By  Jacob Davey, Cécile Simmons, Mario Peucker

The re-emergence of Australia’s far-right in the mid-2010s saw an unprecedented level of online mobilisation and a wave of street protests across the country which were often met with counter-protests by anti-racist and anti-fascist networks, most of them associated with far-left groups. This often resulted in clashes, sometimes violent, between opposed political groups. Potentially violent threats associated with the far-right and, to a significantly lower degree, far-left mobilisation in Australia have become the subject of growing concern for government- and public authorities in recent years.  This demonstrates a shift in understanding of the radical, extremist and terrorist landscape beyond what Australia’s intelligence apparatus now refers to as religiously motivated violent extremism. However, evidence of threats posed by far-left actions remains limited, while the full extent and impact of far-right fringe and extremist activity continues to be investigated by researchers.

Beirut; Berlin; London; Paris; Washington DC : Institute for Strategic Dialogue (ISD), 2022. 19p.

By Batalis, Steph; Puglisi, Anna B.

From the document: "From existing diseases to new and emerging threats, a secure vaccine supply protects a broad range of U.S. interests including public health, economic stability, and biosecurity. Routine vaccinations--from measles and influenza to polio and shingles--keep the American public healthy while increasing life expectancy and decreasing hospitalizations for preventable diseases. Healthy workers contribute to a stable economy by working more productively for longer, and American-made vaccines further advance economic interests by contributing to the growing U.S. bioeconomy. Vaccines are also key to biosecurity, ensuring that our military personnel and communities are protected in the event of a biological attack. Despite the necessity of a resilient vaccine supply, this report identifies two vulnerabilities that threaten the American public's access to vaccines: limited domestic manufacturing and a lack of manufacturing redundancy. A reliance on foreign biomanufacturing means that the United States cannot control vaccine production levels during a public health emergency. Nonredundant manufacturing further increases the risk of vaccine shortages if a vaccine's sole manufacturing facility is disrupted."

Georgetown University. Walsh School Of Foreign Service. Center For Security And Emerging Technology. 2023. 29p.

By Elsa Bengtsson Meuller,

From the document: "Online abuse and extremism disproportionately target marginalised populations, particularly people of colour, women and transgender and non‐binary people. The core argument of this report focuses on the intersecting failure of Preventing and Counter Violent Extremism (P/CVE) policies and cybersecurity policies to centre the experiences and needs of victims and survivors of online extremism and abuse. In failing to do so, technology companies and states also fail to combat extremism. The practice of online abuse is gendered and racialised in its design and works to assert dominance through male supremacist logic. Online abuse is often used by extremist groups such as the far right, jihadist groups and misogynist incels. Yet online abuse is not seen as a 'threat of value' in cybersecurity policies. Additionally, the discipline of terrorism studies has failed to engage with the intersection of racism and misogyny properly. Consequently, we fail to centre marginalised victims in our responses to extremism and abuse. Through the implementation of a feminist theorisation of cybersecurity to tackle extremism, this report proposes three core shifts in our responses to online extremism: Incorporate misogynist and racist online abuse into our conceptions of extremism. Shift the focus from responding to attacks and violence to addressing structural violence online. Empower and centre victims and survivors of online abuse and extremism."

Global Network On Extremism And Technology (Gnet). 2023. 32p.

By Laura J. Feller

Virginia’s Racial Integrity Act of 1924 recodified the state’s long-standing racial hierarchy as a more rigid Black-white binary. Then, Virginia officials asserted that no Virginia Indians could be other than legally Black, given centuries of love and marriage across color lines. How indigenous peoples of Virginia resisted erasure and built their identities as Native Americans is the powerful story this book tells. Spanning a century of fraught history, Being Indigenous in Jim Crow Virginia describes the critical strategic work that tidewater Virginia Indians, descendants of the seventeenth-century Algonquian Powhatan chiefdom, undertook to sustain their Native identity in the face of deep racial hostility from segregationist officials, politicians, and institutions. Like other Southeastern Native groups living under Jim Crow regimes, tidewater Native groups and individuals fortified their communities by founding tribal organizations, churches, and schools; they displayed their Indianness in public performances; and they enlisted whites, including well-known ethnographers, to help them argue for their Native distinctness. Describing an arduous campaign marked by ingenuity, conviction, and perseverance, Laura J. Feller shows how these tidewater Native people drew on their shared histories as descendants of Powhatan peoples, and how they strengthened their bonds through living and marrying within clusters of Native Virginians, both on and off reservation lands. She also finds that, by at times excluding African Americans from Indian organizations and Native families, Virginian Indians themselves reinforced racial segregation while they built their own communities. Even as it paved the way to tribal recognition in Virginia, the tidewater Natives’ sustained efforts chronicled in this book demonstrate the fluidity, instability, and persistent destructive power of the construction of race in America.

