October 13, 2004

MINNEAPOLIS - A creative meditation on politics, engagement, and spirituality, Sharon Welch's latest work, After Empire: The Art and Ethos of Enduring Peace, connects the personal to the political and the ethical to the historical stream in which we all live.

At a time when many progressives feel disoriented and powerless, trapped in a narrative of unbridled assertion of U.S. power, Welch looks into the positive side of the American story, the struggles of peoples to act in concert for inclusive democracy, and hard-earned insights into civic and religious life. She finds the elements of a deep, vital, and hopeful spirituality there. Through chapters on virtuosity, ceremony, audacity, laughter, and risk, she recasts the shape and rationale of personal and political engagement with insights from Native American philosophy, social-contract theory, engaged Buddhism, and the new interreligious commitment to peace.

"This is a fascinating treatment of the challenge of empire by a major religious humanist. Welch combines brilliant analysis, erudite scholarship, and a mature vision of hope in this indispensable book." -Cornel West, Professor of Religion and African American Studies, Princeton University. Author of Democracy Matters: Winning the Fight against Imperialism.

For those who seek a way to affirm and embody a positive ethic in a time of conflict, war, and division, Welch offers this workbook for new human community. "Sharon Welch has thought longer and harder than almost any ethicist about the vital question for activists today: what can keep people working for social change for the long haul, even when no definitive solution is in sight? In After Empire, she answers with a call to audacious risk-taking that combines equal parts anger, compassion, and laughter. Drawing creatively on Native American, Buddhist, and Western tradition, Welch has written a smart, innovative, and persuasive book about not just why, but how, to work for an enduring, peaceable world." -Anna Peterson, Professor, Department of Religion, University of Florida. Author of Martyrdom and the Politics of Religion.

"After Empire is indispensable for anyone seeking justice as related to religion, faith, or spirit. Welch's visionary book unmasks the deception and destruction of imperial and religious logics and then points readers toward new paths of resistance, creativity and artful risk. A most welcome vision of Pax Humana while so many others today settle for a brutal Pax Americana." -Mark Lewis Taylor, Maxwell M. Upson Professor of Theology and Culture, Princeton Theological Seminary. Author of The Executed God: The Way of the Cross in Lockdown America.

Sharon D. Welch is Professor of Religious and Women's Studies at the University of Missouri. She is author also of Communities of Resistance and Solidarity (1985), Sweet Dreams in America: The Ethical Challenge of Multiculturalism (1998), and A Feminist Ethic of Risk (2nd ed. 2000).

Format: Paperback 256 pages 5.5 x 8.5 inches Item No: 0800629868 Price: $18.00

To order After Empire please call Fortress Press at 1-800-328-4648 or visit the web site at http://www.fortresspress.com/.

Fortress Press