Two themes in general run through this book: conflict – both good and bad – and the way that our thinking is still configured by Empire. We are trapped in imperialistic mind sets, not simply the ‘old’ imperialism of Western colonialism but managerial globalism with its distaste for the local and contextual and its celebration of business-style organisation, and ‘results’. We desperately need new ideas and new vision that will carry us beyond these sad relics of modernity, and it would be nice to think that these essays might provide something new. I am not sure that they go that far, but they do ask some important questions. If they get people talking they will have served their purpose.