Norman : University of Oklahoma Press, [2022] 275p.

By Nancy D. Campbel

lDiscovering Addiction brings the history of human and animal experimentation in addiction science into the present with a wealth of archival research and dozens of oral-history interviews with addiction researchers. Professor Campbell examines the birth of addiction science---the National Academy of Sciences's project to find a pharmacological fix for narcotics addiction in the late 1930s---and then explores the human and primate experimentation involved in the succeeding studies of the "opium problem," revealing how addiction science became "brain science" by the 1990s.
Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press, 2007. 337p.

By Eric Wilson

"Eric Wilson’s work poses crucial challenges to social theory, unsettling our understanding of the nature of the liberal democratic state. In The Spectacle of the False Flag, he urges the reader to examine the, often unconsidered, deep state practices that confound conventional notions of the state as monolithic or uniform. This compelling volume traces deep state conflicts and convergences through central cases in the development of American political economic power — JFK/Dallas, LBJ/Gulf of Tonkin, and Nixon/Watergate. Rigorously documented and unflinchingly analyzed, “The Spectacle of the False Flag” provides a stunning example of a new criminological practice—one that takes the state seriously, making the inner workings of the state rather than its effects the primary object of study. Drawing upon a wealth of historical records and developing the theoretical insights of Guy Debord’s writings on spectacular society, Wilson offers a glimpse into a necessary criminology to come."

Brooklyn, NY: punctum books, 2014. 348p.

By Arie Perliger, Catherine Stevens, and Eviane Leidig

Despite the growing complexity of the online misogynist landscape and important efforts to study some misogynist groups through singular case studies, scholars have a limited understanding of the distinctions between the various relevant misogynist communities in terms of their rhetorical, operational, and social facets. The current research aims to address this gap by employing a multi-layered analytical framework of different misogynist communities. We begin with a comprehensive literature review conceptualising extreme misogyny with an overview of the current misogynist spaces and ideological narratives. Consequently, we sample the online ecosystem of extreme misogyny both within and across these communities while utilising a multi-categorical tool in order to identify the discursive, organisational, and operational distinctions between various misogynist communities. Our findings reflect substantial differences between the various misogynist communities in terms of their legitimacy to violence, the conceptualisation of their adversaries, ideological vision’s time orientation, and overall operational discourse.The 

The Hague: International Centre for Counter-Terrorism (ICCT), 2023. 36p

Edited by Anders Sevelsted and Jonas Tougol

This Open Access book explores the role of morality in social movements. Morality has always been central to social movements whether it be in the form of the moral foundations of movement claims, politics and ideologies, the values motivating participation, the new moral principles envisioned and practiced among movement participants, or the overall struggle over society’s moral values that movements engage in. This is evident in movements emerging from recent interlinked crises: the crisis of human rights, the climate crisis, and the developing crisis of democracy. In analyzing these current events through a variety of theoretical, methodological, and empirical lenses, this book brings morality to the forefront of the discussion, allowing for a rethinking of its role. The book is divided into five parts. The first part introduces and explores the central concept of the book, outlining the dominant existing approaches to morality and ethics in the extant movement and civil society literature. The following three parts investigate morality in relation to topics and movements that are either prominent to contemporary politics or salient to the question of morality. In these empirically informed parts, the authors apply a diverse selection of methods spanning fieldwork, historiography, traditional and novel statistical analytical methods, and big data analysis to a diverse selection of data. Topics discussed include refugee solidarity movements, male privilege and anti-feminism movement, environmental and climate justice movements, and religious activism. The fifth and closing part of the book focuses on the more abstract theoretical question of the relationship between morality and ethics and activist practices and points to future research agendas. This book will be of general interest to students, scholars and academics within the disciplines of political sociology, -science and -anthropology and of particular interest to academics in the subfields of social movement and civil society studies.

Cham: Springer Nature, 2023. 334p.

