Pandaemonium: Ethnicity in International Politics
A recent New York Times story listed 48 countries where ethnic conflicts simmer, sear, or roar, and for that reason alone, Senator Moynihan's Pandaemonium is important. Nationalism has become the world's single most potent form of political identification and expression, and Moynihan goes to great lengths to demonstrate that both academia and policy-making institutions have either ignored or understimated its salience. Though politicized ethnicity has been the touchstone for decolonization, sectarian violence, and the disintegration of the Soviet Union, ethnicity has been dismissed as a primoridal holdover or mere tribalism. Moynihan incorporates a brief history of the concept of self-determination into this slim volume, but he misses several notable contributions, such as Ernest Gellner's Nations and Nationalism (Cornell Univ. Pr., 1983) , Benedict Anderson's Imagined Communities (Verso, 1983), and Louis Snyder's Encyclopedia of Nationalism ( LJ 3/1/90). Still, Moynihan's voice rises strongly as a warning to take seriously the sheer power of ethnicity in world politics.- Joseph Parsons, Inst. of Real Estate Mgt., ChicagoCopyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.--This text refers to theHardcoveredition.