Human Sciences All books

Yves Michaud
China Today Volume 8
China is a nation at the crossroads of tradition and modernity. In this previously unpublished volume in the series "lUniversité de tous les savoirs", the authors review the present-day situation and ask the following questions: How should Chinas current political system be defined? What is Chinas position in the world today? What are the different aspects of cultural and intellectual life in China? This is a novel approach to a history of contemporary China. Contributions by Marie-Claire Bergère, Michel Bonnin, Charles Chauderlot, Anne Cheng, Yves Chevrier, Jean-Luc Domenach, Françoise Ged, François Godement, Wang Shaoqi, Joël Thoraval, Léon Vandermeersch, Chu Xiao-Quan.

Étienne-Émile Baulieu, Françoise Héritier, Henri Leridon
Contraception : Constraint or Liberty ? (Work of the Collège de France)
It is now generally accepted that contraception should be readily available.

Stanislas Dehaene, Christine Petit
Words and Music Genesis of human dialogue
Speech and music shape social cognition through shared emotional states, intentions, symbols and cultures...

Monique Sicard
The Making of the Image
It was during the Renaissance that images and pictures were first used by anatomists, microscopists, and astronomers as scientific tools. In that era, scientific images served as a kind of inventory of the known world. In the 19th century, the popularization of scientific ideas gave science a new vigor. Photographic images gave science a new reality, explaining and legitimizing scientific concepts--movement, for example--to a fascinated public. In our days, the scientific image is often a construction--helping us to represent objects and ideas that, like fractals or black holes, cannot be defined through actual observation. Monique Sicard is Projects Director at CNRS Images Média.

Antoine Garapon, Frédéric Gros, Thierry Pech
And this is Justice Punishment in a Democracy
What is the meaning of a sentence? This is the issue that the present book faces squarely and directly, from the philosophical, ethical and political angles. The authors goal is less to confront different viewpoints than to defend a shared belief: a just sentence is one that restores bonds. Antoine Garapon is a former juvenile judge. Frédéric Gros is a philosopher. Thierry Pech is a researcher.

Anne Marcovich
What do societies dream of ?
Why do societies change? How, through countless transformations, do they manage to maintain their own identity? With the help of the many resources provided by the social sciences, history, sociology, social psychology, anthropology and economics, Anne Marcovich has tried to identify the principle of change within a framework of continuity that characterises the evolution of societies. Anne Marcovich is a researcher in the social sciences.

Bernard Frank
Gods and Buddhas in Japan (Work of the Collège de France)
Japanese Buddhism descends directly from the Chinese Buddhist tradition which flourished from the sixth to the eighth centuries.

Sebastian Roché
Réformer la police et la sécurité
Demands for increased public safety are prevalent in both Europe and the United States, and they take similar forms. Do policies based on such notions as zero tolerance, local policing, partnership and mediation serve any real purpose or do they simply act as decoys? In New York City, as elsewhere, improved public safety resulted from the decentralisation of resources and power and, therefore, of responsibilities. In the articles included here, the writers, who are all experts in public safety in their respective countries, examine the issues in a dispassionate manner and offer a comparative study of the results obtained in different countries. Finally, they make some concrete suggestions to resolve the problem of petty crime and incivilities. Sébastian Roché is a professor at the Institut d'Etudes Politiques, in Grenoble. He is the author of Tolérance zéro? Incivilitié et insecurité, published by Editions Odile Jacob.

Philippe Durance
Strategic Foresight in Action
A book that argues in favour of social change, the rational development of governance and sustainable development

Nathan Weinstock
The Promised Land that Promised Too Much
This vast investigation, based on new sources, will transform the prevailing vision of the Arab-Israeli conflict and of its origins.

Régis Debray
God, An Itinerary
"If we can be said to have a goal, it is to reply as precisely and soberly as possible to a childish question, which has been frequently set aside as trivial: Why are these beliefs, which came to light in the desert three thousand years ago, still among us? And why is it that hundreds of millions of men and women still follow them? The study of God's minor aspects does not, in our opinion, lessen its significance. Instead, it gives new life to spiritual issues." Régis Debray Régis Debray teaches at the University of Lyon-III.

Michel Aglietta, Pepita Ould Ahmed, Jean-François Ponsot
Money: Between Debt and Sovereignty
Currency as political animal

Jean-Michel Blanquer, Marc Milet
The Invention of the State Léon Duguit, Maurice Hauriou and the Birth of Modern French Public Law
How France’s judicial state was constructed in the early years of the 20th century, as reflected in the lives of two eminent legal figures

Gilbert Hottois
Philosophy of Science, Philosophy of Technology (Travaux du Collège de France)
Is the philosophy of science concerned with the technique and the philosophy of technology?

















