Foreign Affairs articles from January 2009

Foreign Affairs archives from January 2009

The great crash, 2008: a geopolitical setback for the West.(Financial Fallout)(effect of the 2008 global financial crisis on the economy of the United States, Europe and other countries)
January 1, 2009... THE FINANCIAL and economic crash of 2008, the worst in over 75 years, is a major geopolitical setback for the United States and Europe. Over the medium term, Washington and European governments will have neither the resources nor the economic...

From Doha to the next Bretton Woods: a new multilateral trade agenda.(Financial Fallout)
January 1, 2009... WHEN THE Doha Round of multilateral trade negotiations was launched, in 2001, the price of oil was $25 a barrel, a ton of rice cost $170, China's current account surplus was two percent of the country's ape, U.S. financial institutions were at...

A balanced strategy: reprogramming the Pentagon for a new age.(United States Department of Defense's National Defense Strategy)(Essay)
January 1, 2009... THE DEFINING principle of the Pentagon's new National Defense Strategy is balance. The United States cannot expect to eliminate national security risks through higher defense budgets, to do everything and buy everything. The Department of...

Beyond Iraq: a new U.S. strategy for the Middle East.(Essays)(United States foreign policy in the Middle East)(Essay)
January 1, 2009... ON TAKING office, U.S. President Barack Obama will face a series of critical, complex, and interrelated challenges in the Middle East demanding urgent attention: an Iraq experiencing a fragile lull in violence that is nonetheless straining the...

Change they can believe in: to make Israel safe, give Palestinians their due.(Essays)(the United States' role in the Middle East peace process)(Essay)
January 1, 2009... REVIVING THE Middle East peace process is the worst kind of necessary evil for a U.S. administration: at once very necessary and very evil. It is necessary because the festering dispute between the Israelis and the Palestinians in a volatile,...

The myth of the autocratic revival: why liberal democracy will prevail.(Essays)(effect of the autocratic revival in China and Russia on the foreign policies of the United States)(Essay)
January 1, 2009... AFTER TWO decades of post-Cold War liberal triumph, U.S. foreign policy is being challenged by the return of an old antiliberal vision. According to this vision, the world is not marching toward universal liberal democracy and "the end of...

America's edge: power in the networked century.(advantages of the United States' connectedness through communication networks)(Essay)
January 1, 2009... WE LIVE in a networked world. War is networked: the power of terrorists and the militaries that would defeat them depend on small, mobile groups of warriors connected to one another and to intelligence, communications, and support networks....

In the shadow of the oval office: The next national security adviser.(responsibilities of the position of United States national security advisers)(Essay)
January 1, 2009... Nowhere U.S. law is there a provision establishing the position of the assistant to the president for national security affairs. The job is the creation of presidents, and its occupants are responsible to them alone. The position gained...

The responsibility to contain: protecting sovereignty under international law.(Essay)
January 1, 2009... AS ECONOMIES, societies, and cultures have become increasingly interconnected, the traditional conception of threats to security as stemming from identifiable sources in individual countries has become antiquated. Today, many threats are...

Where are the civilians? How to rebuild the U.S. Foreign Service.(assigning of United States Foreign Service personnel to Iraq)(Essay)
January 1, 2009... WHEN THE State Department threatened to forcibly assign U.S. Foreign Service personnel to Iraq in late 2007, many diplomats read about it in the press before hearing about it from their superiors. The rank and file were irate. On October 30,...

The making of a mess: who broke global finance, and who should pay for it?(Martin Wolf's book Fixing Global Finance)
January 1, 2009... Fixing Global Finance. BY MARTIN WOLF. Johns Hopkins University Press, 2008, 230 pp. $24.95. The current financial crisis poses a fundamental challenge to globalization and to its many analysts. All are now considering what the recent...

Presumed innocent: lessons of the past for the new Middle East.(Martin Indyk's book called Innocent Abroad: An Intimate History of American Peace Diplomacy in the Middle East)
January 1, 2009... Innocent Abroad: An Intimate History of American Peace Diplomacy in the Middle East. BY MARTIN INDYK. Simon & Schuster, 2009, 528 pp. $30.00. Innocent Abroad treats the United States' Middle East policy and performance in the region during...

A broader agenda: beyond Bush-era foreign policy.(Response)(analysis and history of the foreign policies of past United States Presidents)
January 1, 2009... Decades from now, when historians are tempted to examine American opinion at the time of the United States' 2008 presidential election--which has been hyped by some as the most important in over a century--old Foreign Affairs articles are...

