Book reviews International Relations theory Human beings in International Relations. Edited by Daniel Jacobi and Annette Freyberg-Inan. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 2015. 379pp. Index. £65.00. isbn 978 1 10711 625 2. Available as e-book Daniel L. Byman and Kenneth M. Pollack’s 2001 appeal in International Security to bring the statesman back in has largely been ignored in International Relations (IR). Perhaps this is due to IR’s very subject-matter or because of the inherent difficulties in conceptualizing the role individuals play in world politics. But this cannot be the case any longer, for editors Daniel Jacobi and Annette Freyberg-Inan (and their many contributors) offer inHuman beings in Inter- national Relations a comprehensive and decisive account which eloquently argues that human beings have always been central to IR. Without doubt, their impressive volume answers Byman and Pollack’s call ‘to develop a more comprehensive set of theories regarding the role of individuals in international relations’. Jacobi and Freyberg-Inan have delivered a monumental work that will surely prove to be agenda-setting, and is an essential starting-point for all IR scholars who seek to deepen their understanding of the role of human nature in IR. The book’s biggest merit is its modesty in not aiming to set out a new school of thought, paradigm or theory. Instead, it employs a distinction between International Political Anthropology (IPA) and International Political Post-Anthropology (IPPA) as a heuristic device which also neatly divides the two parts of the volume. IPA approaches are charac- terized by a human-centred framework, while IPPA approaches decentre human beings. In other words, IPPA approaches do not rely on human nature alone to account for inter- national politics. The authors emphasize that IPA and IPPA do not necessarily oppose each other; rather, they are ‘two sides of one and the same coin, i.e. of a comprehensive, balanced, open-minded, and up-to-date study of the human element, its relation to world politics, and our ways of producing knowledge about them’ (p. 31). This is further strength- ened by the fact that, on occasion, the two fields are brought together as IP(P)A, to denote a ‘thinking space to observe our understandings of the human element and to connect them with international politics’ (p. 310). In sum, by refusing to get locked into a single paradigm or theory, the authors have succeeded in offering an account of human beings in IR that is applicable to the entire discipline. Part I (IPA) features eight state-of-the-art chapters that examine in depth the extent to which IR theories deal with the human subject, while part II (IPPA) offers six chapters that reject the models offered in part I. This proves to be a particularly powerful way of setting up the volume: the IPA chapters stay within and build on their respective traditions and the IPPA chapters offer alternatives to readers dissatisfied with IPA approaches, while at the same time these latter chapters pose important questions that need to be addressed, such as when and how agency emerges and who can actually count as an agent. Each of the International Affairs 92: 1 2016 197–245 © 2016 The Author(s). International Affairs © 2016 The Royal Institute of International Affairs.Published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd, 9600 Garsington Road, Oxford ox4 2dq, UK and 350 Main Street, Malden, MA 02148, USA. Book reviews 14 chapters is of exceptionally high quality, and the editors have done an impressive job in gathering a wide variety of renowned IR theorists. To give a short illustrative selection, there are chapters by: Duncan Bell (chapter five, ‘In biology we trust: biopolitical science and the elusive self ’); Richard Ned Lebow (chapter six, ‘Greeks, neuroscience, and Interna- tional Relations’); Colin Wight (chapter nine, ‘Realism, agency, and the politics of nature’); and Oliver Kessler (chapter 13, ‘Observing visions of man’). Completing the volume are a very substantive introduction and conclusion, both of which succeed in connecting to the wider field of IR theory. As a finishing touch, the conclusion also offers a broad range of tantalizing options for future research. Jacobi and Freyberg-Inan address the shortcomings of mainstream IPA approaches in theorizing on human nature, and compellingly argue that neglecting IPPA approaches will hamper IR research on human beings. Human beings in International Relations reveals both the importance of theorizing human beings and the lack of conscious theorizing thus far. The volume also offers scholars who already use IPA approaches additional theoretical grounding to improve their research, while the IPPA chapters pose fundamental questions on the nature of our subject of study that are relevant to all IR scholars. Finally, by decen- tring human beings, IPPA treads new ground when it comes to understanding underde- veloped concepts such as agency: ‘by moving not from human agents directly to social structure, but first of all to the social structure of agency, IPPA can usefully reconstruct the basic elements of agency’ (p. 326). Human beings in International Relations is a grand achievement. It is a monumental work that sets the agenda on studying the role of human nature in IR for years to come. It is comprehensive, and offers crucial insights to both veteran researchers and scholars that are new to the subject. In short, it is not to be missed. Yuri van Hoef, University of Leeds, UK Emotional diplomacy: official emotion on the international stage. By Todd H. Hall. