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Last Updated 12/25/12

Best International Relations Books of 2012

Every year, ten scholars review dozens of recently published academic and popular nonfiction books for Foreign Affairs. As this year came to a close, the editors asked each of the reviewers to choose the three best of 2012.

30 Articles

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30 Articles

Table of Contents

November/December 2012

November/December 2012

Advancing the Rule of Law Abroad: Next Generation Reform

G. John Ikenberry

January/February 2013

January/February 2013

The Dictator’s Learning Curve

G. John Ikenberry

January/February 2013

January/February 2013

The Second Nuclear Age: Strategy, Danger, and the New Power Politics

G. John Ikenberry

September/October 2012

September/October 2012

Economics After the Crisis: Objectives and Means

Richard N. Cooper

January/February 2013

January/February 2013

One Billion Hungry: Can We Feed the World?

Richard N. Cooper

January/February 2013

January/February 2013

Doing Capitalism in the Innovation Economy

Richard N. Cooper

September/October 2012

September/October 2012

Embers of War: The Fall of an Empire and the Making of America's Vietnam

Lawrence D. Freedman

September/October 2012

September/October 2012

Manhunt: The Ten-Year Search for bin Laden From 9/11 to Abbottabad

Lawrence D. Freedman

November/December 2012

November/December 2012

The Last Full Measure: How Soldiers Die in Battle

Lawrence D. Freedman

November/December 2012

November/December 2012

Brigham Young: Pioneer Prophet

Walter Russell Mead

November/December 2012

November/December 2012

Sword of the Spirit, Shield of Faith: Religion in American War and Diplomacy

Walter Russell Mead

January/February 2013

January/February 2013

Freedom National: The Destruction of Slavery in the United States, 1861–1865

Walter Russell Mead

March/April 2012

March/April 2012

Thinking the Twentieth Century

Andrew Moravcsik

November/December 2012

November/December 2012

The Myth of the Muslim Tide: Do Immigrants Threaten the West?

Andrew Moravcsik

November/December 2012

November/December 2012

Fortress Europe: Dispatches from a Gated Continent

Andrew Moravcsik

September/October 2012

September/October 2012

Cuban Economic and Social Development: Policy Reforms and Challenges in the Twenty-first Century

Richard Feinberg

September/October 2012

September/October 2012

State-Building and Tax Regimes in Central America

Richard Feinberg

January/February 2013

January/February 2013

Brazil, the United States, and the South American Subsystem: Regional Politics and the Absent Empire

Richard Feinberg

September/October 2012

September/October 2012

Worlds of Dissent: Charter 77, the Plastic People of the Universe, and Czech Culture Under Communism

November/December 2012

November/December 2012

Roads to the Temple: Truth, Memory, Ideas, and Ideals in the Making of the Russian Revolution, 1987–1991

January/February 2013

January/February 2013

Wheel of Fortune: The Battle for Oil and Power in Russia

A Single Roll of the Dice: Obama’s Diplomacy With Iran

November/December 2012

November/December 2012

The Young Turks’ Crime Against Humanity: The Armenian Genocide and Ethnic Cleansing in the Ottoman Empire

January/February 2013

January/February 2013

Muslim Nationalism and the New Turks

September/October 2012

September/October 2012

The Impossible State: North Korea, Past and Future

Andrew J. Nathan

November/December 2012

November/December 2012

Poverty Amid Plenty in the New India

Andrew J. Nathan

November/December 2012

November/December 2012

Double Paradox: Rapid Growth and Rising Corruption in China

Andrew J. Nathan

September/October 2012

September/October 2012

The Night Wanderers: Uganda’s Children and the Lord’s Resistance Army

Nicolas van de Walle

November/December 2012

November/December 2012

China and Africa: A Century of Engagement

Nicolas van de Walle

January/February 2013

January/February 2013

RethinkHIV: Smarter Ways to Invest in Ending HIV in Sub-Saharan Africa

Nicolas van de Walle