World Out of Balance. International Relations and the Challenge of American Primacy.(Political and Legal)(Brief article)(Book review)
January 1, 2009... World Out of Balance." International Relations and the Challenge of American Primacy. BY STEPHEN G. BROOKS AND WILLIAM C. WOHLFORTH. Princeton University Press, 2008, 226 pp. $65.00 (paper, $22.95). Even as pundits are proclaiming the end...

Appeasing Bankers: Financial Caution on the Road to War.(Political and Legal)(Brief article)(Book review)
January 1, 2009... Appeasing Bankers: Financial Caution on the Road to War. BY JONATHAN KIRSHNER. Princeton University Press, 2007, 248 pp. $65.00 (paper, $24.95). Scholars have long debated the role of bankers and businesspeople in matters of war and peace....

The Freedom Agenda: Why America Must Spread Democracy (Just Not the Way George Bush Did).(Political and Legal)(Brief article)(Book review)
January 1, 2009... The Freedom Agenda: Why America Must Spread Democracy (Just Not the Way George Bush Did). BY JAMES TRAUB. Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 2o08, 272 pp. $25.00. The Bush administration's "freedom agenda" linked U.S. national security to the spread...

Crafting Cooperation: Regional International Institutions in Comparative Perspective.(Political and Legal)(Brief article)(Book review)
January 1, 2009... Crafting Cooperation: Regional International Institutions in Comparative Perspective. EDITED BY AMITAV ACHARYA AND ALASTAIR IAIN JOHNSTON. Cambridge University Press, 2007, 330 PP- $34.99. It is often argued that regional groupings of...

The Global Commonwealth of Citizens: Toward Cosmopolitan Democracy.(Political and Legal)(Brief article)(Book review)
January 1, 2009... The Global Commonwealth of Citizens: Toward Cosmopolitan Democracy. BY DANIELE ARCHIBUGI. Princeton University Press, 2008, 320 pp. $29.95. Globalization and the human rights revolution have sparked debates about new forms of a global...

The Partnership: The Making of Goldman Sachs.(Economic, Social, and Environmental)(Brief article)(Book review)
January 1, 2009... The Partnership: The Making of Goldman Sachs. BY CHARLES D. ELLIS. Penguin Press, 2008, 752 pp. $37-95. Goldman Sachs rose from a specialized trader in commercial paper a century ago to arguably the leading investment bank in the world by...

The Politics of Global Health Governance: United by Contagion.(Economic, Social, and Environmental)(Brief article)(Book review)
January 1, 2009... The Politics of Global Health Governance: United by Contagion. BY MARK W. ZACHER AND TANIA J. KEEFE. Palgrave Macmillan, 2008, 256 PP- $79.95. The emergence and spread in recent years of Ebola, West Nile encephalitis, SARS, and avian flu...

The White House and the World: A Global Development Agenda for the Next U.S. President.(Economic, Social, and Environmental)(Brief article)(Book review)
January 1, 2009... The White House and the World: A Global Development Agenda for the Next U.S. President. EDITED BY NANCY BIRDSALL. Center for Global Development, 2008, 372 pp. $22.95. The next U.S. administration will have many high-priority issues on its...

Diasporas and Development: Exploring the Potential.(Economic, Social, and Environmental)(Brief article)(Book review)
January 1, 2009... Diasporas and Development: Exploring the Potential. EDITED BY JENNIFER M. BRINKERHOFF. Lynne Rienner, 2008, 270 pp. $57.00. Extensive emigration today produces diasporas whose members, with modern technology, can readily communicate with...

The WTO: Governance, Dispute Settlement, and Developing Countries.(Economic, Social, and Environmental)(Brief article)(Book review)
January 1, 2009... The WTO: Governance, Dispute Settlement, and Developing Countries. EDITED BY MERIT E. JANOW, VICTORIA DONALDSON, AND ALAN YANOVICH. Juris Publishing, 2008, 1,100 pp. $125.00. This capacious volume is the product of a conference at Columbia...

The War Within: A Secret White House History, 2006-2008.(Military, Scientific, and Technological)(the 2003 United States invasion of Iraq)('The Strongest Tribe: War, Politics, and the Endgame in Iraq' and 'The War Within: A Secret White House History, 2006-2008')(Book review)
January 1, 2009... The War Within: A Secret White House History, 2006-2008. BY BOB WOODWARD. Simon & Schuster, 2008, 512 pp. $32.00. The Strongest Tribe: War, Politics, and the Endgame in Iraq. BY BING WEST. Random House, 2008, 464 pp- $28.00. Tell Me...

