International Relations Since 1945

International Relations since 1945 is the most student-friendly guide to the history of international relations. In it, Young and Kent provide an accessible and comprehensive introduction to key developments in international relations across the world. Now in its third edition, the text has been thoroughly updated to include contemporary developments and includes a brand new concluding part: 'The Age of Uncertainty, 2011 - 2018'. New to the third edition are three chapters covering developments from the last decade. The first of these, 'Conflict and Chaos in the Middle East', describes the development of the War in Syria and the emergence of the so-called Islamic State. Young & Kent tackle Brexit and the Trump administration in a new chapter on 'Threats to the existing Global Order: Instability in the West'. The final new chapter details 'Challenges from the East' with an overview of Russia's unstable relationship with NATO, North Korea's nuclear ambitions, and China's new international economic rules under the leadership of Xi Jinping. International Relations Since 1945 is helpfully structured chronologically and by region, taking the reader through the tension of the Cold War and post-war decolonisation to the Vietnam War, The Détente Era, and the latest developments in Middle East politics. Furthermore, students are supported by helpful learning features including biographies of key figures and chronologies of events.

1 - Tensions in the Grand Alliance and Growing Confrontation, 1945-7
2 - Two Worlds East and West, 1945-8
3 - Empire, Cold War, and Decolonization, 1945-53
4 - The Cold War Intensifies: Containment Superseded, 1948-53
5 - Soviet-American Relations: Avoiding Hot War and the Search for Stability
6 - Maintaining the Spheres of Influence
7 - Fighting the Cold War: The Offensive Strategies
8 - Collapsing Empires: The Cold War Battle for Hearts and Minds, 1953-63
9 - The Eastern and Western Blocs in the 1960s
10 - The Vietnam War
11 - Other Regional Conflicts
12 - An Era of Negotiations, 1972-3
13 - 'Stagflation' and the Trials of Détente, 1973-6
14 - Détente in Decline, 1977-9
15 - The Return to Confrontation, 1979-80
16 - The 'Second' Cold War, 1981-5
17 - Middle East Conflicts in the 1980s
18 - Instability in Latin America
19 - The Decline of the Cold War, 1985-9
20 - Europe and the Former Soviet Union
21 - US Predominance and the Search for a Post-Cold War Order
22 - Stability and Instability in the Less Developed World
23 - The 'War on Terror' and the War in Afghanistan
24 - The War in Iraq
25 - Economic Problems in the West and the Economic Rise of China in the East
26 - Conflict and Chaos in the Middle East
27 - Threats to the existing Global Order: Instability in the West
28 - Threats to the Existing Global Order: Challenges from the East

Professor John W. Young is an expert on post-1945 history of British and US foreign policy (including British relations with European Union), based at the University of Nottingham, UK. Dr John Kent has taught at the Universities of Aberdeen and Strathclyde and is currently an Emeritus Professor at the London School of Economics.