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Book Cover
E-book
Author De Waal, Alex

Title Mass Starvation : the History and Future of Famine
Published Newark : Polity Press, 2017

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Description 1 online resource (264 pages)
Summary The world almost conquered famine. Until the 1980s, this scourge killed ten million people every decade, but by early 2000s mass starvation had all but disappeared. Today, famines are resurgent, driven by war, blockade, hostility to humanitarian principles and a volatile global economy. In Mass Starvation, world-renowned expert on humanitarian crisis and response Alex de Waal provides an authoritative history of modern famines: their causes, dimensions and why they ended. He analyses starvation as a crime, and breaks new ground in examining forced starvation as an instrument of genocide and war. Refuting the enduring but erroneous view that attributes famine to overpopulation and natural disaster, he shows how political decision or political failing is an essential element in every famine, while the spread of democracy and human rights, and the ending of wars, were major factors in the near-ending of this devastating phenomenon. Hard-hitting and deeply informed, Mass Starvation explains why man-made famine and the political decisions that could end it for good must once again become a top priority for the international community
Notes Print version record
Subject Famines -- History
Food supply -- History
Social policy.
public policy.
POLITICAL SCIENCE -- Globalization.
Famines
Food supply
Social policy
Genre/Form History
Form Electronic book
ISBN 9781509524709
1509524703