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An Analysis of Moses Maimonides's Guide for the Perplexed

An Analysis of Michael E. Porter's Competitive Strategy Techniques for Analyzing Industries and Competitors

An Analysis of Michael E. Porter's Competitive Strategy Techniques for Analyzing Industries and Competitors

Michael E. Porter’s 1980 book Competitive Strategy is a fine example of critical thinking skills in action. Porter used his strong evaluative skills to overturn much of the accepted wisdom in the world of business. By exploring the strengths and weaknesses of the accepted argument that the best policy for firms to become more successful was to focus on expanding their market share he was able to establish that the credibility of the argument was flawed. Porter did not believe such growth was the only way for a company to be successful and provided compelling arguments as to why this was not the case. His book shows how industries can be fragmented with different firms serving different parts of the market (the low-price mass market and the expensive high-end market in clothing for example) and examines strategies that businesses can follow in emerging mature and declining markets. If printing is in decline for example there may still be a market in this industry for high-end goods and services such as luxury craft bookbinding. Porter also made excellent use of the critical thinking skill of analysis in writing Competitive Strategy. His advice that executives should analyze the five forces that mold the environment in which they compete – new entrants substitute products buyers suppliers and industry rivals – focused heavily on defining the relationships between these disparate factors and urged readers to check the assumptions of their arguments. Porter avoided technical jargon and wrote in a straightforward way to help readers see that his evaluation of the problem was strong. Competitive Strategy went on to be a highly influential work in the world of business strategy. | An Analysis of Michael E. Porter's Competitive Strategy Techniques for Analyzing Industries and Competitors

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An Analysis of Oliver Sacks's The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat and Other Clinical Tales

An Analysis of Oliver Sacks's The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat and Other Clinical Tales

In The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat neurologist Oliver Sacks looked at the cutting-edge work taking place in his field and decided that much of it was not fit for purpose. Sacks found it hard to understand why most doctors adopted a mechanical and impersonal approach to their patients and opened his mind to new ways to treat people with neurological disorders. He explored the question of deciding what such new ways might be by deploying his formidable creative thinking skills. Sacks felt the issues at the heart of patient care needed redefining because the way they were being dealt with hurt not only patients but practitioners too. They limited a physician’s capacity to understand and then treat a patient’s condition. To highlight the issue Sacks wrote the stories of 24 patients and their neurological clinical conditions. In the process he rebelled against traditional methodology by focusing on his patients’ subjective experiences. Sacks did not only write about his patients in original ways – he attempt to come up with creative ways of treating them as well. At root his method was to try to help each person individually with the core aim of finding meaning and a sense of identity despite or even thanks to the patients’ condition. Sacks thus redefined the issue of neurological work in a new way and his ideas were so influential that they heralded the arrival of a broader movement – narrative medicine – that placed stronger emphasis on listening to and incorporating patients’ experiences and insights into their care. | An Analysis of Oliver Sacks's The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat and Other Clinical Tales

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An Analysis of Carole Hillenbrand's The Crusades Islamic Perspectives

An Analysis of G.W.F. Hegel's Phenomenology of Spirit

An Analysis of Clifford Geertz's The Interpretation of Cultures Selected Essays

An Analysis of Clifford Geertz's The Interpretation of Cultures Selected Essays

Clifford Geertz has been called ‘the most original anthropologist of his generation’ – and this reputation rests largely on the huge contributions to the methodology and approaches of anthropological interpretation that he outlined in The Interpretation of Cultures. The centrality of interpretative skills to anthropology is uncontested: in a subject that is all about understanding mankind and which seeks to outline the differences and the common ground that exists between cultures interpretation is the crucial skillset. For Geertz however standard interpretative approaches did not go deep enough and his life’s work concentrated on deepening and perfecting his subject’s interpretative skills. Geertz is best known for his definition of ‘culture ’ and his theory of ‘thick description ’ an influential technique that depends on fresh interpretative approaches. For Geertz ‘cultures’ are ‘webs of meaning’ in which everyone is suspended. Understanding culture therefore is not so much a matter of going in search of law but of setting out an interpretative framework for meaning that focuses directly on attempts to define the real meaning of things within a given culture. The best way to do this for Geertz is via ‘thick description:’ a way of recording things that explores context and surroundings and articulates meaning within the web of culture. Ambitious and bold Geertz’s greatest creation is a method all critical thinkers can learn from. | An Analysis of Clifford Geertz's The Interpretation of Cultures Selected Essays

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An Analysis of Thomas Paine's Common Sense

An Analysis of Hannah Arendt's The Human Condition

An Analysis of Richard Dawkins's The Selfish Gene

An Analysis of Theodore Levitt's Marketing Myopia

An Analysis of Amartya Sen's Inequality Re-Examined

An Analysis of Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick's Epistemology of the Closet

