State Death: The Politics and Geography of Conquest, Occupation, and Annexation
Winner of the 2008 Best Book Award, Conflict Processes Section of the American Political Science Association"This excellent study begins with the counterintuitive fact that 'of all the states on the map of the world in 1816, nearly half no longer exist today.' The first part of the book details the history of state death, a modest contribution but one heretofore absent from scholarly analysis. More important are the contributions relating to explaining state death and charting the impact of changes in the international system of states. . . . This is a first-rate book with importance for both international relations and geography scholars alike."--P. F. Diehl, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, forChoice"Given the importance of state death to theorizing about international politics, it is surprising that Tanisha Fazal is the first scholar to offer a systematic study of the phenomenon. The wait has been worth it, thought, because Fazal has written an excellent introduction to the topic."--Douglas Lemke,Political Science Quarterly"Fazal outlines a plausible mechanism for state death and supports it with a persuasive combination of statistics and well-executed case studies."--Alexander B. Downes,International History Review"State Deathis well written. It is extremely interesting in that it attempts to systematically approach a subject that has barely been thought about in systematic terms to date. Its main strength is its almost textbook-like demonstration of how to approach a subject matter by devising a meticulous methodology, discussing and refining the data sets used, and combining quantitative analysis with qualitative case studies in a fruitful fashion. . . .State Deathpresents an interesting and valuable argument developed in a methodologically creative way."--Mathias Albert,Perspectives on Politics"The title of the book promises much for scholars of genocide, and not only because it highlights 'state death' with its connotations of violence and ethnic destruction."--A. Dirk Moses,Journal of Genocide Research