CIAO DATE: 04/03

The National Interest

 

Spring 2003 (No. 71)

 

Articles

• Migration and the Dynamics of Empire
  By James Kurth. Do all roads lead to the new (American) Rome? The imperial task has always affected and been affected by the movement of peoples. It still is.

• The Death of Conquest
  By Anna Simons. We don’t "do" conquest anymore–but the new anti-conquest norm has had several unforeseen consequences. Some are proving very worrisome.

• Out of Bali: Cybercaliphate Rising
  By David Martin Jones. The rise of religious fundamentalism in Southeast Asia contradicts longstanding appraisals of Southeast Asian Islam and standard Western theories of modernization.

• Australian for Alliance
  By Paul Kelly. A haze of friendship obscures the real foundation of the U.S.-Australian alliance, a foundation under stress since September 11, 2001. Best to take notice before the haze lifts.

• Frog in the Pot
  By Adam S. Posen. Japan’s economic troubles arise from four interwoven causes, three of which are now extant in Germany–with major global security implications for the United States.

• Imperial Temptations
  By Jack Snyder. The administration’s emphasis on preventive war as a means to preserve American hegemony echoes failed imperial strategies of ages past. Myths of empire promise trouble ahead.

• The Transformation of National Security
  By Philip Zelikow. The Bush Administration’s National Security Strategy is based on five critical redefinitions of international politics–and not a moment too soon.

• Taba Mythchief
  By David Makovsky. The "near miss" at Taba is being widely promoted as the natural starting point for future Israeli-Palestinian diplomacy. The only problem is, there was no "near miss."

• An Empire, If You Can Keep It
  By Stephen Peter Rosen. An empire is functionally distinct from a mere great power. If the United States adopts an imperial vocation, it will need to learn new ways to manage its national security challenges.

• EuroIslam: The Jihad Within?
  By Olivier Roy. Islam in Europe is being transformed from diaspora to "universal" forms. The latter portend a rise of radicalism and terrorism within the EU.

• The Beginning of Economic Wisdom
  By Michael Novak. Two primers on economics reveal a lingering philosophical divide in the intellectual imagination of our time.

 

Quarterly

• Continental Divides
  By Josef Joffe. It took awhile--more than a dozen, in point of fact--but the natural tendency in international politics for states to balance against the power of a hegemon has emerged. In western Europe, of all places.

 

Reviews

• "The Rudest Man I Ever Met"
  By Hume Horan. One of America’s most experienced Middle East hands finds a treasure of insight and grace in a book about the life and times of the late Philip Habib.

• Burying Nikita
  By Susan Eisenhower. William Taubman’s biography of Chairman Khrushchev combines original research and good sense to produce the best last word so far on the late Soviet leader.

• Imperialism, the Highest Stage of American Capitalism?
  By Gideon Rose. Andrew Bacevich’s American Empire is really two books in one: one quite good, the other quite inexplicable.

• Suffering
  By Alan J. Kuperman. David Rieff’s frustrations show in his effort to make sense of post-Cold War humanitarianism.