Choice Outstanding Academic Book! Since the end of the Cold War, economic sanctions have been a frequent instrument of United Nations authority, imposed by the Security Council against nearly a dozen targets. Some efforts appear to have been successful, others are more doubtful—all, though, have been controversial. This book, based on more than two hundred interviews with officials from    More >

How has the Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN) affected Nicaragua and its politics since the Sandinista revolution of 1979? Addressing this question, the authors offer a comprehensive assessment, discussing the country's political institutions and public policy, its political culture, and its leadership, as well as the FSLN as a political party. Their focus is on contemporary issues,    More >

Focusing on debates within the World Bank about the value of social capital concepts for the encouragement of more participatory and empowering forms of development, the contributors to this volume offer both an ethnography of a huge development organization and an insightful look at the nature of bureaucracy and organizational change.    More >

Colin Gray returns nuclear weapons to the center stage of international politics. Taking issue with the complacent belief that a happy mixture of deterrence, arms control, and luck will enable humanity to cope adequately with weapons of mass destruction (WMD), Gray argues that the risk posed by WMD is ever more serious. Policy that ignores the present nuclear age, he cautions, is policy that    More >

With contentious issues of sovereignty and self-determination a focus of current world affairs, this comprehensive analysis is especially timely. The authors explore the conceptual, political, legal, cultural, economic, and strategic aspects of self-determination—encompassing both theory and practice—in the context of the evolving international system. Wide-ranging case studies enrich    More >

New democracies all over the world are finding themselves haunted by the old demons of clientelism, corruption, arbitrariness, and the abuse of power—leading to a growing awareness that, in addition to elections, democracy requires checks and balances. Democratic governments must be accountable to the electorate; but they must also be subject to restraint and oversight by other public    More >

These powerful stories were written between 1947, when Pakistan was created, and 1971, when it was fragmented by the creation of Bangladesh as an independent nation. Steeped in an unmistakable Shi’ite ambiance, they also draw freely on memoirs and memories, dreams and visions, Middle Eastern oral traditions, and Hindu and Buddhist mythology.    More >

Jabra's highly acclaimed novel is a masterful exploration of the post-1948 Arab world, with its frustrations, yearnings for homeland, and struggle for survival. As his characters interact on a ship sailing from Beirut to Europe, Jabra exposes them to the elements of spiritual and physical displacement. Some survive; others do not.    More >

Charged with monitoring the huge civilian press corps that descended on Hue during the Vietnam War’s Tet offensive, US Army Captain George W. Smith witnessed firsthand a vicious twenty-five day battle. Smith recounts in harrowing detail the separate, poorly coordinated wars that were fought in the retaking of the Hue. Notably, he documents the little-known contributions of the South    More >

A woman abandons her newborn baby in a ditch. Soon discovered, the corpse arouses in the local peasants an intense desire to bring the killer to justice—and gives them the excuse to pry into the lives of the entire community. The primary suspects are a group of migrant workers, and the question of their guilt or innocence soon reveals other kinds of truths. The Sinners is an evocative    More >