Because policy actions are always taken within a value context, this comprehensive text uses values and beliefs as the basic organizing theme. The book portrays the way values and beliefs about foreign affairs have changed over the course of U.S. history and how foreign policy has changed from its earliest years through the end of the Cold War and beyond.

Leading scholars of Middle East politics and international relations present comprehensive coverage of the international politics of the Middle East, a region at the forefront of international attention.

AMERICAN FOREIGN POLICY is the market leader for the American foreign policy course. Guiding students through 21st century American foreign policy by placing contemporary issues, debates, challenges, and opportunities in their historic context, this text helps students understand and assess the forces underlying continuity and change. This Sixth Edition retains the book's effective analytical framework. Harnessing the conceptual, theoretical, and historical components that facilitate analysis of American foreign policy, the text maintains that five sources--international, societal, governmental, role, and individual--collectively influence decisions about foreign policy goals and the means chosen to realize them. Readers will come away from this text with knowledge of how the enduring principles, values and interests of the United States (peace and prosperity, stability and security, democracy and defense) define and reinforce the ability of policymakers to respond to changes in the international environment.

Thoroughly updated in its fifth edition, World Politics in a New Era is a comprehensive and thought-provoking text for introductory courses on world politics. Reflecting the changes that have occurred worldwide since the collapse of the Berlin Wall--including recent upheavals in the financial sphere--the book integrates coverage of the competing threads of globalization and fragmentation, examining how they tangle and weave through studies of global politics, economics, and culture. World Politics in a New Era, Fifth Edition, provides a uniquely in-depth treatment of the field by introducing key contemporary issues with theory; supporting these issues with historical context; and giving students the analytical tools to apply the theories to current issues. It introduces the major theories used to explain international relations--realism, liberalism, constructivism, and a few select alternatives--in Chapter 2, providing students with a primer on the topic. Discussions of these theories are then incorporated into the narrative throughout the text, creating a useful framework for analysis. Extensive historical coverage in four chapters (3-6) reviews key events in world politics from the Peace of Westphalia in 1648 to the present, offering students the best context to fully comprehend the modern political stage. Chapters 7-14 cover key topics in contemporary world politics: security, trade and investment, development, human and resource issues, global governance, and ethics. FEATURES: * "At a Glance" text boxes apply the theories and levels of analysis--individual, domestic, and systemic--to each chapter's theme * "What Would You Do" boxes profile real-life events, asking students to play the role of a world leader/decision maker and propose a solution that takes into account the many complexities of world politics * "Spotlight" features in every chapter highlight interesting people, places, and situations; discuss important international events and colorful personalities in greater depth; or focus on specific facets of complex conflicts or theories NEW TO THIS EDITION: * Thoroughly updated to reflect the economic crisis, the changing security environment, data on issues in population, migration, and health, and more * Refines the discussion of constructivism, emphasizing that its significance equals that of realism and liberalism * Explains (in the four history chapters) how specific events were chosen for study and why history itself is important SUPPLEMENTS: * A Companion Website at www.oup.com/us/spiegel offers substantial review materials for students and password-protected resources for instructors * Instructor's Resource Manual with Test Bank * Computerized Test Bank * PowerPoint-based slides * Instructor's Resource CD including the Instructor's Resource Manual with Test Bank, the Computerized Test Bank, the PowerPoint-based slides, and graphics from the text

The idea of national unification has long been a powerful mobilizing force for nationalist thinkers and ethnic entrepreneurs since the rise of nationalist ideology in the late 1700s. This phenomenon came to be known as irredentism. During the Cold War, irredentist projects were largely subordinated to the ideological struggle between East and West. After the Cold War, however, the international system has witnessed a proliferation of such conflicts throughout Europe and Asia. Ambrosio integrates both domestic and international factors to explain both the initiation and settlement of irredentist conflicts. His central argument is that irredentist states confront two potentially contradictory forces: domestic nationalism and pressure from the international community. Irredentist leaders are forced to reconcile their nationalist policies with pressures from the international plane. At the same time, irredentist leaders exploit perceived windows of opportunity in pursuit of their nationalist goals. Ambrosio examines in depth the past, present, and possible irredentist projects of Serbia, Croatia, Hungary, and Armenia within a theoretical and comparative framework. His conclusions yield signficant theoretical findings and important policy implications for both scholars of ethnic conflicts, nationalism, and international relations and policy makers.

An innovative view of the changing geopolitical landscape that draws on the science of complex adaptive systems to understand changes in global interaction. Liberal internationalism has been the West's foreign policy agenda since the Cold War, and the West has long occupied the top rung of a hierarchical system. In this book, Hilton Root argues that international relations, like other complex ecosystems, exists in a constantly shifting landscape, in which hierarchical structures are giving way to systems of networked interdependence, changing every facet of global interaction. Accordingly, policymakers will need a new way to understand the process of change. Root suggests that the science of complex systems offers an analytical framework to explain the unforeseen development failures, governance trends, and alliance shifts in today's global political economy. Root examines both the networked systems that make up modern states and the larger, interdependent landscapes they share. Using systems analysis—in which institutional change and economic development are understood as self-organizing complexities—he offers an alternative view of institutional resilience and persistence. From this perspective, Root considers the divergence of East and West; the emergence of the European state, its contrast with the rise of China, and the network properties of their respective innovation systems; the trajectory of democracy in developing regions; and the systemic impact of China on the liberal world order. Complexity science, Root argues, will not explain historical change processes with algorithmic precision, but it may offer explanations that match the messy richness of those processes.