The Perils of Global Transparency: Why the Information Revolution May Not Lead to Security, Democracy, or Peace. By Kristin M. Lord. Albany: SUNY Press, 2006. $65.00 cloth, $21.95 paper.

Kristin M. Lord's book title sums up her provocative and thought-provoking main arguments. The conventional wisdom is that transparency usually reduces unwarranted fears and worst-case assumptions, and reduces corruption in government and business. Transparency can thereby calm arms races, prevent wars, and promote understanding, democracy, wealth generation, and justice. Lord's clearly written book is the single most pointed attack on these widely held views. This is its major contribution, and it builds on her work with Bernard I. Finel with whom she coedited Power and Conflict in the Age of Transparency (2002). (See also James Marquardt, “Why Transparency in International Relations is not What it Appears to Be,” Ph.D. diss.,University of Chicago, 1998.)

Peaceful Resistance. Advancing Human Rights and Democratic Freedoms. By Robert M. Press. Aldershot, UK: Ashgate Publishing, 2006. 227p. $99.50.

The New Transnational Activism. By Sidney Tarrow. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005. 258p. $55 cloth, $19.99 paper.

Two new books argue that recent claims asserting the power of transnational activism have overstated the influence of those external forces. Robert Press uses the case of Kenya to show that a domestic culture of resistance, not donor pressure or transnational activism, set the nation on a path toward democratization during the late 1980s and 1990s. Sidney Tarrow takes a more subtle approach by reminding us how exceedingly difficult it is to create and maintain transnational coalitions for social change in the first place. Whereas Press pits domestic against international factors, Tarrow incorporates both, theorizing a set of transnational processes to elaborate the opportunities and challenges of organizing for social and political change across borders.

Politicizing the International Criminal Court: The Convergence of Politics, Ethics, and Law. By Steven C. Roach. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2006. 213p. $75.00 cloth, $26.95 paper.

No political scientist predicted that the world would witness the establishment of an International Criminal Court (ICC) by 2002, and as of yet, there are few compelling explanations for this phenomenon. Steven Roach addresses the next set of questions that the ICC raises for political scientists, namely, how it will impact international political outcomes, and how it will be forced to cope with pressures from states and other actors. Roach's work is an important first step toward a political understanding of the role of the ICC in world politics and demonstrates political scientists' growing interest in international law.

Unifying China, Integrating with the World: Securing Chinese Sovereignty in the Reform Era. By Allen Carlson. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2005. 320p. $55.00.

This is one of the first major works examining Chinese sovereignty in the post-Mao era. Unlike earlier works that have examined sovereignty through its manifestation in one or two policy areas—such as Taiwan, human rights, or economic integration—Allen Carlson's synthesizes Chinese behavior and rhetoric over a range of issue areas, from Taiwanese independence to World Trade Organization accession.

Predators and Parasites: Persistent Agents of Transnational Harm and Great Power Authority. By Oded Löwenheim. Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press, 2007. 280p. $70.00 cloth, $24.95 paper.

At a time when tangible success in the global war on terror seems increasingly elusive, and critics question not only its direct costs (both economic and in human lives) but also the indirect costs of resources diverted from other important concerns, Oded Löwenheim provides a timely explanation of the single-minded U.S. focus on Al Qaeda at the expense of other (and some would argue) equally if not more destructive actors in international society. The author argues that Al Qaeda, and terrorist groups in general, can be viewed as one among many subnational actors he designates as PATHs, “persistent agents of transnational harm,” and as such, they are usefully understood in terms of their impact (perceived or otherwise) on Great Power authority.

Globalization from Below: Transnational Activists and Protest Networks. By Donatella della Porta, Massimiliano Andretta, Lorenzo Mosca, and Herbert Reiter. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2006. 300p. $75.00 cloth, $25.00 paper.

It Was Like a Fever: Storytelling in Protest and Politics. By Francesca Polletta. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2006. 242p. $45.00 cloth, $19.00 paper.

While different in scope and intent, both books offer a refreshing and uplifting sense of the capacity and willingness of people to protest conditions in society, or the world, which they deem unjust. The authors may not have set out to highlight idealism in political activism, but they ended up doing so.

Territory, Authority, Rights: From Medieval to Global Assemblages. By Saskia Sassen. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2006. 502p. $35.00.

