Open Access Books - Technology - 2020
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PublicationThe State, Popular Mobilisation and Gold Mining in Mongolia: Shaping ‘Neoliberal’ Policies( 2020)"Mongolia's mining sector, along with its environmental and social costs, have been the subject of prolonged and heated debate. This debate has often cast the country as either a victim of the 'resource curse' or guilty of 'resource nationalism'. In The State, Popular Mobilisation and Gold Mining in Mongolia, Dulam Bumochir aims to avoid the pitfalls of this debate by adopting an alternative theoretical approach. He focuses on the indigenous representations of nature, environment, economy, state and sovereignty that have triggered nationalist and statist responses to the mining boom. In doing so, he explores the ways in which these responses have shaped the apparently 'neo-liberal' policies of twenty-first century Mongolia, and the economy that has emerged from them, in the face of competing mining companies, protest movements, international donor organizations, economic downturn, and local and central government policies. Applying rich ethnography to a nuanced and complex picture, Bumochir's analysis is essential reading for students and researchers studying the environment and mining, especially in Central and North East Asia and post-Soviet regions, and also for readers interested in the relationship between neoliberalism, nationalism, environmentalism and state."
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PublicationPyrrhic Progress: The History of Antibiotics in Anglo-American Food Production( 2020)Pyrrhic Progress analyses over half a century of antibiotic use, regulation, and resistance in US and British food production. Mass-introduced after 1945, antibiotics helped revolutionize post-war agriculture. Food producers used antibiotics to prevent and treat disease, protect plants, preserve food, and promote animals' growth. Many soon became dependent on routine antibiotic use to sustain and increase production. The resulting growth of antibiotic infrastructures came at a price. Critics blamed antibiotics for leaving dangerous residues in food, enabling bad animal welfare, and selecting for antimicrobial resistance (AMR) in bacteria, which could no longer be treated with antibiotics. Pyrrhic Progress reconstructs the complicated negotiations that accompanied this process of risk prioritization between consumers, farmers, and regulators on both sides of the Atlantic. Unsurprisingly, solutions differed: while Europeans implemented precautionary antibiotic restrictions to curb AMR, consumer concerns and cost-benefit assessments made US regulators focus on curbing drug residues in food. The result was a growing divergence of antibiotic stewardship and a rise of AMR. Kirchhelle's comprehensive analysis of evolving non-human antibiotic use and the historical complexities of antibiotic stewardship provides important insights for current debates on the global burden of AMR. This Open Access ebook is available under a CC-BY-NC-ND license, and is supported by a generous grant from Wellcome Trust.
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PublicationThe Oil Wars Myth: Petroleum and the Causes of International Conflict( 2020)Do countries fight wars for oil? Given the resource's exceptional military and economic importance, most people assume that states will do anything to obtain it. Challenging this conventional wisdom, The Oil Wars Myth reveals that countries do not launch major conflicts to acquire petroleum resources. Emily Meierding argues that the costs of foreign invasion, territorial occupation, international retaliation, and damage to oil company relations deter even the most powerful countries from initiating "classic oil wars." Examining a century of interstate violence, she demonstrates that, at most, countries have engaged in mild sparring to advance their petroleum ambitions.The Oil Wars Myth elaborates on these findings by reassessing the presumed oil motives for many of the twentieth century's most prominent international conflicts: World War II, the two American Gulf wars, the Iran–Iraq War, the Falklands/Malvinas War, and the Chaco War. These case studies show that countries have consistently refrained from fighting for oil. Meierding also explains why oil war assumptions are so common, despite the lack of supporting evidence. Since classic oil wars exist at the intersection of need and greed—two popular explanations for resource grabs—they are unusually easy to believe in.The Oil Wars Myth will engage and inform anyone interested in oil, war, and the narratives that connect them.
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PublicationThe Jet Makers: The Aerospace Industry from 1945 to 1972( 2020)This volume presents the history of the American jet aircraft manufacturing industry from World War II to 1972, documenting the evolution of its technology and covering the intricacies of its management, economics, and relations with the government. A valuable contribution to general aviation history, it also provides a unique opportunity to study the dynamic of a major U.S. industry. Charles D. Bright traces the momentous revolution of the aerospace era from birth to maturity, using as a base the jet aircraft industry. He investigates all significant aspects: the comingofage of aviation during World War II, including global transportation and aerodynamics; the development of jets and missiles from the Truman era to the Vietnam War; the controlling influence of national military strategy; the U.S. Air Force and other government markets; the mechanics of government procurement-bidding, pricing, buying; difficulties in the commercial airliner business; the ordering of technology and the prevailing "design or die" philosophy; and different systems of production through the years. Special attention is given to major problems such as the industry's need for diversification and the skyrocketing costs that threaten to make aerospace products uneconomical. The conventional economic concerns of entry into and exit from the industry are treated in depth. _x000B_Bright focuses on the overall economic pattern, from the first demand for aerospace machines for military, space, and commercial uses to the failures of recent times as the industry entered recession and peacetime equilibrium. He tells of the desperate competition among giants of the industry, those companies on the frontiers of technology that manufactured fixedwing aircraft of their own design. This is the group that bore the brunt of adaptation to the jet age: Boeing, CurtissWright, Douglas, Fairchild, General Dynamics, Grumman, Lockheed, martin, McDonnell, North American Northrop, and Republic. Central to the story are the reasons for America's leadership in the jet age: enterprising business managers, scientists, and engineers; the pressure of economics; and manifold competition brought on by economics; and manifold competition brought on by the cold war. Bright points to an industry that has responded to incredible demands and that has shown the strength to weather storms. This volume is illustrated with fiftyfive photographs depicting the growth in aircraft technology from 1945 to 1972. As a unique blend of aeronautic, economic, business, and military history, it will fascinate not only those connected with aviation and the aerospace industry, but also those interested in the history of technology, business management, and governmentmilitarybusiness relations. The Jet Makers received Honorable Mention in the 1977 History Manuscript award competition of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics.
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PublicationEngineering Statics: Open and Interactive( 2020)Engineering Statics is a free, open-source textbook appropriate for anyone who wishes to learn more about vectors, forces, moments, static equilibrium, and the properties of shapes. Specifically, it has been written to be the textbook for Engineering Mechanics: Statics, the first course in the Engineering Mechanics series offered in most university-level engineering programs. This book’s content should prepare you for subsequent classes covering Engineering Mechanics: Dynamics and Mechanics of Materials. At its core, Engineering Statics provides the tools to solve static equilibrium problems for rigid bodies. The additional topics of resolving internal loads in rigid bodies and computing area moments of inertia are also included as stepping stones for later courses. We have endeavored to write in an approachable style and provide many questions, examples, and interactives for you to engage with and learn from.