BOOKS
PAX TRANSATLANTICA
The notion that a “West” exists dominates in international relations and political discourse. Yet, especially in recent years, more and more people believe that the “West” is falling apart. The eminent historian of international relations Jussi Hanhimäki refutes this idea, emphasizing the continued strength of transatlantic security co-operation (particularly NATO) and the deeply integrated transatlantic commercial relationship. In Pax Transatlantica, he further argues that even the rise of populism is evidence of close transatlantic political interconnections rather than a recipe for divorce. Not only will the “West”, the book concludes, continues to exist. It is likely to thrive in the future.
Book talks
September 27 at the Graduate Institute (in person, home court :))
September 29 at American University (zoom)
October 5 at University of London, Institute of Historical Research (zoom)
October 12 at Duke University (zoom)
Blog
A clear, compact, and accessible introduction to the United Nations. In this fully updated edition Hanhimäki examines the UN’s history and future prospects. The book evaluates the UN’s successes and failures, aiming to debunk some of the persistent myths that swirl around what is ultimately an indispensable global organization.
The Rise and Fall of Détente offers students and scholars a survey of the evolution of American foreign policy during a key period in recent history, the era of superpower détente and global transformation in the 1960s and 1970s. Describing détente as not only an era but also a strategy of waging the Cold War, Hanhimäki examines the reasons that led to the rise of détente, explores the highlights of the era’s reduced East-West tensions, and explains the causes of détente’s demise.
Henry Kissinger dominated American foreign relations like no other figure in recent history. He negotiated an end to American involvement in the Vietnam War, opened relations with Communist China, and orchestrated détente with the Soviet Union. Yet he is also the man behind the secret bombing of Cambodia and policies leading to the overthrow of Chile's President Salvador Allende. Which is more accurate, the picture of Kissinger the skilled diplomat or Kissinger the war criminal?
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Containing Coexistence: America, Russia, and the “Finnish Solution,” 1945–1956, is the first full-scale study of Finland’s role in Soviet-American relations during the onset of the cold war.
This major global history of the twentieth century is written by four prominent international historians. It is an ideal textbook for first-year undergraduate level and upward. Using their thematic and regional expertise, the authors have produced an authoritative yet accessible account of the history of international relations in the last century, covering events in Europe, Asia, the Middle East, Africa and the Americas. They focus on the history of relations between states and on the broad ideological, economic and cultural forces that have influenced the evolution of international politics over the past one hundred years.
Transatlantic Relations Since 1945 offers a comprehensive account of transatlantic relations since World War II. Written in an accessible style, it emphasises transatlantic interactions, and avoids the temptation to focus on either U.S. ‘domination’ or European attempts to ‘resist’ an American effort to subjugate the old continent. That influence has travelled across the Atlantic in both directions is a key theme of this book.
The Cold War contains a selection of official and unofficial documents which provide a truly multi-faceted account of the entire Cold War era. The experiences of the East Berlin housewife are placed alongside those of the South African student; the participation of political leaders from Europe and the Third World stand juxtaposed. Not only does this book put a human face on the conflict, but it draws emphasis to the variety of ways in which the Cold War was experienced.
The reasons that led to the end of the Cold War in 1989-1991 remain shrouded in scholarly controversy. How and why an international system dominated by the bipolar conflict ended so seemingly unexpectedly and peacefully has been debated for almost three decades. Dominated initially by fairly simplistic, and often politically motivated, arguments revolving around the role played by major "winners" and "losers," the historiogaphy of the subject is constantly growing.
A fresh look at the history of international terrorism through in-depth analysis of several important terrorist crises. This book provides readers with the tools to understand the historical evolution of terrorism and counterterrorism over the past 150 years.
This book sheds new light on the foreign policies, roles, and positions of neutral states and the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) in the global Cold War.