An Analysis of Keith Thomas's Religion and the Decline of Magic

An Analysis of Keith Thomas's Religion and the Decline of Magic

Keith Thomas's classic study of all forms of popular belief has been influential for so long now that it is difficult to remember how revolutionary it seemed when it first appeared. By publishing Religion and the Decline of Magic Thomas became the first serious scholar to attempt to synthesize the full range of popular thought about the occult and the supernatural studying its influence across Europe over several centuries. At root his book can be seen as a superb exercise in problem-solving: one that actually established magic as a historical problem worthy of investigation. Thomas asked productive questions not least challenging the prevailing assumption that folk belief was unworthy of serious scholarly attention and his work usefully reframed the existing debate in much broader terms allowing for more extensive exploration of correlations not only between different sorts of popular belief but also between popular belief and state religion. It was this that allowed Thomas to reach his famous conclusion that the advent of Protestantism – which drove out much of the superstition that characterised the Catholicism of the period – created a vacuum filled by other forms of belief; for example Catholic priests had once blessed their crops but Protestants refused to do so. That left farmers looking for other ways of ensuring a good harvest. It was this Thomas argues that explains the survival of what we now think of as magic at a time such beliefs might have been expected to decline – at least until science arose to offer alternative paradigms. | An Analysis of Keith Thomas's Religion and the Decline of Magic

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An Analysis of Milton Friedman's Capitalism and Freedom

An Analysis of Milton Friedman's Capitalism and Freedom

Milton Friedman was arguably the single most influential economist of the 20th-century. His influence particularly on conservative politics in America and Great Britain substantially helped – as both supporters and critics agree – to shape the global economy as it is today. Capitalism and Freedom (1962) is a passionate but carefully reasoned summary of Friedman’s philosophy of political and economic freedom and it has become perhaps his most directly influential work. Friedman’s argument focuses on the place of economic liberalism in society: in his view free markets and personal economic freedom are absolutely necessary for true political freedom to exist. Freedom for Friedman is the ultimate good in a society – the marker and aim of true civilisation. And crucially he argues real freedom is rarely aided by government. For Friedman indeed “the great advances of civilization whether in architecture or painting in science or literature in industry or agriculture have never come from centralized government”. Instead he argues they have always been produced by “minority views” flourishing in a social climate permitting variety and diversity. ” In successive chapters Friedman develops a well-structured line of reasoning emerging from this stance – leading him to some surprising conclusions that remain persuasive and influential more than 60 years on. | An Analysis of Milton Friedman's Capitalism and Freedom

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An Analysis of Bernard Bailyn's The Ideological Origins of the American Revolution

An Analysis of Bernard Bailyn's The Ideological Origins of the American Revolution

Historians of the American Revolution had always seen the struggle for independence either as a conflict sparked by heavyweight ideology or as a war between opposing social groups acting out of self-interest. In The Ideological Origins of the American Revolution Bernard Bailyn begged to differ re-examining familiar evidence to establish new connections that in turn allowed him to generate fresh explanations. His influential reconceptualizing of the underlying reasons for America's independence drive focused instead on pamphleteering – and specifically on the actions of an influential group of ‘conspirators’ who identified and were determined to protect a particularly American set of values. For Bailyn these ideas could indeed be traced back to the ferment of the English Civil War – stemming from radical pamphleteers whose anti-authoritarian ideas crossed the Atlantic and embedded themselves in colonial ideology. Bailyn's thesis helps to explain the Revolution's success by pointing out how deep-rooted its founding ideas were; the Founding Fathers may have been reading Locke but the men they led were inspired by shorter pithier and altogether far more radical works. Only by understanding this Bailyn argues can we understand the passion and determination that allowed the rebel American states to defeat a global superpower. | An Analysis of Bernard Bailyn's The Ideological Origins of the American Revolution

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An Analysis of Hans J. Morgenthau's Politics Among Nations

An Analysis of St. Augustine's The City of God Against the Pagans

An Analysis of Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak's Can the Subaltern Speak?

An Analysis of Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak's Can the Subaltern Speak?

A critical analysis of Spivak's classic 1988 postcolonial studies essay in which she argues that a core problem for the poorest and most marginalized in society (the subalterns) is that they have no platform to express their concerns and no voice to affect policy debates or demand a fairer share of society’s goods. A key theme of Gayatri Spivak's work is agency: the ability of the individual to make their own decisions. While Spivak's main aim is to consider ways in which subalterns – her term for the indigenous dispossessed in colonial societies – were able to achieve agency this paper concentrates specifically on describing the ways in which western scholars inadvertently reproduce hegemonic structures in their work. Spivak is herself a scholar and she remains acutely aware of the difficulty and dangers of presuming to speak for the subalterns she writes about. As such her work can be seen as predominantly a delicate exercise in the critical thinking skill of interpretation; she looks in detail at issues of meaning specifically at the real meaning of the available evidence and her paper is an attempt not only to highlight problems of definition but to clarify them. What makes this one of the key works of interpretation in the Macat library is of course the underlying significance of this work. Interpretation in this case is a matter of the difference between allowing subalterns to speak for themselves and of imposing a mode of speaking on them that – however well-intentioned – can be as damaging in the postcolonial world as the agency-stifling political structures of the colonial world itself. By clearing away the detritus of scholarly attempts at interpretation Spivak takes a stand against a specifically intellectual form of oppression and marginalization. | An Analysis of Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak's Can the Subaltern Speak?

