This major new text analyzes changes and continuities in the current international order and their implications for understanding international development in the 21st century. The author assesses the extent and impact of globalization as well as the emergence of a more aggressive unilateralist and militarist stance by the United States and the debates this has provoked on hegemony, empire and imperialism. He offers a careful rebuttal of mainstream thinking on development and globalization while also challenging some key arguments of its radical critics.

RAY KIELY is Professor of International Politics, Queen Mary and Westfield College, University of London.

"This invaluable text aims to restore to development the 'broad ambition of that once stimulating area of study' by re-setting it in the indispensable historical and political-economic context from which it has been progressively divorced in recent decades and engaging with the large and complex forces that actually determine the fate of the world's poor. To a truly admirable extent, it succeeds, in the process guiding the reader through a vast range of literature and making judicious assessments of all the key debates." --Colin Leys, Emeritus Professor, Queen's University, Kingston, Canada