6 reviews for:

The Chessboard and the Web: Strategies of Connection in a Networked World

Anne-Marie Slaughter

3.6 AVERAGE

sadiecyanide's review against another edition

5.0

Insightful

Insightful study of international relations through the prism of network theory arguing for a pluralist approach to ideologies of organisation and governance

msmo's review against another edition

4.0

Author was often speaking to the interconnectedness of social networks and political nation states, but my brain kept drifting to bibliometrics and impact factors. Maybe they are all good models in network theory.

I used audible.com, and it was a bit like listening to a book read by Siri. Ugh.

jonsploder's review against another edition

1.0

Has taken a great concept which I’m fascinated about, network science, merged it with political science (in the title, not in reality), and completely butchered it. A shallow collection of good ideas that are misrepresented in some cases, and clearly misunderstood by the author. Anyone who has seen someone in the humanities who has never taken a tertiary math course trying to talk about math or physics, ramble on about chaos theory, quantum physics, neural networks and artificial intelligence, as if they understand any of it. The treatment of eigenvector distance in a social network was particularly lousy, because people in the humanities only worship big words, so the author makes it out to be a mystical elusive concept at parts, before proudly simplifying it for her readers… well done.

Not only that, the font is large, and my main gripe is every 3 pages could be condensed into a single sentence without all the waffle of unsubstantiated opinionated crap, name dropping, and random quote insertion for an air of sophistication. So yes the book is printed and drawn out to seem like it treats a topic well, but could be summarised in 10-20 pages much better.

Sadly I have nothing better to recommend, as my journey into network science is just beginning, but Wikipedia would do a better job, and even a dry maths textbook would be better than this. Skim read it at best

marksongs's review against another edition

5.0

This is an excellent book on Foreign Policy and International Relations. I got a lot out of this book, especially because my IR professor in college was not very able to articulate his view of international relations with respect to views put forth in some of my other courses. This book really helped to explain in modern terms how relationships work in IR as integrated into more traditional approaches. Slaughter is also a good writer, and she was able to convey a lot of information in a single book. There are plenty of bibliographical footnotes for those who are interested in the various, interwoven topics that she introduces us to in this reasonably short book. I can definitely see her book becoming required reading in future college courses on International Relations.

taylermae's review against another edition

3.0

Certainly well-written and well-researched, this book seems situated in a very particular time and place. Reading it even two years after it was published, I could feel the technological dating of it. It was insightful for redefining the current state of international relations.

sadiecyanide's review

5.0

Insightful

Insightful study of international relations through the prism of network theory arguing for a pluralist approach to ideologies of organisation and governance