Catalog All books
Hervé Le Bras
Essay on Social Geometry
Hervé Le Bras examines here how post-modern mathematics, targeting concrete issues, can help us to address a fundamental concern of all human societies, i.e., how space is occupied. Among many topics he examines pastoral nomadism, agricultural sedentariness, territorial conquest, migrations, ancient and modern urban planning, national and regional development, and road traffic. Hervé Le Bras is a demographer and course director at the Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales.
Collectif
The National Gendarmerie A Republican Institution for Civic Service
The national Gendarmerie has passed through eight centuries of history in constantly adapting to the needs of the State and citizens. The changes of political regimes and governments has little by little forged an original military institution, faithful to republican principles. Its specificity lies in the multiplicity of its tasks : defence, judiciary policing, and public security. On October 12th 1999, more than three hundred members of parliament, senior officials, academics, practitioners, researchers and military men were brought together at the Luxembourg Palace. The proceedings of this conference are gathered together in this book for the purpose of helping to trace a vision of the future for tomorrows Gendarmerie.
Giulia Sissa
The Soul is a Feminine Being
Do women have a soul ? Philosophers have historically doubted this, refusing to accord women rationality. However, at the same time, they have been unable to imagine the soul without the help of feminine metaphors : the soul conceives, it is pregnant with knowledge, it gives birth in pain and distress but always with the help of someone. In reading classic texts such as Derrida, and deconstructing them while drawing comparisons with others and focusing on what may seem paradoxical, such as the many Freudian slips, Giulia Sissa leads us to interrogate ourselves on the exclusively feminine attributes of the Western soul. A radical questioning of the difference between the sexes which leads us to the most profound aspects of our culture.
Bernard Walliser
Cognitive Economics
This book should help readers gain a greater understanding of economic reasoning and rationality. It shows how a period of study and apprenticeship can improve the otherwise limited rationality of economic decisions-makers, how to co-ordinate the various actors expectations in a given situation, and how speculation results from the circulation of the opinions of the economic decision-makers. Bernard Walliser teaches economics at the Ecole des Ponts et Chaussées.
André Klarsfeld, Frédéric Revah
The Biology of Death
Why are most living organisms condemned to die a natural death, even if they are in a well-protected and highly favourable environment ? Is death a "useful" biological process or does it not correspond to any natural necessity ?