Governance in a Global Economy: Political Authority in Transition. Edited by Miles Kahler and David A. Lake. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2003. 472p. $70.00 cloth, $24.95 paper.

The social scientific study of “globalization” has not been especially productive. Varying and expansive definitions of the phenomenon are used, cause and effect tend to be confused, and positive and normative claims are sometimes mixed. In this volume, Miles Kahler and David A. Lake offer a tractable and fruitful approach to the study of globalization by defining the phenomenon narrowly—in terms of economic integration made possible by reduced barriers to exchange and capital mobility—and by adopting a “second image reversed” perspective. Globalization is the independent variable used to explain changes in governance policies and institutions at the national level. This coherent focus allows the individual contributions to speak to each other while building on landmark works, such as Ronald Rogowski's (1989) Commerce and Coalitions and Robert Keohane and Helen Milner's (1996) Internationalization and Domestic Politics.

A Theory of Global Capitalism: Production, Class, and State in a Transnational World. By William I. Robinson. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2004. 224p. $46.95 cloth, $18.95 paper.

This book intervenes in the contemporary debates on globalization by asking what it means to conceptualize the global economy. Demonstrating the inadequacy of nation-state-based or international-centric responses to this question, it makes a case for conceptualizing globalization as a historically novel form of transnational capitalism. World capitalism, William Robinson argues, has undergone an “epochal change” involving not just a quantitative intensification but also a qualitative reconfiguration of economic, political, and social processes that were hitherto largely international. Taking advantage of technological developments and organizational innovations, capital has liberated itself from the social and political constraints imposed on it by nation-states and reorganized—fragmented and decentralized—the production process on a transnational basis. This reorganization of the productive base has gone hand in hand with the emergence of a transnational capitalist class (TCC), a transnational state apparatus, and a transnational ideological project.

The Ties That Divide: Ethnic Politics, Foreign Policy and International Conflict. By Stephen M. Saideman. New York: Columbia University Press, 2001. 348p. $70.00 cloth, $23.00 paper.

The Geography of Ethnic Violence: Identity, Interests, and the Indivisibility of Territory. By Monica Duffy Toft. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2003. 256p. $37.50.

These two useful books represent important contributions to the literature on violent ethnic conflicts. Monica Duffy Toft proposes a useful theory and adduces convincing evidence on some of the key determinants of severe ethnic violence. Stephen Saideman provides an even stronger theory and strongly suggestive evidence for explaining states' decisions to intervene in ethnic conflicts over secession. Both books provide a mix of quantitative analysis and case studies to support their claims more or less convincingly. Both conclusions deserve prominent attention in the literature.

A New World Order. By Anne-Marie Slaughter. Princeton: Princeton University Press. 2004. 368p. $29.95.

This book puts forth a bold vision for global governance, based on a simple but powerful argument. The argument is this: “Networks of government officials … are a key feature of world order in the twenty-first century, but they are underappreciated, undersupported, and underused …” (p. 1). Central to this vision are the concepts of network and governance. Anne Marie Slaughter is careful to define each of these concepts and, in so doing, calls attention to the fundamental theoretical, empirical, and pragmatic challenges inherent in transforming this vision into some semblance of reality.

Europe's Foreign and Security Policy: The Institutionalization of Cooperation. By Michael E. Smith. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2004. 308p. $80.00 cloth, $28.99 paper.

Michael Smith asks and answers a question about the foreign policy of the European Union: How do we explain its surprising growth and development over the past 30 years despite the many obstacles? The question is timely for scholars and practitioners. For practitioners, the EU is beginning to matter more in international politics as it finally begins to operationalize the European Security and Defense Policy (ESDP) in the Balkans and Africa. For scholars, a theory of European foreign policy has not enjoyed the attention paid by theorists to internal economic integration (neofunctionalism), interstate bargains struck at intergovernmental conferences (realism, liberal intergovernmentalism), and the impact of ideas, preferences, identities, and interests (constructivism) that influence institutions.

Trade Threats, Trade Wars: Bargaining, Retaliation, and American Coercive Diplomacy. By Ka Zeng. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2004. 324p. $57.50.

This book examines bilateral U.S. trade diplomacy during the 1980s and early 1990s. Ka Zeng advances (and generally sustains) an important thesis: that in trade disputes, U.S. policy has been tougher and more effective toward advanced industrial democracies (Europe, Japan) than nondemocratic nations (esp. China). The reason, she argues, lies in the structure of the economic relationships. Trade between the United States and the democracies is largely “competitive,” with industries and sectors going head-to-head for markets. The trade pattern with autocracies (and less-advanced economies like India and Brazil) is more “complementary,” with imports from these countries largely in product areas U.S. producers have abandoned.

The Impact of Public Opinion on U.S. Foreign Policy Since Vietnam. By Richard Sobel. New York: Oxford University Press, 2001. 288p. $24.95.

International Public Opinion and the Bosnia Crisis. Edited by Richard Sobel and Eric Shiraev. Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2003. 344p. $80.00 cloth, $25.95 paper.

In 2001, Richard Sobel published four case studies chronicling the impact of public opinion on U.S. foreign policy since the start of the Vietnam War. He used public opinion surveys and interviews with senior policymakers, including three secretaries of state and four secretaries of defense, to document how opinions fluctuated throughout each crisis and how various movers and shakers felt about the weight that they should assign to public opinion in their deliberations. The crises—the Vietnam War, the Nicaraguan Contra-funding controversy, the Persian Gulf War, and the Bosnia crisis—demonstrate that public opinion did constrain policy options, but did not determine the specific policies that were chosen. This finding confirms V. O. Key's theory, first expressed in his pathbreaking study Public Opinion and American Democracy (1961) that public opinion operates like a system of dikes. These dikes limit how far policymakers can go in committing the country to actions in the policy sphere.