By Haroon Sheikh; Corien Prins; Erik Schrijvers

This open access book offers a strategic perspective on AI and the process of embedding it in society. After decades of research, Artificial Intelligence (AI) is now entering society at large. Due to its general purpose character, AI will change society in multiple, fundamental and unpredictable ways. Therefore, the Netherlands Scientific Council for Government Policy (WRR) characterizes AI as a system technology: a rare type of technologies that have a systemic impact on society. Earlier system technologies include electricity, the combustion engine and the computer. The history of these technologies provides us with useful insights about what it takes to direct the introduction of AI in society. The WRR identifies five key tasks to structurally work on this process: demystification, contextualisation, engagement, regulation and positioning. By clarifying what AI is (demystification), creating a functional ecosystem (contextualisation), involving diverse stakeholders (engagement), developing directive frameworks (regulation) and engaging internationally (positioning), societies can meaningfully influence how AI settles. Collectively, these activities steer the process of co-development between technology and society, and each representing a different path to safeguard public values. Mission AI - The New System Technology was originally published as an advisory report for the government of the Netherlands. The strategic analysis and the outlined recommendations are, however, relevant to every government and organization that aims to take up 'misson AI' and embed this newest system technology in our world.

Cham: Springer Nature, 2023. 410p.

By Suvi Keskinen

This book provides an original approach to the connections of race, racism and neoliberalisation through a focus on ‘postethnic activism,’ in which mobilisation is based on racialisation as non-white or ‘other’ instead of ethnic group membership. Developing the theoretical understanding of political activism under the neoliberal turn in racial capitalism and the increasingly hostile political environment towards migrants and racialised minorities, the book investigates the conditions, forms and visions of postethnic activism in three Nordic countries (Denmark, Sweden and Finland). It connects the historical legacies of European colonialism to the current configurations of racial politics and global capitalism. The book compellingly argues that contrary to the tendencies of neoliberal postracialism to de-politicise social inequalities the activists are re-politicising questions of race, class and gender in new ways. The book is of interest to scholars and students in sociology, ethnic and racial studies, cultural studies, feminist studies and urban studies.

London; New York: Routledge, 2022. 164p.

By Aaron Lynch

From the Preface:” This book introduces a new branch of science dealing with the evolution of ideas that program f for their own retransmission. These self-spreading ideas have been called memes ever since zoologist Richard Dawkins coined the term in his 1976 book, The Selfish Gene. After ten chapters on genetic evolution, he devoted the closing chapter to the nongenetic evolution of memes. Two years later, I independently reinvented this theory of self-propagating ideas, and realized that ti would someday warrant a whole book. I had coined a different neologism back then, but later adopted the term meme after a friend told me about Dawkins's meme chapter.”

NY. Basic Books, 1996. 194p. CONTAINS MARK-UP

By Richard Dawkins

From the Preface: “he first chapter does some of the work of a Preface, in explaining what the book does and does not set out to accomplish, so I can be brief here. It si not a textbook, nor an introduction to an established field. It is a personal look at the evolution oflife, and in particular at the logic of natural selection and the level in the hierarchy of life at which natural selection can be said toact. I happen to be an ethologist, but I hope preoccupations with animal behaviour will not be too noticeable.The intended scope of the book is wider. The readers for whom I am mainly writing are my professional colleagues. evolutionary biologists, ethologists and sociobiologists, ecologists, and philosophers and humanists interested in evolutionary science, including, of course, graduate and undergraduate students in all these disciplines. 'Therefore, although this book is in some ways the sequel to my previous book, The Selfish Gene, it assumes that the reader has professional knowledge of evolutionary biology and its technical terms. On the other hand it is possible to enjoy a professional book as a spectator, even if not a participant in the profession.

Oxford. New York. Oxford University Press. 1982. 319p. CONTAINS MARK-UP

By Richard Dawkins

From the Preface: “This book should be read almostas though it were science fiction. It is designed to appeal to the imagination. But it is not science fiction: it is science. Cliché or not, 'stranger than fiction' expresses exactly how I feel aboutt h etruth. We are survivalmachinesr o b o t vehicles blindly programmed to preserve the selfish molecules known as genes. This is atruth which still fils me with astonishment. Though I have known it for years, I never seem to get fully used to it. One of my hopes is that I may have some success in astonishing others.”

Oxford New York. Oxford University Press. 1976. 360p. CONTAINS MARK=UP

By Alexander Alland, Jr.

From the Preface: “My interest in human ecology, particularly its medical aspects, developed during my first field experience in the Ivory Coast, West Africa. There I was struck by the wide range of behaviors which made good sense in terms of basic hygiene. Among these were the use of pit latrines, apparently before European contact, frequent and thor- ough bathing, isolation of the sick in the case of certain highly contagious diseases, and the thorough cooking of food. The situation was, of course, by no means perfect, and many tropical diseases could be found in the popu- lation. Still, these people who had no concept of preven- tive medicine other than the use of charms to ward off disease had developed a basically sound set of hygiene practices.”

