The authors of this ambitious book address a fundamental political question: why are leaders who produce peace and prosperity turned out of office while those who preside over corruption, war, and misery endure?

DIVIn this landmark work, two leading theorists of international relations analyze the strategies designed to avoid international conflict.

Bruce Bueno de Mesquita is a master of game theory, which is a fancy label for a simple idea: People compete, and they always do what they think is in their own best interest.

“A lucidly written, shrewdly argued meditation on how democrats and dictators preserve political authority.” —Wall Street Journal Bruce Bueno de Mesquita and Alastair Smith’s canonical book on political science turns conventional ...

Clearly explaining both the foundational ideas of international relations as well as the key concepts of the strategic perspective, Bueno de Mesquita effectively links these to the analytic tools students will employ throughout.

This work shows students how leaders translate their personal interests and ambitions into actions of the state and, thus, demonstrates how international and domestic politics are inextricably linked.

What will it take to put you in this car today?

In contrast to most current approaches to international politics, this work views domestic politics and international relations as inseparable and the role of individual political leaders as key.

The book analyzes the viability of policy extremism as a political strategy that enables candidates to forge new coalitions and outflank conventional political allegiances.

In the tradition of Why Nations Fail, this book solves one of the great puzzles of history: Why did the West become the most powerful civilization in the world?