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In The Political Economy of Regional Peacemaking, scholars examine the efficacy of trade agreements, economic sanctions, and other strategies of economic statecraft for the promotion of peace both between rival states and across conflict-ridden regions more generally. In the introduction, Steven E. Lobell and Norrin M. Ripsman pose five central questions: (1) What types of economic statecraft, including incentives and sanctions, can interested parties employ? (2) Who are the appropriate targets in the rival states—state leaders, economic and social elites, or society as whole? (3) When should specific economic instruments be used to promote peace—prior to negotiations, during negotiations, after signature of the treaty, or during implementation of the treaty? (4) What are the limits and risks of economic statecraft and economic interdependence? (5) How can economic statecraft be used to move from a bilateral peace agreement to regional peace? The chapters that follow are grouped in three sections, corresponding to the three stages of peacemaking: reduction or management of regional conflict; peacemaking or progress toward a peace treaty; and maintenance of bilateral peace and the regionalization of the peace settlement. In each chapter, the contributors consider the five key questions from a variety of methodological, historical, cultural, and empirical perspectives, drawing data from the Pacific, the Middle East, Europe, Asia, and Latin America. The conclusion expands on several themes found in the chapters and proposes an agenda for future research.

'A very important and long-awaited major contribution to the debate... Her work cannot be ignored.'--Nils Petter Gleditsch, Journal of Peace Research'Barbieri builds on a solid foundation of work on trade and conflict and specifies the conditions under which trade reduces and increases conflict.... The bottom line is that this is an important book in the study of trade and conflict because of its comprehensive approach.'--Kathy L. Powers, Perspectives on Politics'Barbieri's analysis reveals the fundamental and intellectual weaknesses of the various arguments on this topic. [A] solid and timely contribution to the literature'--Choice The Liberal Illusion sheds light on an increasingly important question in international relations scholarship and the domain of policy making-whether international trade promotes peace. By examining a broad range of theories about trade's impact on interstate relations and undertaking a set of empirical analyses of the trade-conflict puzzle, Katherine Barbieri provides a comprehensive assessment of the liberal view that trade promotes peace. Barbieri's stunning conclusions depart from conventional wisdom in international relations. Consequently, The Liberal Illusion serves as an important counterargument and a warning call to policymakers who rely upon trade-based strategies to promote peace, strategies that appear to offer little hope of achieving their goals.

The Challenge of Hegemony explains how international forces subtly influence foreign, economic, and security policies of declining world powers. Using detail-rich case studies, this sweeping study integrates domestic and systemic policy to explain these countries'grand strategies. The book concludes with a discussion of the implications for the future of American foreign policy.'His conceptually rigorous and tightly reasoned study... reminds us that power is never value neutral but organizes commercial systems in liberal or imperial terms.'---Perspectives on Politics'Lobell's book is tightly written, nicely argued and thoroughly researched to a fault. He seems to delight in historical detail. The complexity of his approach is refreshing.'---International Affairs'The Challenge of Hegemony is a pleasure to read. It is both theoretically sophisticated and empirically rich.'---International Studies Review'The Challenge of Hegemony offers a compelling reinterpretation of key historical cases and provides wise guidance as to how the United States should wield its power today.'--Charles A. Kupchan, Council on Foreign Relations'Lobell demonstrates clearly how the international environment confronting great powers interacts with their domestic political coalitions to produce different grand strategies. Through a masterful sweep of history, Lobell shows us the alternative trajectories before the United States today.'--David A. Lake, University of California, San Diego

No study of international relations is complete without consideration of foreign policy processes and an understanding of state security, conflict in global politics, and the relationship between the world economy and international behavior. Conflict, Security, Foreign Policy, and International Political Economy: Past Paths and Future Directions in International Studies consists of twelve original essays that point out the strengths and weaknesses of current approaches in these research areas as well as suggest agendas for future research. See table of contents and excerpts. Frank P. Harvey is Professor of Political Science and Director of the Centre for Foreign Policy Studies at Dalhousie University. Michael Brecher is the R.B. Angus Professor of Political Science at McGill University and past president of the International Studies Association. Millennial Reflections on International Studies This volume is part of the Millennial Reflections on International Studies project in which forty-five prominent scholars engage in self-critical, state-of-the-art reflection on international studies to stimulate debates about successes and failures and to address the larger questions of progress in the discipline. Other paperbacks from this project: Realism and Institutionalism in International Studies Evaluating Methodology Critical Perspectives in International Studies The full collection of essays is available in the handbook Millennial Reflections on International Studies.

Leadership has long been an important subject in the study of international economic relations. Many scholars give American leadership credit for strong economic growth in western Europe and Japan after World War II. Other scholars have accused leading nations of using their power to the detriment of foreign countries. For example, it is often argued that a failure of both British and American leadership was a cause of the Great Depression of the 1930s. In Leading Questions, Robert Pahre develops a series of formal models to determine under what conditions leadership will be beneficial or harmful for the international political economy. He begins with a simple model of collective action and then adds leadership, security concerns, cooperation, and multilateral regimes to this basic model. He tests each model against a different historical period between 1815 and 1967. Pahre's findings challenge conventional wisdom on international leadership. He finds that a leading state harms others when it has many allies but is good for the international political economy when it lacks allies. Leaders are less likely to engage in international cooperation than are other states, but having a leader in the system makes cooperation among follower states more likely. Cooperation by others may cause the leader to join a system of multilateral cooperation. Pahre presents the technical material in an accessible style. By challenging the conventional interpretations of political economy in several historical periods, Leading Questions will be of interest not only to political scientists but also to economists and historians. Robert Pahre is Associate Professor of Political Science, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.