-tech and other industrial sectors. With a GDP of €1.9 billion in 2012, the UK’s economy is the third largest in the EU after Germany and France, and accounts for more than 14% of the EU’s total GDP, making it an important member of the European Union. On the other hand, nearly half of the UK’s exports go to the EU member countries making EU an indispensable market for the UK’s economy. The question of leaving the EU is therefore a much debated one, and this paper adds to the discussion.

In recent years there has been growing interest in the contrasts and parallels between the development of Ireland, England, Scotland and Wales. This collection of essays looks at economic, language and culture, and law development.

'The past is a foreign country' has become a truism, yet the past differs from the present in many unfamiliar ways and historical memory is extraordinarily imperfect. The degree to which we think of the European past as the history of France, Germany, Britain, Russia and so on, actually obstructs our view of former reality, and blunts our sensitivity to the ever-changing political landscape. Europe's past is littered with kingdoms, empires and republics which no longer exist but which were some of the most important entities of their day - 'the Empire of Aragon', which dominated the western Mediterranean in the thirteenth century, the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, the largest country in Europe for part of the eighteenth century. This book shows the reader how to peer through the cracks of mainstream history-writing, and to catch a glimpse of the 'Five, Six or Seven Kingdoms of Burgundy'. How long will it be before the USSR, until recently one of the world's two superpowers, is wholly or half-forgotten as most of these? The histories of the lost echo across the centuries, mixed in with more familiar sounds. One of the purposes of this book is to help us hear them again more clearly, and appreciate where they came from. As in his earlier celebrated books Europe and The Isles, Norman Davies aims to subvert our established view what looks familiar in history and urges us to look and think again. This stimulating book, full of unexpected stories, observations and connections, gives us a fresh and original perspective on European history.

"With appendices containing the treaties and statutes relating to extradition ; the treaties relating to the desertion of seamen ; and the statutes, rules of practice, and forms, in force in the several states and territories, relating to interstate rendition."--T.p.

An expert in Arab Gulf politics offers a revealing analysis of the region’s stunning rise to global power and the challenges it confronts today. Once just sleepy desert sheikdoms, the Arab Gulf states of Saudi Arabia, Oman, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Bahrain, and Kuwait now exert unprecedented influence on international affairs—the result of their almost unimaginable riches in oil and gas. In this accessible study, Gulf politics expert Rory Miller examines the achievements of these countries since the 1973 global oil crisis. He also investigates how the shrewd Arab Gulf rulers who have overcome crisis after crisis meet the unpredictable future. The Arab Gulf region has become a global hub for travel, tourism, sports, culture, trade, and finance. But can the autocratic regimes maintain stability at home and influence abroad as they deal with the demands of social and democratic reform? Miller considers an array of factors—Islamism, terrorism, the Arab Spring, volatile oil prices, global power dynamics, and others—to assess the region’s future possibilities.