New York and London. Columbia University Press. 1970. 208p. CONTAINS MARK-UP

By George C. Williams

“'Eyes are for seeing and ears for hearing, but what is life itself for? Does it serve any purpose, or did it spring quite by chance from the primeval soup?' Sunday Telegraph

'Anyone with even a casual interest in evolution can enjoy and profit by Williams's book. It can be read like a novel, a novel of ideas. It is a great way to find out what a leading evolutionist is thinking about' Nature

London. Weidenfeld & Nicholson. 1996. 258p. CONTAINS MARK-UP

By David M. Buss

From the Introduction: “Human Mating Behavior delights and amuses us and galvanizes our gossip, but it is also deeply disturbing. Few domains of human activity generate as much discussion, as many laws, or such elaborate rituals in al cultures. Yet the elements of human mating seem to defyunder- standing. Women and men sometimes find themselves choosing mates who abuse them psychologically and physically. Efforts to attract mates often backfire. Conflicts eruptwithin couples, producing downward spirals of blame and despair. Despite their best intentions and vows of life- long love, half of all married couples end up divorcing.

Pain, betrayal, and loss contrast sharply with the usual romantic notions of love. We grow up believing in true love, in finding our "one and only." We assume that once we do, we will marry in bliss and live happily ever after. But reality rarely coincides withour beliefs.Even a cursory look at the divorce rate, the 30 to 50 percent incidence of extramarital affairs, and the jealous rages that rack so many relation- ships shatters these illusions.”

NY. Basic Books. 1994. 265p. CONTAINS MARK-UP

By Matt Ridley

From the Introduction. This is a book about human nature, and in particular the surprisingly social nature of the human animal. We live in towns, work in teams, and our lives are spiders' webs of connections - linking us to relatives, colleagues, companions, friends, superiors, inferiors. We are, misanthropes not withstanding, unable to live without each other. Even on a practical level, it is probably a million years since any human being was entirely and convincingly self-sufficient: able to survive without trading his skills for those of his fellow humans.We are far more dependent on other members of our species than any other ape or monkey. We are more like ants or termites who live as slaves to their societies. We define virtue almost exclusively as pro-social behaviour, and vice as anti-social behaviour. Kropotkin was right to emphasize the huge role that mutual aid plays in our species, but wrong and anthropomorphic to assume that therefore it applied to other species as well. One of the things that marks humanity out from other species, and accounts for our ecological success, is our collection of hyper-social instincts.

London. Penguin,. 1996.294p. CONTAINS MARK-UP

By John Maynard Smith

From the cover: Al living plants and animals, including man, are the modified descendants of one or a few simple living things. A hundred years ago Darwin and Wallace in their theory of natural selection, or the survival of the fittest, explained how evolution could have happened, in terms of processes known to take place today. In this book, John Maynard Smith describes how their theory has been confirmed, but at the same time transformed, by recent research, and ni particular by the discovery of the laws of inheritance.

Cambridge. Cambridge University Press. 1975. 371p. CONTAINS MARK-UP

By Richard Dawkins

From the introduction: “Darwinism encompasses all of life- human, animal, plant, bacterial, and, fi I am right in the last chapter of this book, extraterrestrial. It provides the only satisfying explanation forwhy we all exist, why we are the way that we are. It is t h ebedrock on which rest all t h edisciplines known as the humanities. I do not mean that history, literarycriticism, and the law should be recast in a specifically Darwinian mould. Far fromit, very far. But all human works are the products of brains, brainsare evolved data processing devices, and we shall misunderstand their works if we forget this fundamental fact. If more doctors understood Darwinism, humanity would not now be facing a crisis of antibiotic resistance. Darwinian evolution, as onereviewer has observed, 'is the most portentous natural truth that science has yet discovered'. I'd add, o'r is likely to discover.”

London. Norton. 1986. 360p. CONTAINS MARK-UP

By Vian Bakir and Andrew McStay

This open access book deconstructs the core features of online misinformation and disinformation. It finds that the optimisation of emotions for commercial and political gain is a primary cause of false information online. The chapters distil societal harms, evaluate solutions, and consider what must be done to strengthen societies as new biometric forms of emotion profiling emerge. Based on a rich, empirical, and interdisciplinary literature that examines multiple countries, the book will be of interest to scholars and students of Communications, Journalism, Politics, Sociology, Science and Technology Studies, and Information Science, as well as global and local policymakers and ordinary citizens interested in how to prevent the spread of false information worldwide, both now and in the future.

Cham: Springer, 2022. 280p.