The chapter defines theory and establishes how it informs discourse analysis. Theory is defined as an idea that explains what discourse is, how discourse should be understood, or both. Conversely, a theory is not an opinion, thought, or belief, which are simply intuitions without an explanatory framework. Topics discussed in this chapter include theories of knowledge and applied theories. After reading this chapter, readers will know how to define theory; understand how theory relates to the analytic process; know the difference between a theory of knowledge and an applied theory; and be able to identify the different types of applied theory that exist.

This chapter develops the main argument of the book. It posits that some displacement strategies – namely, forced relocation – act as a mechanism for sorting the population in wartime. The argument focuses on how the territorialization of political identity in civil wars and the tendency for combatants to utilize informational shortcuts impels them to use relocation to identify opponents through “guilt by location.” It also shows that relocation can create “zones of appropriation” that facilitate the mobilization of the population into the war effort, without requiring combatants to invest in resource-intensive methods of territorial occupation. To demonstrate the logic and plausibility of each aspect of the "assortative" theory of displacement and illustrate its central causal claims, the chapter provides empirical examples from a wide range of civil wars, from the Revolt of the Camisards in eighteenth-century France, to colonial wars in British, French, Japanese, and Portuguese territories, to modern conflicts in Angola, Bangladesh, El Salvador, Ethiopia, Guatemala, India, Nicaragua, Peru, the Philippines, Rwanda, and Sri Lanka. The chapter also discusses a set of hypotheses and observable implications of the theory.

This chapter takes seriously the concerns of Eliot’s early reviewers with a tension in her fiction between the devoted depiction of life later associated with realism, and a didactic impulse to which they increasingly felt she succumbed. Asking why Eliot interrupted representation with theorisation, the chapter takes as a case study her alternating dramatisation and analysis of incongruous versions of history in Chapter 20 of Middlemarch. It traces the lineage of such alternation, via an allusion to her friend John Sibree’s translation of Hegel’s Lectures on the Philosophy of History, into one of the notebooks Eliot used as she developed Middlemarch, which is read less as a source for either the novel’s theories or its facts than as a laboratory for its experiments in moving between them. The chapter suggests that Eliot valued the dissonance her reviewers detected when dogma intruded upon depiction. It thereby elucidates her contribution to the dialectical novel of ideas this book explores.

Early childhood education as a field has heavily relied on theories from developmental psychology since the 19th century to inform pedagogy and practice. The use of developmental theories has been significant in assisting the field to raise its professional status, however, an over-reliance on these theories alone has contributed to marginalising children with rich cultural, linguistic and religious diversities. This chapter will focus on exploring co-constructed pedagogies as creating inclusivity in early childhood education (birth to age 8). In particular, co-constructed pedagogies engage children, educators/teachers, families and community in dialogue to inform curriculum and practices that reflect diverse learning communities. It is argued that co-constructed pedagogies are not only important in early childhood education but also offer insights that can support inclusivity in primary and secondary education.

This chapter first develops a theoretical framework on the behavioral dynamics behind voters’ responses to different mobilization strategies and their different effects on voter preferences and party identification. It then goes on to explore why these different strategies are available to new parties in the first place. It develops a theoretical model that focuses on the period before a new party contests its first major election to show how the intra-elite dynamics during these founding moments shape early on which mobilization strategies the party adopts.

This chapter summarizes the main points of the book and reflects on possible ways ahead for experimental sociology.

This chapter examines the relationship between “critique” as a mode of literary work and digital literary studies. It provides a brief genealogy of the origins of critique in early modern textual criticism and eighteenth-century disputes over autonomous criticism, and connects that genealogy to contemporary schools of critique. The debates over critique in digital literary studies are surveyed, along with a range of work in feminist, postcolonial, intersectional, Marxist, and other forms of cultural critique. It analyzes the recent turn to work in “postcritique” and allied theoretical modes, and indicates areas of shared interest as well as boundaries between digital literary studies and the cultures of critique.

This chapter examines several feminist approaches to the study and practice of international relations. It highlights the similarities between these approaches, but also the differences. It does this first by tracing the interventions made by feminists into international relations and the creation of a distinctly feminist IR agenda. Second, it uses the ‘gender lens’ to demonstrate and analyse how experiences and understandings in international relations can be ‘gendered’. Finally, it explains and examines the critiques made by the different feminist approaches to international relations.

