This chapter documents the complex relationship between the papacy and liberation theology. Prior to the explicit emergence of liberation theology, the papacies of Pius XII and John XXIII provided important institutional and theological conditions in which liberation developed and became influential. A relative harmony existed during the ministry of Paul VI, as liberation theologians often took positions influenced theologically by Vatican II and politically by Paul VI’s attention to global poverty and hopes for the underdeveloped world. This tenor changed dramatically under John Paul II and Benedict XVI. Their experiences of communism and reaction to perceived excesses in the implementation of Vatican II translated into great tensions between the Vatican and liberation theologians. The papacy of Francis signals that these tensions have passed, as his priorities align more closely to the work of liberation theologians with important implications for Church governance and in relation to pressing global issues.

This case study presents innovative work by a Chinese state-owned enterprise (SOE) to use corporate social responsibility (CSR) as a key component of its business strategy in Kenya. AVIC International’s (“AVIC INTL’s”) core business is exporting Chinese machinery and vocational training to enhance the use of equipment in host countries and to build local training capacity. Through active learning with stakeholders in Kenya, AVIC INTL has developed the “Africa Tech Challenge” to host training and competitions for candidates from Kenya. This project, first initiated in 2014, later became a signature CSR project for the company, one which was repeated annually and received Chinese government awards for companies’ overseas brand-building. This case study shows how CSR can be an effective business strategy for Chinese SOEs operating in African states. Chinese SOEs have started to use CSR projects to gain market access, build a positive image, and cultivate ties with host country politicians, industry, and civil society. The study also demonstrates how Chinese SOEs, over the course of overseas operations, have experienced a steep learning curve in host countries and how, despite structural asymmetry vis-à-vis China, African actors can actively shape the behavior of Chinese SOEs that are financially powerful and technically strong.

Anaesthetists working in paediatric settings may care for patients ranging in age from preterm neonates to teenagers, some of whom will be undergoing relatively simple procedures for isolated conditions whereas others will have extremely complex needs and will be undergoing complicated, high-risk procedures. What all of these patients will have in common, however, is the need for developmentally appropriate communication from and with the professionals caring for them. Alongside an understanding and knowledge of the anatomical, physiological and pharmacological issues relevant to the care of the paediatric patient, anaesthetists also need an understanding of the developmental, communication, emotional and behavioural issues relevant to their paediatric patient. This chapter summarises some of the key theories of cognitive and psychosocial development, including beliefs about illness, and how these are relevant to the child undergoing anaesthesia. Effective communication with children and their families is central to the delivery of high-quality care, and this is discussed alongside the role of preparation and behavioural and psychological techniques in optimising experiences and outcomes for the child, family and anaesthetist.

Over a century and a half, expos have been used by the Japanese state, local authorities, and private companies, not to prescribe meaning, but to aggregate interest – to accommodate the multiple demands of organizers, exhibitors, and visitors – and thereby to foster development. After three decades of economic stagnation, the age of regional expos in Japan seems to have passed, though ‘expo’ (haku) remains a useful, protean term. Japan also remains a reliable participant in international exhibitions overseas, rehearsing an old story about harmony between nature and culture, first retailed in the late nineteenth century. The Japanese state also continues to use expos at home to promote its vision and plans for the future. The next world expo will open in April 2025, promulgating the United Nation’s sustainable development goals and the Japanese government’s vision of Society 5.0, while also promising Osaka’s neoliberal ‘restoration’. Meanwhile, the Japanese lesson about the utility of expos for development has been absorbed elsewhere. Shanghai in 2010 and Dubai in 2021 deployed, Riyadh in 2030 and possibly Busan in 2035 will riff on, a template first made in Japan.

The introduction starts by recounting the history of this project, from an ignorant first encounter with the traces of expos, through the enthusiastic embrace of the burgeoning academic literature on them, to a puzzling first experience of an expo in real life. It suggests that the existence of expos, and their endurance in Japan, challenges the existing literature, which either mines them to explore other phenomena, or assumes that as exemplars of modern spectacle they can serve as an effective ideological apparatus. Rather, it argues, they might help us refine our understanding of development, spectacle, and their relationship, and of modern Japan. Doing so, however, requires us to be alert to the limits of our sources, however extensive the expo archive, and to craft our accounts to reflect these.

