'The history of external interventions aimed at 'fixing failed states' is littered with the detritus of repeated failures. In her provocative and persuasively argued new book, political scientist Susan L. Woodward draws on a wealth of empirical research and her own astute observations to skewer the conventional wisdom that has long driven these failures. Her central thesis is that the concept of failed states - a notion whose flaws she authoritatively catalogues - 'is not just a label but an ideology'. Together with its semantic siblings, it spawned both a set of strongly held and unquestioned principles and, most consequentially, a strategic plan of action for putting these principles into practice . Not content with leaving her inquiry to speak for itself or to append to it a set of anodyne policy recommendations, Woodward concludes with a provocation to both the policy and academic worlds to pursue that most elusive but critical of goals - cumulative learning.' S. Del Rosso, Director, International Peace and Security, Carnegie Corporation of New Yorke and Security, Carnegie Corporation of New Yorke and Security, Carnegie Corporation of New Yorke and Security, Carnegie Corporation of New York.