The essays in this Handbook cover a broad range of historical and contemporary themes, including the founding of NATO; the impact of the Korean War; the role of nuclear (non-)proliferation; perspectives of individual countries (especially France and Germany); the impact of culture, identity and representation in shaping post-Cold War transatlantic relations; institutional issues, particularly EU-NATO relations; the Middle East; and the legacy of the Cold War, notably tensions with Russia.
December 2021
DÉTENTE AND THE RECONFIGURATION OF SUPERPOWER RELATIONS
The essay explores the long-term consequences of détente and Sino-American diplomatic normalization during “the long 1970s.” Détente as a strategy emerged against the backdrop of American military, economic, and cultural decline in the 1960s, alongside increasing Soviet activity in the Middle East, Africa, and Vietnam. Though its political life was short, détente played an important role in U.S. triangular diplomacy between China and the Soviet Union, transforming the political calculus of the Cold War. The most significant developments of the period— China’s opening to the world, increasing European East-West diplomacy across the Iron Curtain, Soviet-American summitry, and U.S.-Soviet cooperation on space exploration and nuclear arms control— were often undertaken as limited, short-term political maneuvers with domestic considerations in mind, but they indelibly reconfigured superpower relations in ways the principal political architects and practitioners did not anticipate. The lasting effect was an undermining of the Cold War binary, enabling China’s rise on the global stage and loosening the cohesion of strategic alliances in the decolonizing world.
August 2020
NEW PERSPECTIVES ON THE END OF THE COLD WAR
Research on the causes and consequences of the end of the Cold War is constantly growing. Initially, it was dominated by fairly simplistic, and often politically motivated, debates revolving around the role played by major "winners" and "losers". This volume addresses a number of diverse issues and seeks to challenge several "common wisdoms" about the end of the Cold War. Together, the contributions provide insights on the role of personalities as well as the impact of transnational movements and forces on the unexpected political transformations of the late 1980s and early 1990s. Geographically, the chapters largely focus on the United States, Europe, with special emphasis on Germany, and the Soviet Union. The individual chapters are drawn together by the overarching theme relating to a particular "common wisdom": were the transformations that occurred truly "unexpected"? This collection of essays will make an important contribution to the growing literature on the developments that produced the collapse of the Iron Curtain, the demise of the Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War.
April 2019
THE FOREIGN POLICY OF THE UNITED STATES: INDISPENSABLE NO MORE?
Is the United States’ global power and influence in decline? In Europe and America: The End of the Transatlantic Relationship (edited by Federiga Bindi, Brookings Institution Press, 2019), Jussi Hanhimäki answers this question by providing a historical analysis of America’s interaction with the rest of the world since the end of the Cold War. He argues that the United States, despite what President Trump’s rhetoric, and many observers, suggest, remains the indispensable guarantor of the existing international order.
February 2019
RE-CONFIGURING THE FREE WORLD: KISSINGER, BRZEZINSKI, AND THE TRILATERAL AGENDA
Did Henry Kissinger’s 1973 ‘Year of Europe (and Japan)’—initiative fall flat? Not at all, this essay argues. By focusing on the roles of Kissinger and Zbigniew Brzezinski, who together dominated much of US policymaking in the 1970s (and shared a European background), the article maintains that such initiatives as the G-7 and the CSCE reshaped the relationship between the USA and its major European allies (and Japan) in a way that reflected the changing international environment but did not dilute America’s dominant position as the leader of the ‘West’.
May 2017
NON-ALIGNED TO WHAT? EUROPEAN NEUTRALITY AND THE COLD WAR
This article examines the role of European neutrality and non-alignment during the Cold War. It focuses particularly on the efforts of Austria, Finland, Sweden and Switzerland to balance their evident preference for the so-called West with their official policies of non-alignment.
September 2014
THE (REALLY) GOOD WAR? COLD WAR NOSTALGIA AND AMERICAN FOREIGN POLICY
This article argues that the Cold War nostalgia of the present in the United States is ultimately based upon a poor – instrumentalist – reading of history. If anything, Cold War nostalgia shows the malleability of our present-day understanding of the past.