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An Analysis of Walter Benjamin's The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction

An Analysis of Timothy Snyder's Bloodlands Europe Between Hitler and Stalin

An Analysis of Franz Boas's Race Language and Culture

An Analysis of Leon Festinger's A Theory of Cognitive Dissonance

An Analysis of Leon Festinger's A Theory of Cognitive Dissonance

Leon Festinger’s 1957 A Theory of Cognitive Dissonance is a key text in the history of psychology – one that made its author one of the most influential social psychologists of his time. It is also a prime example of how creative thinking and problem solving skills can come together to produce work that changes the way people look at questions for good. Strong creative thinkers are able to look at things from a new perspective often to the point of challenging the very frames in which those around them see things. Festinger was such a creative thinker leading what came to be known as the “cognitive revolution” in social psychology. When Festinger was carrying out his research the dominant school of thought – behaviorism – focused on outward behaviors and their effects. Festinger however turned his attention elsewhere looking at “cognition:” the mental processes behind behaviors. In the case of “cognitive dissonance” for example he hypothesized that apparently incomprehensible or illogical behaviors might be caused by a cognitive drive away from dissonance or internal contradiction. This perspective however raised a problem: how to examine and test out cognitive processes. Festinger’s book records the results of the psychological experiments he designed to solve that problem. The results helped prove the existence for what is now a fundamental theory in social psychology. | An Analysis of Leon Festinger's A Theory of Cognitive Dissonance

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An Analysis of Ha-Joon Chang's Kicking Away the Ladder Development Strategy in Historical Perspective

An Analysis of Ha-Joon Chang's Kicking Away the Ladder Development Strategy in Historical Perspective

South Korean economist Ha-Joon Chang used his 2003 work Kicking Away The Ladder to challenge the central orthodoxies of development economics using his creative thinking skills to shine new light on an old topic. Creative thinkers are often distinguished by their willingness to challenge received ideas and this is a central aspect of Chang’s work on development. Before Chang the received wisdom was that developing countries needed the same kinds of economic policies and institutions as developed countries in order to enjoy the same prosperity. But as Chang pointed out the historical evidence showed that First World economic success was in fact due to exactly the kinds of state intervention that modern development orthodoxy shuns. Western affluence is the product of precisely the kinds of state control – of protectionism and the setting of price tariffs – that developed countries have since denied the developing world in the name of economic freedom and ‘best practice. ’ By insisting that Third World nations should adopt these economic policies themselves argued Chang the West is actually stifling Third World economic prospects – kicking away the ladder. His carefully reasoned argument for a novel point of view was closely based on the critical thinking skill of producing novel explanations for existing evidence and led many to question development orthodoxies – sparking a rethink of modern development strategies for less-developed countries. | An Analysis of Ha-Joon Chang's Kicking Away the Ladder Development Strategy in Historical Perspective

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An Analysis of Daniel Jonah Goldhagen's Hitler's Willing Executioners Ordinary Germans and the Holocaust

An Analysis of Burton G. Malkiel's A Random Walk Down Wall Street

An Analysis of Burton G. Malkiel's A Random Walk Down Wall Street

Burton Malkiel’s 1973 A Random Walk Down Wall Street was an explosive contribution to debates about how to reap a good return on investing in stocks and shares. Reissued and updated many times since Malkiel’s text remains an indispensable contribution to the world of investment strategy – one that continues to cause controversy among investment professionals today. At the book’s heart lies a simple question of evaluation: just how successful are investment experts? The financial world was and is full of people who claim to have the knowledge and expertise to outperform the markets and produce larger gains for investors as a result of their knowledge. But how successful Malkiel asked are they really? Via careful evaluations of performance – looking at those who invested via ‘technical analysis’ and ‘fundamental analysis’ – he was able to challenge the adequacy of many of the claims made for analysts’ success. Malkiel found the major active investment strategies to be significantly flawed. Where actively managed funds posted big gains one year they seemingly inevitably posted below average gains in succeeding years. By evaluating the figures over the medium and long term indeed Malkiel discovered that actively-managed funds did far worse on average than those that passively followed the general market index. Though many investment professionals still argue against Malkiel’s influential findings his exploration of the strengths and weaknesses of the argument for believing investors’ claims provides strong evidence that his own passive strategy wins out overall. | An Analysis of Burton G. Malkiel's A Random Walk Down Wall Street

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