Technology and the American Way of War Since 1945.(Military, Scientific, and Technological)(Brief article)(Book review)
January 1, 2009... Technology and the American Way of War Since 1945. BY THOMAS G. MAHNKEN. Columbia University Press, 2008, 256 pp. $29.50. Through an account of the major technological innovations in U.S. defense procurement since World War II, Mahnken...

The Atomic Bomb and the Origins of the Cold War.(Military, Scientific, and Technological)(Brief article)(Book review)
January 1, 2009... The Atomic Bomb and the Origins of the Cold War. BY CAMPBELL CRAIG AND SERGEY RADCHENKO. Yale University Press, 2008, 232 pp. $27.00. This book provides a helpful and accessible stocktaking of the position reached in the long-running...

Empires of Trust: How Rome Built--and America Is Building--a New World.(The United States)(Brief article)(Book review)
January 1, 2009... Empires of Trust: How Rome Built--and America Is Building--a New World. BY THOMAS F. MADDEN. Dutton, 2008, 352 pp. $25.95. Since the birth of the American republic, writers and commentators have been drawing foreboding analogies between the...

Religion and American Foreign Policy, 1945-1960: The Soul of Containment.(The United States)(Brief article)(Book review)
January 1, 2009... Religion and American Foreign Policy, 1945-1960: The Soul of Containment. BY WILLIAM INBODEN. Cambridge University Press, 2008, 368 pp. $80.00. The American academy has been rediscovering the importance of religion in politics and foreign...

Evangelicals and Israel: The Story of American Christian Zionism.(The United States)(Brief article)(Book review)
January 1, 2009... Evangelicals and Israel: The Story of American Christian Zionism. BY STEPHEN SPECTOR. Oxford University Press, 2008, 352 pp. $29.95. Christian Zionism and its relationship to U.S. politics and the American Jewish community have seldom...

The Rebellion of Ronald Reagan: A History of the End of the Cold War.(The United States)(Brief article)(Book review)
January 1, 2009... The Rebellion of Ronald Reagan: A History of the End of the Cold War. BY JAMES MANN. Viking, 2009, 432 pp. $27.95. Mann, one of the leading students of contemporary U.S. foreign policy, whose Rise of the Vulcans is the best study yet of the...

The Irish Americans: A History.(The United States)(Brief article)(Book review)
January 1, 2009... The Irish Americans: A History. BY JAY P. DOLAN. Bloomsbury Press, 2008, 368 pp. $30.00. It is difficult to overstate the importance of Irish Americans in U.S. history. This is not only because of the significant contributions they have...

The Closing of the American Border: Terrorism, Immigration, and Security since 9/11.(The United States)(Book review)
January 1, 2009... The Closing of the American Border: Terrorism, Immigration, and Security Since 9/11. BY EDWARD ALDEN. HarperCollins, 2008, 368 pp. $27.95. In this revealing and richly researched account, Alden describes how the Bush administration came to...

Hitler's Empire: How the Nazis Ruled Europe.(Western Europe)(Brief article)(Book review)
January 1, 2009... Hitler's Empire: How the Nazis Ruled Europe. BY MARK MAZOWER. Penguin Press, 2008, 768 pp. $39.95. The Nazis are rightly better remembered for their capacity to wage war than for their ability to consolidate peace. In this impressive work,...

Transatlantic Trends 2008.(Western Europe)(Brief article)(Book review)
January 1, 2009... Transatlantic Trends 2008. BY THE GERMAN MARSHALL FUND OF THE UNITED STATES AND THE COMPAGNIA DI SAN PAOLO. German Marshall Fund of the United States, 2008, 24 pp. Free. Every year since 2002, the German Marshall Fund of the United States...

Left in Dark Times: A Stand Against the New Barbarism.(Western Europe)(Brief article)(Book review)
January 1, 2009... Left in Dark Times: A Stand Against the New Barbarism. BY BERNARD-HENRI LEVY. Random House, 2008, 256 pp. $25.00. Levy burst onto the French intellectual scene in 1977 with the publication of Barbarism With a Human Face, a denunciation of...

