Article
Vol. 26, No. 4
Steven E. Miller, Michael E. Brown, Owen R. Cote Jr., Sean M. Lynn-Jones, and Diane J. McCree, editors
(The MIT Press, Spring 2002)
This issue begins with an article by Valerie Hudson of Brigham Young University and Andrea Den Boer of the University of Kent who trace the rise in offspring sex selection in China and India that has resulted in a "surplus" of young men, which in turn has increased the potential for internal and external violence, while diminishing prospects for democracy.
Sarah Mendelson of the Center for Strategic and International Studies argues that despite the proliferation of democratic institutions in Russia over the last decade, noncompliance with international norms appears to be on the rise, particularly in Chechnya.
Robert English of the University of Southern California criticizes Stephen Brooks and William Wohlforth''s winter 2000/01 article in IS, "Power, Globalization, and the End of the Cold War," for privileging materialist explanations for the end of the Cold War and the collapse of the Soviet Union to the exclusion of other possible causes— in particular, the influence of "new thinkers" led by Mikhail Gorbachev. Brooks and Wohlforth respond.
John Western of Mount Holyoke College explains why President George H.W. Bush chose to intervene militarily in Somalia but not in Bosnia in 1992, when both areas were being torn apart by ethnic strife.
BCSIA''s John Garofano reviews three books on the Vietnam War: Kennedy''s Wars, by Lawrence Freedman; American Tragedy, by David Kaiser; and Choosing War, by Fredrik Logevall.
The September 11 terrorist attacks against the United States are the subject of two commentaries. Bruce Jentleson of Duke University asks where political scientists and international relations scholars should turn to find answers to a variety of questions emerging from the attacks. Jusuf Wanandi of the Centre for Strategic and International Studies in Jakarta, Indonesia, counsels that although much of the military burden in the war on international terrorism will continue to fall on the U.S., the breadth and depth of the terrorist threat will require a global coalition that can tackle the problem on a variety of fronts.
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