The globalization literature has now reached a level of maturity that allows one to distinguish between different schools of thought. Whereas the first two stages broadly dealt with the process at large (its development and manifestation), the latest generation of scholarship seems mostly concerned with its current and future governance. Saskia Sassen's latest contribution to this dialogue is similar to Andrew Drainville's recent volume (Contesting Globalization, 2004) for which she wrote the introduction. Both defend the need to situate the globalization discourse in concrete locations to gain a fuller understanding of it. More specifically, in Territory, Authority, Rights: From Medieval to Global Assemblages, Sassen presents an extensively developed criticism of the globalization literature. Sassen argues that both critics and proponents of the globalization concept in its latest iteration miss crucial developments of the transformative processes captured by the term “globalization” in their focus on established actors and institutional forms. She argues for the need to situate globalization more concretely and broadly, in terms of both space and place (i.e., territory), and for the establishment of new organizing logics, which manifest themselves in new combinations of authority and rights. Even though Sassen builds on her previous scholarship, this is a novel work—and a most welcome and important contribution to this field, as she not only points out the shortcomings of existing approaches, but provides a well-theorized proposition on how to remedy them.

The Limits of Culture: Islam and Foreign Policy. Edited by Brenda Shaffer. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 2006. 360p. $50.00 cloth, $25.00 paper.

This edited volume addresses a question of great interest to scholars working at the intersection of international and comparative politics: What influence does culture exert over a state's foreign policy? In seeking to provide answers, the book focuses on the foreign policies of the states of the greater Caspian region during the first decade after the dissolution of the Soviet Union.

Unanswered Threats: Political Constraints on the Balance of Power. By Randall L. Schweller. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2006. 200p. $29.95.

In this insightful and elegantly written book, Randall Schweller examines the phenomenon of underbalancing, which he defines as situations in which “threatened countries have failed to recognize a clear and present danger, or, more typically, have simply not reacted to it or, more typically still, have responded in paltry and imprudent ways” (p. 1). The study is motivated by the failure of many states throughout history to act in accordance with the cardinal prediction of structural realist theory that states will tend to balance against rising powers that threaten their survival, through the acquisition of arms and/or allies. Schweller argues that domestic political factors account for this discrepancy, enhancing or diminishing the ability and/or willingness of states to mobilize their national resources in response to systemic dangers.

In the Space of Theory: Postfoundational Geographies of the Nation-State. By Matthew Sparke. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2005. 395p. $78.00 cloth, $26.00, paper.

The historic intertwining of things political, military, and geographical are tight and many. To take but one example, the term “region” comes from the Latin regere—to rule. Historically, geographers have been among the key knowledge producers for and analysts of politics. When geographers largely dropped out of political sight during the Cold War, it was an historical anomaly. With the upsurge in critical geopolitics, they are back with a vengeance.

Making War and Building Peace. By Michael W. Doyle and Nicholas Sambanis. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2006. 400p. $24.95.

Sustainable Peace: Power and Democracy after Civil Wars. Edited by Philip G. Roeder and Donald Rothchild. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2005. 392p. $55.00 cloth, $19.95 paper.

The two books discussed in this review address the same substantive question: How does one establish sustainable peace after civil war? However, their approaches are quite different. The Roeder and Rothchild edited volume focuses on one aspect of establishing postwar peace—the post–civil war political institutions of the country. Doyle and Sambanis focus on the role of the United Nations in helping to establish sustainable postwar peace. I will first address the edited volume and then turn to the Doyle and Sambanis book before offering a few concluding remarks.

Deterring America: Rogue States and the Proliferation of Weapons of Mass Destruction. By Derek D. Smith. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2006. 197p. $75.00 cloth, $24.99 paper.

By the early 1990s, scholars and policymakers alike began voicing reservations about the ability of deterrence strategies to counter nuclear, chemical and biological arsenals as these weapons proliferated into the hands of state and nonstate actors. Some observers doubted if it was technically feasible to create credible deterrent commitments given the possibility that there might be no significant targets in the opposing camp to hold at risk, that potential opponents were irrational or suicidal, or that it might be impossible to identify the culprits who launched the attack itself (e.g., the origins of an epidemic might never be identified). Others doubted the strategic wisdom of relying on deterrence, given that the costs of policy failure were potentially catastrophic. And, as the September 11 terrorist attacks demonstrated, overwhelming military superiority cannot deter or defend against terrorist cells that are willing to sacrifice themselves to achieve their objectives. Because of the inherent limitations of deterrence, many suggested that preventive war and preemption were the best way to deal with rogue states and terrorist organizations that were acquiring weapons of mass destruction.

Reluctant Crusaders: Power, Culture, and Change in American Grand Strategy. By Colin Dueck. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2006. 236p. $29.95.