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press. 2015. 264pp. £26.25. isbn 978 0 80145 301 4. Available as e-book. Emotion has long been a central component of successful diplomacy. Although traditional approaches to the practice of statecraft focus on a reasoned calculation of interests, diplo- macy nevertheless relies on the art of persuasion. Expressions of empathy, sympathy, anger and even guilt are key to effective diplomatic negotiations.Emotional diplomacy builds on this knowledge to demonstrate that state actors undertake explicit and coordinated emotional expressions as part of a deliberate political strategy. Understanding the role of official emotion in state interaction allows us, Todd H. Hall argues, to comprehend the power of emotional diplomacy as a behaviour and strategy in its own right. State actors employ official emotion through the mandated performance of linguistic and symbolic expressions connected to specific actions as a targeted means to achieve key political goals. Hall demonstrates that emotional diplomacy—the official projection of a particular emotional response from one state to another through synchro- nized behaviour at all levels of government—is an instrumental tool of strategy that has far-reaching international political consequences. Hall examines practices of official emotion in three stages. First, in chapter one, ‘Emotional diplomacy’, he illustrates how the synchronized team performance of emotion is a purposeful, conscious and deliberate action. Emotional diplomacy pushes conventional diplomatic encounters beyond routine interactions, as it frames the image of a state and 198 International Affairs 92: 1, 2016 Copyright © 2016 The Author(s). International Affairs © 2016 The Royal Institute of International Affairs. International Relations theory how it wishes to be perceived in the international arena. Hall maintains that emotional diplomacy has the capacity to transform interstate relations: the emotional image a state wants to project to another plays a key role in the instigation of political crises or the mitiga- tion of potential conflict. In the second stage, Hall applies his theoretical framework of emotional diplomacy to investigate its effects in three case-studies with different central emotional politics: anger and the Taiwan Strait Crisis of 1995–6; sympathy and the responses of the Russian Federa- tion and People’s Republic of China to the US in the aftermath of 9/11; and guilt within the relationship between the Federal Republic of Germany and the state of Israel (chapter four). Herein lies one of the key strengths of this book, as Hall deftly illustrates how anger, sympathy and guilt unfold in each interstate relationship using interviews, excerpts from official telegrams, public policy statements and newspaper articles. However, this reviewer was left wondering about the role of other affective dynamics in the practice of emotional diplomacy, beyond the official emotional image that a state projects to others. The case- study in chapter two on the PRC’s response to Taiwanese president Lee Teng-hui’s visit to Cornell University, which preceded the Taiwan Strait Crisis, clearly illustrates how China projected synchronized state-level official anger towards the US and Taiwan, yet the role of humiliation in this response goes unexamined. Given the historical contingency of China’s ‘Century of National Humiliation’, how the insult of Lee’s visit—although presented as unofficial by Taiwan he ‘nonetheless enjoyed an impressive degree of celebrity’ (p. 58)— might have been framed through previous experiences of humiliation that allowed for a turn to anger would have provided further insight into the development of official emotion. In chapter five, ‘Further studies in emotional diplomacy’, Hall extends the case-study analyses to further develop his argument that official emotion matters on the international stage. Hall rightly demonstrates that recurring emotional patterns—particularly those of anger, sympathy and guilt—exist in the practice of diplomacy, and go much further than traditional approaches in explaining dramatic shifts in interstate relations. He also develops the distinction between official and popular emotion (pp. 191–2), which adds nuance to his claims regarding the strategic value of state-level emotional behaviour. While Hall demonstrates that there are shared conventional understandings of how anger, sympathy and guilt are conveyed, a limitation of this position is that it can overlook historical and cultural particularities and thus representations that influence the perfor- mance and reception of emotional diplomacy.