Interregionalism and International Relations, Heiner Hänggi, Ralf Roloff and Jürgen Rüland, eds., Routledge Advances in International Relations and Global Politics; London: Routledge, 2006, pp. 364.

How do we explain a widespread international phenomenon that only occasionally contributes to the geo-strategic or economic interests of the participating states? This book is about interregionalism, the international organizations and institutions that link regional organizations from more than one region of the world (as, for example, ASEM, also known as Asia-Europe Meeting) or that span across more than one region, such as APEC (Asia-Pacific Economic Co-operation) or FTAA (Free Trade Area of the Americas). The fact is that few of these institutions have accomplished much in concrete terms, yet they continue to proliferate, as the four-and-a-half page list of acronyms at the beginning of this volume amply demonstrates.