This edited book explores diverse contestations and transformations of sovereignty around the world. Sovereignty plays a central role in modern political thought and practice, but it also remains fundamentally contested. Depending on the context and perspective, it seems either omnipresent or elusive, liberating or oppressive, fading or resilient. Indeed, if in recent decades sovereignty has been expected to wane, today it is back on the agenda; not as the solid bedrock of modern – international – politics, which it never was, but as variations on a concept and institution that are ever contested and, as a result, constantly transforming. Bringing together perspectives from various disciplines, including International Relations (IR), political theory, geography, law, and anthropology, this volume: • goes beyond debates over the resilience or decline of sovereignty to instead emphasize how precisely the inherent ambiguities, tensions, and contestations in scholarship and practice spark sovereignty’s manifold transformations; • offers three theoretical chapters that examine the illusions, contradictions, transformation, and lasting appeal of sovereignty and the nation-state; • explores sovereignty from various disciplinary perspectives in 11 empirical chapters that highlight its role in different contexts around the world, from the European Union (EU) to the South China Sea, to Western Sahara and Palestine; • problematizes the interplay between theory and practice of statehood and sovereignty, as in the perception of Northern Cyprus as a ‘fake state’, scholars’ promotion of Kurdish ‘statehood’ in Iraq, and studies affirming the ‘Islamic State’. This book will be of much interest to students of statehood, sovereignty, conflict studies and International Relations. Chapters 8 of this book are available for free in Open Access at www.taylorfrancis.com. It has been made available under a Creative Commons Attribution-No Derivatives 4.0 license.

"We are at a moment in world affairs when the essential ideas that govern statecraft must change. For five centuries it has taken the resources of a state to destroy another state . . . This is no longer true, owing to advances in international telecommunications, rapid computation, and weapons of mass destruction. The change in statecraft that will accompany these developments will be as profound as any that the State has thus far undergone." —from the Prologue The Shield of Achilles is a classic inquiry into the nature of the State, its origin in war, and its drive for peace and legitimacy. Philip Bobbitt, a professor of constitutional law and a historian of nuclear strategy, has served in the White House, the Senate, the State Department, and the National Security Council in both Democratic and Republican administrations, and here he brings his formidable experience and analytical gifts to bear on our changing world. Many have observed that the nation-state is dying, yet others have noted that the power of the State has never been greater. Bobbitt reconciles this paradox and introduces the idea of the market-state, which is already replacing its predecessor. Along the way he treats such themes as the Long War (which began in 1914 and ended in 1990). He explains the relation of violence to legitimacy, and the role of key individuals in fates that are partially—but only partially—determined. This book anticipates the coalitional war against terrorism and lays out alternative futures for the world. Bobbitt shows how nations might avoid the great power confrontations that have a potential for limitless destruction, and he traces the origin and evolution of the State to such wars and the peace conferences that forged their outcomes into law, from Augsburg to Westphalia to Utrecht to Vienna to Versailles. The author paints a powerful portrait of the ever-changing interrelatedness of our world, and he uses his expertise in law and strategy to discern the paths that statehood will follow in the coming years and decades. Timely and perceptive, The Shield of Achilles will change the way we think about the world.

Sovereignty, as a concept, is in a state of flux. In the course of the last century, traditional meanings have been worn away while the limitations of sovereignty have been altered as transnational issues compete with domestic concerns for precedence. This volume presents an interdisciplinary analysis of conceptions of sovereignty. Divided into six overarching elements, it explores a wide range of issues that have altered the theory and practice of state sovereignty, such as: human rights and the use of force for human protection purposes, norms relating to governance, the war on terror, economic globalization, the natural environment and changes in strategic thinking. The authors are acknowledged experts in their respective areas, and discuss the contemporary meaning and relevance of sovereignty and how it relates to the constitution of international order.

No scholar better exemplifies the intellectual challenges foisted on the Neorealist school of international relations than prominent scholar Stephen Krasner (Graham H. Stuart Professor of International Studies, the Senior Associate Dean for the Social Sciences, School of Humanities & Sciences, and Director of Policy Planning at the US State Department 2005-2007). Throughout his career he has wrestled with realism's promises and limitations. Krasner has always been a prominent defender of realism and the importance of power understood in material terms, whether military or economic. Yet realist frameworks rarely provided a complete explanation for outcomes, in Krasner's analyses, and much of his work involved understanding power's role in situations not well explained by realism. If states seek power, why do we see cooperation? If hegemony promotes cooperation why does cooperation continue in the face of America's decline? Do states actually pursue their national interests or do domestic structures and values derail the rational pursuit of material objectives? Krasner's explanations were as diverse as were the problems. They pushed, to use his phrase, "the limits of realism." Edited by Martha Finnemore and Judith Goldstein, Back to Basics asks scholars to reflect on the role power plays in contemporary politics and how a power politics approach is influential today. The arguments made by the authors in this volume speak to one of three themes that run through Krasner's work: state power and hegemony; the relationship between states and markets; conceptions of the nation state in international politics. These themes appeared regularly in Krasner's scholarship as he wrestled, over his career, with fundamental questions of inter-state politics. Contributors largely agree on the centrality of power but diverge substantially on the ways power is manifest and should be measured and understood. Many of the contributors confronted the same intellectual dilemmas as Krasner in struggling to define power and its relationship to interests, yet their responses are different. Together, these essays explore new ways of thinking about power's role in contemporary politics and demonstrate the concepts continued relevance for both policy and theory.