The Cold War was the most important feature of the international system in the second half of the twentieth century. The rivalry between the Soviet Union and the United States shaped the contours of conflict and cooperation among states and peoples between 1945 and 1991 and its dynamics permeated almost all corners of the globe. Whether in Baghdad, Bangkok or Brussels, the influence of geopolitical and ideological conflict was unmistakable. The Cold War created rivalries and political faultlines that have continued to shape international relations years after its passing. Sino-American competition has become so intense that many think the world is on the brink of another period of bipolar rivalry.

This chapter considers the relevance of postcolonialism to the discipline of ‘international relations’ (IR). It argues that postcolonialism advances a powerful critique of traditional approaches to IR (see chapters on realism and liberalism) since it calls into question the discipline’s foundational ontological and epistemological assumptions. In particular, it challenges the dominant assumption that states are the basic units of IR and that we should examine the relations between these units in the context of an anarchical system. Postcolonialism refocuses our attention on the constitutive role played by colonialism in the creation of the modern world and sees international relations as hierarchical rather than anarchical. It sees academic disciplines such as IR – and Western rationalist, humanist and universalist modes of thinking in general – as complicit in reproducing colonial power relations and seeks normatively to resist practices of colonialism in its material and ideational forms, whether political, economic or cultural.

How would our understanding of the history of literary theory change if we focused on the seminal essays, rather than the monumental books and monographs? It would surely seem more variegated and provisional, less finished and definitive, more of a process of trying out ideas and defending interests, more motley, confusing, and elusive, a bit like the essay form itself. This chapter examines the rise and fall of theory in the UK inside and outside the academy, beginning with its origins in the British New Left, which looked to continental Europe for intellectual sustenance. It traces the institutional influences and pressures exerted on the essay form as it migrates across the Channel, arguing that while critique could be amenable to the norms of tough-minded knowledge acquisition, the more oblique and personal voice that we associate with essayism has, until recently, often been eschewed in universities.

This chapter presents an institutional theory of miscalculation on the road to war. The central proposition is that leaders face a trade-off between good information and political security. This trade-off is discussed in two parts. The chapter first discusses the informational constraints faced by leaders contemplating beginning an international crisis, explaining why integrated institutions that feature inclusive and open information flows tend to deliver better information to leaders. The chapter then discusses the political logic by which many leaders choose to forgo integrated institutions in favor of institutional alternatives that deliver less complete and less accurate information but provide political protection from bureaucratic punishment.

It will be clear from Chapter 4 that we consider regulation of corporate governance to be prominent in a good corporate governance model. This chapter builds upon that model by focusing on the regulation of corporate governance in particular. It deals specifically with the various mechanisms, legislative and non-legislative, which regulate the corporation and which set in place, collectively, a framework by which good governance can be achieved. Overall, this collective body of mechanisms forms part of what has recently been described as an emerging ‘law of corporate governance’. The regulation of corporate governance in Australia is achieved through binding and non-binding rules, international recommendations and industry-specific standards, the commentaries of scholars and practitioners, and the decisions of judges. The legislature acts to facilitate the achievement of good corporate governance directly by refining corporate law, and indirectly through the entire panoply of rules and regulations which have an impact on the corporation and its activities. There are other agencies that also assume a role in the regulation of corporate governance.

In this chapter the focus is on corporate governance developments in countries where the two-tier board system is used. The number of EU member states with different corporate law systems makes corporate governance harmonisation quite difficult, but also leads to very interesting and dynamic discussion within the EU. The G20/OECD Principles of Corporate Governance cover board structures. Germany has a two-tier board structure with employee representatives forming part of the supervisory board. Elements of the German corporate governance model influenced the original Japanese corporate governance model, but Anglo-American influence emerged after World War II. China has a unique corporate governance model because Chinese corporations were traditionally state-owned and many major corporations are still either state-owned or state-controlled. Nevertheless, elements of both the German model and the Anglo-American model, especially as far as independent, non-executive directors for listed companies are concerned, have influenced the Chinese corporate governance model.