Shorts
Our Shorts are between 20-50,000 words and are available as e-books and in print with a shorter production schedule.
We publish two types of Shorts under both Bristol University Press and Policy Press:
Research: books providing the latest cutting-edge or topical research findings (longer than an article but shorter than a monograph) publishing in hardback for an international market with a lower priced eBook which allows for individual purchase;
Insights: books covering issues of wide interest and where a timely intervention is likely to attract substantial media coverage and reach a broad non-specialist audience, these accessibly-written Shorts enable authors to join the debate authoritatively and quickly and are published as low-price paperbacks and eBooks.
Policy Press also publish the following Shorts:
Policy and practice: as part of our commitment to impact and engaging with a wider audience, we also publish ‘policy and practice’ Shorts where there is support with dissemination through Open Access, organisational links, course buy-in or other direct routes to the policy and practice audience.
Written by experts in their fields, these formats provide high quality, peer reviewed content quickly and are available for both personal purchase and for libraries and institutions through the usual channels.
Download a Shorts proposal form, including detailed guidelines, here.
Detroit and new urban repertoires
Imagining the co-operative city
Using Detroit as a case study, this important book argues that cycles of neoliberal policy-led expansion and contraction created hollow shells of once vibrant industrial centres, and explores the potential for large scale cooperative networks to promote urban regeneration and sustain local economies
Enabling Participatory Planning
Planning Aid and Advocacy in Neoliberal Times
Engaging with Policy, Practice and Publics
Intersectionality and Impact
Available Open Access under CC-BY-NC licence. This book examines the increasing importance of engagement with non-academic groups and actors in the co-production of knowledge and real-world influence in academic research.
English Planning in Crisis
10 Steps to a Sustainable Future
This book is a manifesto for a new planning system in England. Reflecting on controversial new Government reforms and deregulation, the authors draw on policy and practice examples from across the UK and internationally to challenge the current English system and ignite debate about its future.
Environment in the Lives of Children and Families
Perspectives from India and the UK
Based on involved creative, qualitative work with families in India and the UK who live in different contexts, this book illuminates how environmental practices are negotiated within families, and how they relate to values, identities, and society.
Fake Goods, Real money
The Counterfeiting Business and its Financial Management
The books examines the financial and business structures of the counterfeiting business and considers how the internet and e-commerce present financial opportunities for counterfeiters. It explores ‘organised crime’ and criminal markets, digital technologies and cultural values and practices.
Female Serial Killers in Social Context
Criminological Institutionalism and the Case of Mary Ann Cotton
This book explores how institutions such as the family, economy and religion shaped the environment and social integration of 19th century serial killer Mary Ann Cotton. It will equip criminologists with a methodological toolkit for performing institutional analysis.
The Global Financial Crisis and Austerity
A Basic Introduction
Written by an expert in political science and straddling finance, economics and political science, this entry-level summary demystifies global finance and puts the financial crisis in its historical context. It also outlines the policy responses of Western governments to the crash and the ensuing recession and turn to austerity.
Good Finance
Why We Need a New Concept of Finance
Presenting a sharp critique of extreme financialization and the economics profession’s continuing blind faith in the efficient market hypothesis this book considers how our current concept of finance can be revised for the good of society.
How Inequality Runs in Families
Unfair Advantage and the Limits of Social Mobility
In the UK, as in other rich countries, the ‘playing-field’ is anything but level and the family plays a surprisingly crucial part in maintaining inequality. This book explores how seemingly mundane aspects of family life raise fundamental questions of social justice and calls for a rethink of what equality of opportunity means.
How to Build Houses and Save the Countryside
Focusing on house building and conservation politics in England, Spiers uses his considerable experience and extensive research to demonstrate why the current model doesn’t work, and why there needs to be both planning reform and a more active role for the state, including local government.
Imprisonment Worldwide
The Current Situation and an Alternative Future
Providing a comprehensive account of prison populations worldwide, this new work links prison statistics from the last 15 years with considerations of how prisons and prison populations are managed. It is a major contribution to the knowledge of those currently debating prisons and the use of imprisonment.