This book offers a fresh analysis of constitutional, economic, demographic and cultural developments in the overseas territories of Britain, France, the Netherlands, Denmark, Spain, the United States, Australia and New Zealand. Ranging from Greenland to Gibraltar, the Falklands to the Faroes, and encompassing islands in the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian Oceans, and the Caribbean, these territories command attention because of their unique status, and for the ways that they occasionally become flashpoints for rival international claims, dubious financial activities, illegal migration and clashes between metropolitan and local mores. Connell and Aldrich argue that a negotiated dependency brings greater benefits to these territories than might independence.

This analysis of 'globalised' standard-setting processes draws together insights from law, political sciences, sociology and social anthropology to assess the authority and accountability of non-state actors and the legitimacy and effectiveness of the processes. The essays offer new understandings of current governance problems, including environmental and financial standards, rules for military contractors and complex public-private partnerships, such as those intended to protect critical information infrastructure. The contributions also evaluate multi-stakeholder initiatives (such as the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative), and discuss the constitution of public norms in stateless areas. A synopsis of the latest results of the World Governance Indicator, arguably one of the most important surveys in the area today, is included.

A Search for Sovereignty approaches world history by examining the relation of law and geography in European empires between 1400 and 1900. Lauren Benton argues that Europeans imagined imperial space as networks of corridors and enclaves, and that they constructed sovereignty in ways that merged ideas about geography and law. Conflicts over treason, piracy, convict transportation, martial law, and crime created irregular spaces of law, while also attaching legal meanings to familiar geographic categories such as rivers, oceans, islands, and mountains. The resulting legal and spatial anomalies influenced debates about imperial constitutions and international law both in the colonies and at home. This study changes our understanding of empire and its legacies and opens new perspectives on the global history of law.

This volume's central purpose is to provide a clearly written, scholarly exploration of cultural variation regarding conflict resolution and in so doing, highlight certain alternatives to violence. It presents an interdisciplinary examination of how conflicts are perceived and handled in a variety of cultural settings. Drawing on data and models from anthropology, psychology, and political science, the chapters analyze conflict resolution across the societal spectrum, including cases from Western and non-Western traditions, complex and tribal societies, and violent and non-violent cultures. While demonstrating the extremely important impact of culture on conflict resolution processes, the book does not solely emphasize cultural specificity. Rather--through introductory chapters, section introductions, and a concluding chapter--the volume editors draw attention to cross-cultural patterns in an attempt to further the search for more general conflict principles. An explicit message throughout the book is that alternatives to violence exist. The volume demonstrates that at various levels--from the interpersonal to the international-- conflicts can be handled in ways that cause far less pain and destruction than violence. Chapters by psychologists discuss social and cognitive processes for facilitating the learning of alternatives to violence among children and youth. Anthropology contributors explore mechanisms for dealing with social conflict which allow some cultures to remain relatively peaceful and consider implications of their work for reducing violence in other societies. Chapters by former President of Costa Rica, Oscar Arias, and by political scientists examine how non-violent political solutions can be employed as alternatives to warfare and violent resistence.

"This is an excellent compilation of work on the discipline of international relations (IR). . . . This handbook will become indispensable for libraries serving graduate programs in IR. It will also be a good reference for faculty and scholars in the field, and its individual entries will be of interest to advanced undergraduate students." --CHOICE, November 2002 --CHOICE, November 2002 This major Handbook brings together the worlds leading scholars of international relations to provide a state of the art review and indispensable guide to the field. A genuinely international undertaking, the Handbook reviews the many historical, philosophical, analytical and normative roots to the discipline and the key contemporary topics of research and debate today. An essential benchmark publication for all advanced undergraduates, graduate students and academics in politics and international relations.

Based on over five years of ethnographic research [carried out] in the southwest Yukon, Sovereignty's Entailments is a close ethnographic analysis of everyday practices of state formation in a society whose members do not take for granted the cultural entailments of sovereignty.