The French White Paper on Defence and National Security.(Western Europe)(Brief article)(Book review)
January 1, 2009... The French White Paper on Defence and National Security. BY THE WHITE PAPER COMMISSION. Odile Jacob, 2008, 336 pp. $19.95. The third official statement of French defense policy since the founding of the Fifth Republic--and the first in 14...

Pipelines, Politics, and Power: The Future of EU-Russia Energy Relations.(Western Europe)(Brief article)(Book review)
January 1, 2009... Pipelines, Politics, and Power: The Future of EU-Russia Energy Relations. EDITED BY KATINKA BARYSCH. Center for European Reform, 2008, 115 pp. 10.00 [pounds sterling]. As energy prices rose dramatically during the early years of this...

The Dictator's Shadow: Life Under Augusto Pinochet.(Western Hemisphere)(Brief article)(Book review)
January 1, 2009... The Dictator's Shadow: Life Under Augusto Pinochet. BY HERALDO MUNOZ. Basic Books, 2008, 376 pp. $27.50. In his final heartbreaking radio broadcast, from a besieged presidential palace, Salvador Allende prophesied that "the grand avenues...

Falling Behind: Explaining the Development Gap Between Latin America and the United States.(Western Hemisphere)(Brief article)(Book review)
January 1, 2009... Falling Behind: Explaining the Development Gap Between Latin America and the United States. EDITED BY FRANCIS FUKUYAMA. Oxford University Press, 2008, 336 pp. $29.95. In today's fast-moving world, delaying publication for three...

The United States and Latin America After the Cold War.(Western Hemisphere)(Brief article)(Book review)
January 1, 2009... The United States and Latin America After the Cold War. BY RUSSELL CRANDALL. Cambridge University Press, 2008, 276 pp. $85.00 (paper, $24.99). In offering the best available textbook on contemporary U.S. policies toward Latin America,...

First Stop in the New World: Mexico City, the Capital of the Twenty-first Century.(Western Hemisphere)(Brief article)(Book review)
January 1, 2009... First Stop in the New World: Mexico City, the Capital of the Twenty-first Century. BY DAVID LIDA. Riverhead, 2008, 352 pp. $25.95. If Mexico City were located in western Europe, it would be a must-see tourist destination in the same league...

Russian Eurasianism: An Ideology of Empire.(Eastern Europe and Former Soviet Republics)(Brief article)(Book review)
January 1, 2009... Russian Eurasianism: An Ideology of Empire. BY MARLENE LARUELLE. Woodrow Wilson Center Press, 2008, 296 pp. $60.00. This book is a tour de force not merely because of the depth of the scholarship and the skill of the argument but also...

Eurasia's New Frontiers: Young States, Old Societies, Open Futures.(Eastern Europe and Former Soviet Republics)(Brief article)(Book review)
January 1, 2009... Eurasia's New Frontiers: Young States, Old Societies, Open Futures. BY THOMAS W. SIMONS, JR. Cornell University Press, 2008, 200 pp. $25.00. In this small, spare book, Simons is the first to address one of the key failings of U.S. Russia...

Blue Helmets and Black Markets: The Business of Survival in the Siege of Sarajevo.(Eastern Europe and Former Soviet Republics)(Brief article)(Book review)
January 1, 2009... Blue Helmets and Black Markets: The Business of Survival in the Siege of Sarajevo. BY PETER ANDREAS. Cornell University Press, 2008, 240 pp. $25.00. Andreas does not deny the suffering or the heroism of those caught in the...

For Kin or Country: Xenophobia, Nationalism, and War.(Eastern Europe and Former Soviet Republics)(Brief article)(Book review)
January 1, 2009... For Kin or Country: Xenophobia, Nationalism, and War. BY STEPHEN M. SAIDEMAN AND R. WILLIAM AYRES. Columbia University Press, 2008, 320 pp. $35.00. The Cold War, with its architecture of state against state, bloc against bloc, ideology...

Consumption and Social Change in a Post-Soviet Middle Class.(Eastern Europe and Former Soviet Republics)(Brief article)(Book review)
January 1, 2009... Consumption and Social Change in a Post-Soviet Middle Class. BY JENNIFER PATICO. Stanford University Press, 2008, 240 pp. $60.00 (paper, $24.95). Ethnographers use a ground-level perspective to get at social phenomena--in this case, the...

