Regions and Powers: The Structure of International Security: 91 (Cambridge Studies in International Relations, Series Number 91)

Regions and Powers: The Structure of International Security: 91 (Cambridge Studies in International Relations, Series Number 91)

by Barry Buzan (Author), Barry Buzan (Author)

Synopsis

This book develops the idea that since decolonisation, regional patterns of security have become more prominent in international politics. The authors combine an operational theory of regional security with an empirical application across the whole of the international system. Individual chapters cover Africa, the Balkans, CIS Europe, East Asia, EU Europe, the Middle East, North America, South America, and South Asia. The main focus is on the post-Cold War period, but the history of each regional security complex is traced back to its beginnings. By relating the regional dynamics of security to current debates about the global power structure, the authors unfold a distinctive interpretation of post-Cold War international security, avoiding both the extreme oversimplifications of the unipolar view, and the extreme deterritorialisations of many globalist visions of a new world disorder. Their framework brings out the radical diversity of security dynamics in different parts of the world.

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More Information

Format: Illustrated
Pages: 598
Edition: Illustrated
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Published: 04 Dec 2003

ISBN 10: 0521891116
ISBN 13: 9780521891110
Book Overview: An analysis and application of security complex theory in security regions in the post-Cold War order.

Media Reviews
'The empirical sweep of the study is monumental. This book is a major re-think of the problem of security in the post-Cold War world and successfully challenges conventional and competing approaches.' Kalevi J. Holsti, University of British Columbia
'The book is heroic in its ambition and Herculean in its execution. A landmark study that displays a rare combination of cutting-edge theoretical sophistication with an insatiable appetite for data.' Peter J. Katzenstein, Cornell University
'... offers a truly global empirical overview of security dynamics in all regions of the world.' Tidsskriftet Politik
'Among its most notable aspects are the clear prose and the sharp focus of the empirical studies ... The empirical study is nothing short of titanic in its ambition and breadth, and the succinct overviews of regional security dynamics will undoubtedly become required reading in graduate security studies curricula.' Slavonic and East European Review
'This is undoubtedly an important volume that makes a significant contribution to security studies' Political Studies Review
'... A sophisticated analytical toolbox equipped with a plethora of useful concepts and categories, heuristic models and methods, checklists of comparative criteria, etc. ... this is a valuable study and it should be read by both security/IR scholars and policy practicioners. As a macro-study with a global sweep, the book opens the door up to research programming to students of security, above all in terms of the more detailed micro-studies of and within various RSCs.' Journal of International Relations and Development
Regions and Powers is a work that demands attention from both general IR theorists and regional specialists. Spencer D. Bakich, Virginia Quarterly Review
The authors' earlier works in security studies are brought together and developed into an innovative and coherent regional security complex theory. The empirical sweep of the study is monumental. This book is a major re-think of the problem of security in the post-Cold War world and successfully challenges conventional and competing approaches. Kalevi J. Holsti, University of British Columbia
This is the long-awaited follow-on book to Buzan's and Waever's initial statement of securitization.Regions and Powers develops a conceptual apparatus for an interpretation of all of the world's different regional security complexes. The book is heroic in its ambition and Herculean in its execution. A landmark study that displays a rare combination of cutting-edge theoretical sophistication with an insatiable appetite for data. Peter J. Katzenstein, Cornell University
The domain of world society has for some time been a neglected dimension in English School theorizing. Barry Buzanas book has not only filled this gap, it has radically reconfigured the relationship between international system, international society and world society. The result is a formidable work of grand theory. At last we have a work in the English School which is analytically rigorous enough to meet the high standards set by the best recent American IR theory while at the same time remaining faithful to the richness of the original sociological institutionalism. Tim Dunne, University of Exeter
This is the long-awaited follow-on book to Buzan's and Waever's initial statement of securitization.Regions and Powers develops a conceptual apparatus for an interpretation of all of the world's different regional security complexes. The book is heroic in its ambition and Herculean in its execution. A landmark study that displays a rare combination of cutting-edge theoretical sophistication with an insatiable appetite for data. Peter J. Katzenstein, Cornell University
This is a book tht deserves to be widely read, and it is liekly to serve as an inspiration for many subsequent studies of regions. Political Science Quarterly
Author Bio
Barry Buzan is Professor of International Relations at the LSE. Ole Waever is Professor of International Relations at the Department of Political Science, University of Copenhagen.