Catalog All books
Yves Coppens
Pretexts
In these short essays, Yves Coppens makes us discover the most recent findings in prehistory. A masterly lesson.
Dominique Rousseau
The Fifth French Republic Is Dying! Long Live Democracy!
The First French Republic was consular, the Second was presidential, the Third and Fourth were parliamentary, but the Fifth seems to have no distinguishing qualities.
Stuart J. Edelstein
From genes to genomes
Rapid progress in the field of genetics is changing our lives in more ways than one. In order to understand these changes, Stuart Edelstein has approached each facet of the subject from three points of view: contemporary society and politics; technical developments; and basic research. By keeping to some fundamental points, this book will enable the lay reader to understand before judging the social implications of recent discoveries in biology. This is science with a civic sense. Stuart Edelstein teaches biochemistry at the University of Geneva.
Éric Baratay
And Man Created the Animal History of a Condition
In this book, Baratay holds a mirror up to humanity. He reviews the changing status of animals throughout human history: from ancient myths about animal domestication to the invention of bullfighting, from the great pastoral epics to modern slaughterhouses, from the ancient role played by animals in the human imagination to modern laboratory testing. Eric Baratay is a historian specialising in the contemporary world and in the status of animals.
Pierre Buser
Neurophilosophy of the Brain Neurons That Aspire to Explain the Mind
A highly topical discussion, linked to the latest findings in the neurosciences: is it still relevant nowadays, given recent neurobiological research.
Claude Hagège
Against Uniform Thinking
The threat of uniform thinking, relayed notably through the English language, should lead us to react in defence of linguistic and cultural diversity.
Claude Olievenstein, Carlos Parada
Like A Cannibalistic Angel Drugs, Adolescents and Society
Does it make sense to place hallucinogens and hard drugs in the same category and to regard them all as addictive? Should tobacco and alcohol be put on the same plane as heroin, cocaine and crack ? With the assistance of Carlos Parada, his collaborator at the Centre Médical de Marmottan, Claude Olievenstein offers the reader his latest thoughts and ideas on the highly distinctive world of substance abusers, which is characterised by pleasure, withdrawal, the need for warmth and haste and, above all, by instability and chaos. Claude Olievenstein is the head doctor at the Centre Médical de Marmottan, in Paris, and a senior research fellow at the University of Lyon-II. Carlos Parada, a physician specialising in drug addiction, works at the Centre Médical de Marmottan.
Antoine Garapon
The Guardian of Promises Justice and Democracy
The multiplying cases, the explosion of litigations, the sensational trials which catch the attention of the public : all are evidence of a growth in power of the judicial system, which we expect to be, at the same time, the arbiter of morals, the guarantee of public morality and responsible for the salvation of the people. But why dont we ask what things it cannot provide ? Isnt the idea of a judicial democracy just an illusion, which serves to hide serious problems ? The power of the judicial system is more worrying than exciting. It is an indicator of the discreditation of the State at the same time as a reduction in social cohesion. In the face of the fragility of democratic society, this book is a thorough reflection on the exercise of public power, affirming that the real role of the judge is not to take the place of the politic, but to diffuse the risk of democratic implosion by remaining the guardian of the promises at the very heart of republican laws. Antoine Garapon, a former judge and member of the editorial team of the journal Esprit, is the head of the Institute of Advanced Judicial Studies.
Nicolas Mariot, Claire Zalc
Faced with persecution The Destruction of the Jews of Lens, 1940-1945
The history of the Holocaust in France, seen from an entirely new angle. This book does not simply describe the numerous possible attitudes: it aims to explain them.