The six years since the 9/11 terrorist attacks on New York and Washington have seen a proliferation of books on the limits of U.S. primacy, the origins of the Bush doctrine, and the future of U.S. grand strategy. The conventional wisdom is that the George W. Bush administration's grand strategy—chiefly its unilateralism, its hubris, its open embrace of “preemption” (more accurately preventive war) as means to prevent states and terrorists from acquiring weapons of mass destruction, its pursuit of democratization in the Middle East as a cure-all for jihadist terrorism, and its refusal to plan for or devote sufficient resources to the postwar reconstruction of Iraq in 2003–4—represent a radical break with the grand strategies of previous administrations.

Painful Choices: A Theory of Foreign Policy Change. By David A. Welch. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2005. 312p. $35.00.

In this book, David A. Welch delivers a nuanced and parsimonious theory of foreign policymaking and policy change. Welch also addresses a perennial concern in international relations, namely whether the search for a general IR theory is futile. His answer, and a persuasive one at that, is that such a search can be fruitful if we ask the right questions.

The Samaritan's Dilemma: The Political Economy of Development Aid. By Clark C. Gibson, Krister Andersson, Elinor Ostrom, and Sujai Shivakumar. New York: Oxford University Press, 2005. 288p. $99.00 cloth, $35.00 paper.

The authors of this book start from the premise that there is something “wrong with development aid” (p. 3). They point to a number of studies that were conducted in the 1990s and found little consonance between foreign aid levels and changes in macrolevel indicators like economic growth and poverty reduction in recipient developing countries. Their aim is to explore the “perverse incentives” within the current aid system that militate against aid's success.

The Ideological Origins of Great Power Politics, 1789–1989. By Mark L. Haas. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2005. 250p. $39.95.

Realists argue that state behavior is predicated on the distribution of power in the international system. Specifically, states attempt to acquire, maintain, exercise, and balance power in response to the same behavior expected of other states in the system. In this book, Mark L. Haas offers a compelling argument for thinking beyond power variables and considering the independent effects of ideology on leaders' foreign policy decisions. The main thrust of his thesis is that the greater the ideological distance between decision makers of different states, the greater the likelihood that they will view each other as threats to domestic power and international security. Conversely, the greater the ideological affinity between states' leaders, the greater the likelihood that they will see each other as mutually supportive of one another's interests and, therefore, as less threatening. Decision makers' conflictual or accommodative foreign policies, then, are a function of threat perception caused by ideological distance. The book begins with the explication of the theoretical argument and then applies the theory to five different historical case studies. Haas concludes with policy implications and prescriptions for current and future international politics generally, and U.S. foreign policy specifically.

Keepers of the Flame: Understanding Amnesty International. By Stephen Hopgood. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2006. 249p. $49.95 cloth, $19.95 paper.

As human rights promotion gradually comes to rival development and democratization in the Western policy pantheon, more human rights–related books appear each year. Only a minority of these are empirically and methodologically rigorous, however, and even fewer are theoretically adventurous. Stephen Hopgood's unique study of Amnesty International is thus a welcome contribution from a political scientist with anthropological instincts, and it is likely to become a classic in the field. Hopgood immersed himself for over a year in Amnesty's culture, rituals, and politics, and then interpreted this data with insights from Emile Durkheim and Pierre Bourdieu. He writes clearly and well, and his interpretations should appeal to students of transnational organizing, human rights, and international affairs, broadly conceived.

Capitalism, Democracy and Welfare. By Torben Iversen. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005. 226p. $29.99.

Inequality and Prosperity: Social Europe vs. Liberal America. By Jonas Pontusson. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2005. 242p. $19.95.

Can policymakers reconcile the dual objectives of economic development and social justice? Are equity and sustained growth in an inherent conflict? How does the welfare system fit in a capitalist market economy? Jonus Pontusson and Torben Iversen provide two perspectives on these basic policy and political debates in interesting, well done, and quite complementary studies of comparative capitalism.

States, Scarcity, and Civil Strife in the Developing World. By Colin H. Kahl. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2006. 354p. $35.00.

Environmental issues have only recently attracted more attention in social science's reasoning about the causation of war. Even though many scholars would probably agree with the assertion that environmental degradation and demographic pressure play a role in the causal nexus of many civil wars, the question of how this relation could be conceptualized has remained open for a long time. It is the aim of Colin Kahl's book to tackle this issue not by a mere theoretical and conceptual discussion but by using two intensely studied cases as material to construct such a conceptualization and to render it empirically applicable and plausible.

The Peace of Illusions: American Grand Strategy from 1940 to the Present. By Christopher Layne. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2006. 290p. $29.95.

For over a decade, through a series of influential articles, Christopher Layne has been the leading advocate within the academy of an entirely new and much more detached foreign policy strategy for the United States, one based upon what he calls “offshore balancing.” In The Peace of Illusions, Layne puts his argument in book form, addressing conceptual as well as historical and policy issues.