Review: Miscellaneous: Peacemaking by Democracies
| Author | David A. Welch |
| Published date | 01 June 2003 |
| Date | 01 June 2003 |
| DOI | 10.1177/002070200305800213 |
| Subject Matter | Review |
Reviews
The
authors
divide
the
MENA
region
into four
'ideal'
types:
bunker
states,
bully praetorian
states,
globalizing
monarchies,
and
fragmented
democracies.
These
describe
not
only
the
political regime
but
also
the
nature
of
the
international
engagement
strategies
that
characterize
members
of
a
given
category.
With
the
exception
of
'fragmented
democracies,'
which,
by
the
authors'
own
admission,
is
residual
and
too
diverse
to
be really useful,
the
other
types
permit
a
diagnosis
of
the
current
state
of
affairs
in
MENA
countries
while
predicting
their
ability
to
face
the
challenges
of
globalization.
The
breadth
and
depth
of
the
analysis
deserve
special
mention.
MENA
economic
data
is
usually
scarce
and
unreliable.
Nonetheless,
the
authors
have
not
only
gathered
an
impressive
number
of
facts
and
fig-
ures,
they
have
also
managed to
do
so
while
maintaining
the
coherence
and
incisiveness
of
their
analysis.
As
a
result,
the
volume
marks
a
mile-
stone
in
studying the
impact
of
globalization
on
the
MENA
region.
It
will
be
of
particular
use
to
students
of
the Middle
East,
but
also
to any-
one
seeking
a
better
understanding
of
the
challenges
and
opportunities
facing regional
governments
in
the
years
and
decades
to
come.
Marie-Joille Zahar/Universit6
de
Montrtal
PEACEMAKING
BY
DEMOCRACIES
The
effect
of
state
autonomy
on
the
post-world
war
settlements
Norrin
M.
Ripsman
University
Park:
Pennsylvania State
University
Press,
2002,
viii,
272
pp,
US$45.00,
ISBN
0-271-02222-1
Political
science,
done
well,
often
involves
a
delicate
balancing
act.
Peacemaking
by
Democracies
is
political
science
at
its
best.
Here
the
rel-
evant
balancing
act
is
between
storytelling
and
formalism,
between
'mere'
history and
methodological
fetishism.
Norrin
Ripsman
gets
the
balance
just
right, and the
result
is
a
book
that
tells
us
something
both
novel
and
important.
Rightly
noting that
political scientists
in
most
subfields
readily
acknowledge
that
different
types
of
democratic
states
do
things
rather
differently, Ripsman
wonders
why
it
is
that
students
of
national
or
international
security
tend
not
to
do
so.
Some
-
neorealists,
for
example
-
do
not
think
domestic
forms
of
government
are
interesting
or
relevant
at
all.
There
are
those
who
tend
to
think that
democracies
behave
INTERNATIONAL
JOURNAL
Spring2003
423
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