This chapter provides an in-depth analysis and discussion of eco-tourism in Surama Village. It considers such tourism’s origins and development in the village, as well as the circumstances regarding its ongoing operations and daily processes. There is an emphasis on the ways that this tourism is described in the local discourse of villagers. The chapter examines villagers’ interactions with outsiders, such as tourists, tourism leaders, and consultants, within the context of eco-tourism and explores how eco-tourism fits into a broader discursive context of ‘development’ in the village. The chapter discusses issues concerning commodification, as well as alternative options for paid employment in the region. It begins to elucidate how villagers working in eco-tourism relate to tourists as outsiders. Throughout the chapter, there is a central focus on how eco-tourism provides a context through which outside resources (both material and immaterial) are acquired and transformations towards otherness and alterity are enabled.

This chapter examines how the acquisition of material and immaterial things from outside visitors to Surama Village is used in local projects of transformation and becoming. The chapter begins with the author’s encounter with a villager in Surama who claimed to have inadvertently started becoming ‘white’ during his work with a BBC film crew. This transformation mostly centred around changes in diet and clothing. The chapter discusses how such transformations among the Makushi occur at a broader level through changing practices and how they are often associated with ‘development’ in the present. It links Makushi interactions with tourists with bodily orientated perspectival changes and shows how transformation is seen in the desires for education, healthcare, and political representation in Surama Village. Transformation is also seen in the gradual adoption of economic individualism, wage labour, and a cash-mediated economy. The chapter focuses on the shamanic aspects (particularly perspectival shape-shifting) of such transformations.

The afterword discusses the author’s return to Surama Village in 2019–2020 and describes recent political and economic changes. The chapter further addresses the consequences following the death of the local shaman (Mogo) and the elevation of one of the early promoters of eco-tourism in Surama to national political prominence. This final chapter addresses the mixed record of ‘development’ in Surama Village and the still changing nature of the eco-tourism economy in the context of Covid-19 and political uncertainties. It also further connects the book’s themes with the Amazonian ethnological literature as part of a broader examination of Makushi practices of drawing in the outside through persons, objects, and organisations. The chapter reiterates the significance of a shamanic relational mode for contemporary Makushi interactions with certain visitors (particularly tourists) in the village and the importance of these relations to the Makushi in forming partnerships with outsiders aimed at addressing contemporary challenges.

This chapter discusses the role of Imelda Marcos in the diplomatic practice and foreign policy of the government of Ferdinand Marcos. At the outset, Imelda is cast not only as a First Lady but as a vital colleague and co-operator in running the affairs of the Philippine state from the 1960s through the 1980s, the other half of the so-called conjugal dictatorship. At one point in time, she was simultaneously governor of Metro Manila, Minister of Human Settlements, member of the Interim Parliament, and Ambassador Plenipotentiary and Extraordinary. This being said, her status as First Lady and Patroness of the Arts is not dismissed as mere tangent or appendage; it was as First Lady that Imelda became a compelling presence in the political theatre. The combination of her beauty and her charisma formed a particular aesthetic that inevitably evolved into a policy of culture and democracy so central in the formation of a post-independence nation-state in Southeast Asia.

This chapter explores the synergies, limitations, and challenges of addressing statelessness through human rights and development approaches, using the Hill Country Tamils of Sri Lanka as a case study. In addressing the legacy of statelessness, both the human rights and development frameworks must be drawn on and used simultaneously. However, a frameworks approach alone falls short in addressing statelessness, given the political, economic and societal factors that perpetuate discrimination. Instead, as the case of the Hill Country Tamils demonstrates, both human rights and development approaches must be underpinned by a deeper commitment to pursuing equality and combatting discrimination at large. Despite claims of success, the legacy of statelessness in Sri Lanka still lingers. The Hill Country Tamils are still among the ‘furthest behind’ in Sri Lanka and continue to experience severe discrimination well after securing formal citizenship. The community’s prolonged statelessness has led to long-term deterioration in human rights conditions, such that a grant of formal citizenship alone is inadequate to address structural drivers of disadvantage that the community continues to endure.