His familiarity with the body of just war literature and his unconventional approach to the question make his contribution worthy of critical engagement. Recommended.

CHOICE

Eric Patterson's small and eminently readable volume can easily serve as a digestible short introduction to the history and major components of the Just War tradition. His approach is especially helpful as a result of his concern with the changing nature of conflict in the contemporary environment.

Parameters

Eric Patterson succeeds in rescuing discussion about the justice of war from stale questions and arcane philosophy and brings analysis square into the most relevant debates of the age—humanitarian intervention, the war on terrorism, and justice after war's end. Ironically, he does so by returning to the very historical foundations of the just war tradition. And he does so with rhetorical force, conceptual clarity, and refreshing directness.

- Daniel Philpott, University of Notre Dame,