Twenty years ago I worked on an advisory report on the effectiveness of various tobacco control policy measures, commissioned by the Dutch Ministry of Health1 as part of the process of presenting a revised Tobacco Act to the parliament (Willemsen, De Zwart, & Mooy, 1998). Soon after the report was finished I attended the World Conference on Tobacco or Health in Beijing, where I spoke with a civil servant from the Dutch Ministry of Health. I asked him what would happen with the report and was shocked when he told me that many of the conclusions were “not politically feasible” and could not be taken up. This was the first time that I was confronted with the concept of “political feasibility.” In hindsight, this was rather naïve of me, but students and researchers who invest time and effort in understanding better ways of helping people to overcome tobacco addiction sooner or later come to realize that the tobacco problem has political roots. To do something about it on a societal level, one has to acknowledge what many people would describe as “nasty” politics. Many scientists shy away from this, just as I did then, because they believe that science is independent and politics-free or because they are intimidated by what they perceive as complexity, unpredictability, and irrationality in politics for which they are not prepared, being used to working from within an evidence-based science paradigm. A more effective strategy to address the tobacco problem on a societal level is to try to understand the policy process and why this process at times appears so irrational. Since my professorship in tobacco control research, journalists, scientific colleagues from other countries, and students have asked me the same question: why is the Dutch government not doing more to control tobacco? This book is my attempt to formulate an answer. As an introductory text to the field, it seeks to provide an understanding of the full complexities of tobacco control policy. It further aims to offer a broad framework for thinking about tobacco control policymaking. Many of the understandings in the book can be applied to other public health areas, and lessons drawn from the analysis of the Dutch case may be of interest to other countries, particularly those with similar multi-party parliamentary democracies.

This book takes a taxpayer's perspective to the relations taxation creates between people and their state. Larsen proposes that in order to understand tax compliance and cheating, we have to look beyond law, psychological experiments and surveys to include tax collectors and taxpayers' practices. The text explores the view of taxes seen as citizen’s explicit economic relation to the state and implicit economic relation to all other compatriots. Larsen suggests how to build and increase tax compliance if we take the idea of taxation creating reciprocal relations seriously. The empirical cases are based on ethnography from two opposing tax practices in Sweden. Firstly, from a study of analysts, auditors, legal experts and managers at the Swedish Tax Agency and how they, quite successfully, strive for legitimacy in their tax collecting activities in society. Secondly, from fieldwork among a group of middle-aged Swedes and how they justify their tax-cheating when purchasing work off the books. Sweden is a modern society seen as particularly rational and the least prone to worry about survival issues; they trust their government and fellow citizens. Sweden is therefore an important country to look at as an example of tax compliance and whether other countries showing a continuous inclination towards these values will follow their lead.

This book delves into the widely held belief that the 21st century will be the "Asian Century" by examining the Asia's rapid economic development in the post-war era and the challenges it faces in forging ahead of world leaders in the West. The impact of the current turbulent global political climate on Asia is critically analyzed, employing a holistic and multidisciplinary approach, combining economic, social, political and geopolitical perspectives. Written in an accessible style, the book offers students, business, government, and civil society players powerful insights on Asia.

This book defines the new field of "Bioeconomy" as the sustainable and innovative use of biomass and biological knowledge to provide food, feed, industrial products, bioenergy and ecological services. The chapters highlight the importance of bioeconomy-related concepts in public, scientific, and political discourse. Using an interdisciplinary approach, the authors outline the dimensions of the bioeconomy as a means of achieving sustainability. The authors are ideally situated to elaborate on the diverse aspects of the bioeconomy. They have acquired in-depth experience of interdisciplinary research through the university’s focus on “Bioeconomy”, its contribution to the Bioeconomy Research Program of the federal state of Baden-Württemberg, and its participation in the German Bioeconomy Council. With the number of bioeconomy-related projects at European universities rising, this book will provide graduate students and researchers with background information on the bioeconomy. It will familiarize scientific readers with bioeconomy-related terms and give scientific background for economists, agronomists and natural scientists alike.