The Making of Strategy: Rulers, States, and War - Hardcover

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0521453895 ISBN 13: 9780521453899

Publisher: Cambridge University Press, 1994

Synopsis

Most writing about strategy has focused on individual strategic theorists or great military leaders. This book focuses instead on the messy processes by which rulers and states have framed strategy in the past - a subject of vital practical importance to strategists, and of great interest to students of strategy and statecraft. It consists of 17 case studies that range from fifth-century Athens and Ming China to Hitler's Germany, Israel, and the post-1945 United States. The studies analyse, within a common interpretive framework, precisely how rulers and states have made strategy. The introduction emphasises the constants in the rapidly shifting world of the strategist; the concluding essay tries to understand the forces that have driven the transformation of strategy since 400 BC and seem likely to continue to transform it in the future.

About this title

Review

"This book traces the processes that resulted in military strategies in 17 cases, ranging from ancient Greece and Rome to American nuclear strategy....Each essay is self-contained, and academics searching for brief but expert analyses of strategic case studies for teaching purposes will welcome this book." Foreign Affairs

"...the essays, including those on Israel and the United States in the nuclear age, are presented with remarkable verve and freshness." Brian Bond, Times Literary Supplement

"The essays by some of the finest strategic analysts in the world, both historians and historically minded political scientists, are of a uniformly high quality. The Making of Strategy is an exceptional work. Anyone who wishes to understand the essence of strategy-making as a process, and the factors that influence strategy-making will profit by reading these essays." Mackubin T. Owens, Strategic Review

"One of the advantages of the book is its essays on lesser-known periods for some powers....Military historians and political scientists can benefit from this work, as can students from the upper-division undergraduate level onward." R. Higham, Choice

"The Making of Strategy: Rulers, States, and War offers an important collection of essays which examines the process of strategic decision-making from the Peloponnesian Wars to the nuclear age." The International History Review

Book Description

An analysis of how rulers and states from the fifth century BC to the present day have formulated their strategic choices. The case studies range from fifth-century Athens to Hitler's Germany, from Ming China to Israel and the post-war world order.

Edition details

• Publisher: Cambridge University Press
• Publication date: 1994
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0521453895
• ISBN 13: 9780521453899
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 704
• Editor: Murray Williamson, Bernstein Alvin, Knox MacGregor