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Despite unprecedentedly high prices of natural resources such as oil and gas on the global market, resource-rich countries are home to over 60# of the world's poorest people. This book discusses the counterintuitive phenomenon known as the "resource curse" and how mineral wealth can impoverish countries.

Seven studies addressing major issues such as the human rights and human security nexus, gender aspects of human security, ethical and environmental challenges, human security as a basic element for a policy framework, the human security agenda developed by the Human Security Network, and debates on human security within the United Nations.

Interdisciplinary and international in scope, this volume forms the foundations for a Durkheimian sociology of violence, exploring the political anthropology of war, the rapport between power and the sacred, and various forms of contemporary irrationalism ranging from mass-mediated suicide to torture at Abu Ghraib.