Serbia's Antibureaucratic Revolution: Milosevic, the Fall of Communism, and Nationalist Mobilization.(Eastern Europe and Former Soviet Republics)(Brief article)(Book review)
January 1, 2009... Serbia's Antibureaucratic Revolution: Milosevic, the Fall of Communism, and Nationalist Mobilization. BY NEBOJSA VLADISAVLJEVIC. Palgrave Macmillan, 2008, 240 pp. $74-95. Vladisavlievic challenges nearly every aspect of previous accounts...

King Hussein of Jordan: A Political Life.(Middle East)(Lion of Jordan: The Life of King Hussein in War and Peace)(Brief article)(Book review)
January 1, 2009... King Hussein of Jordan: A Political Life. BY NIGEL ASHTON. Yale University Press, 2008, 464 pp. $35.00. Lion of Jordan: The Life of King Hussein in War and Peace. BY AVI SHLAIM. Knopf, 2008, 752 pp. $35.00. Great-grandson of Sharif...

Descent Into Chaos: The United States and the Failure of Nation Building in Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Central Asia.(Middle East)(Brief article)(Book review)
January 1, 2009... Descent Into Chaos: The United States and the Failure of Nation Building in Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Central Asia. BY AHMED RASHID. Viking, 2008, 544 pp. $27.95. The politics and diplomacy of Afghanistan and its neighbors have long been...

The Search for Al Qaeda: Its Leadership, Ideology, and Future.(Middle East)(Brief article)(Book review)
January 1, 2009... The Search for Al Qaeda: Its Leadership, Ideology, and Future. BY BRUCE RIEDEL. Brookings Institution Press, 2008, 224 pp. $26.95. Riedel served as a point man for the Middle East on the U.S. National Security Council from 1997 to 2003, in...

Hamas in Politics: Democracy, Religion, Violence.(Middle East)(Brief article)(Book review)
January 1, 2009... Hamas in Politics: Democracy, Religion, Violence. By JEROEN GUNNING. Columbia University Press, 2008, 320 pp. $34.50. Here is a book that refreshingly avoids the pitfalls of either dismissing Hamas as a terrorist organization or presenting...

A World of Trouble: The White House and the Middle East--From the Cold War to the War on Terror.(Middle East)(Brief article)(Book review)
January 1, 2009... A World of Trouble: The White House and the Middle East--From the Cold War to the War on Terror. BY PATRICK TYLER. Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 2009, 640 pp. $27.00. The misperceptions and misdeeds of the United States in the Middle East from...

Crude Continent: The Struggle for Africa's Oil Prize.(Africa)(Poisoned Wells: The Dirty Politics of African Oil)(Book review)
January 1, 2009... Crude Continent: The Struggle for Africa's Oil Prize. BY DUNCAN CLARKE. Profile Books, 2008, 720 pp. $69.95. Poisoned Wells." The Dirty Politics of African Oil. BY NICHOLAS SHAXSON. Palgrave Macmillan, 2008, 288 pp. $26.95. Long a...

Angola: The Weight of History.(Africa)(L'Angola postcolonial: Guerre et paix sans democratisation)(Book review)
January 1, 2009... Angola: The Weight of History. EDITED BY PATRICK CHABAL AND NUNO VIDAL. Columbia University Press, 2007, 256 pp. $50.00. L'Angola postcolonial: Guerre et paix sans democratisation. By CHRISTINE MESSIANT. Karthala, 2008, 420 pp. 29.00...

The French Betrayal of Rwanda.(Africa)(Brief article)(Book review)
January 1, 2009... The French Betrayal of Rwanda. BY DANIELA KROSLAK. Indiana University Press, 2007, 322 pp. $65.00 (paper, $24.95). What is France's responsibility for the Rwandan genocide of 1994? Kroslak's study of the relationship between the Habyarimana...

For the record.(Recent Books on International Relations)(Correction notice)
January 1, 2009... A review of Seduced by Secrets: Inside the Stasi's Spy-Tech World, by Kristie Macrakis, in the November/December 2008 issue wrongly stated that the author grew up in East Germany. In fact, she studied there as a graduate student.

Foreign affairs bestsellers: the top-selling hardcover books on American foreign policy and international affairs.(Brief article)(List)
January 1, 2009... 1. Hot, Flat, and Crowded: Why We Need a Green Revolution--and How It Can Renew America. THOMAS L. FRIEDMAN. Farrar, Straus & Giroux, $27.95. 2. The War Within: A Secret White House History, 2006-2008. BOB WOODWARD. Simon & Schuster,...