The Saudi Kingdom: Between the Jihadi Hammer and the Iranian Anvil

Persian Gulf Security System”, that describes one win-win scenario. The absence of other suggested scenarios, and the limited list of other scholars’ work, suggests opportunities to focus on problem-solving strategies. Perhaps the focus should shift from substance to process, especially regarding the obvious lack of peaceful dispute-resolution mechanisms, capacity, and mindsets in the region. Chillingly, the author declares that, in this unstable landscape, the use of force rather than negotiation is the least damaging choice among available options (p. 119). The book left this reader particularly concerned about the ability of the younger, more belligerent generation of leaders to handle skillfully the security dilemmas they face, along with sectarianism, extremism, and the human security needs of their citizens. Mismanagement of these issues could easily lead to devastating results for the whole region. The author also acknowledges the importance of human security— so it would have been useful to provide data about issues of human security faced by each Persian Gulf country, including population trends,more demographic and economic data, and a discussion of citizens’ access to jobs, food, housing, and health care. What do these security threats look like in the coming years? While the book is well-written and easy to read, the author uses several similarly named political science concepts that may serve to confuse readers who do not possess the necessary scholarly IR background. These include the concepts of security, insecurity, securitization, security architecture, security complexes, security dilemma, security guarantee, and security paradox. To this reviewer’s mind, this slim volume could also have benefited from further editing to eliminate some of the redundancies in later chapters. Chapter organization seemed to force some of these redundancies. Nonspecialist readers might have wished for more discussion of the origins of some of the theories Kamrava applies, especially the security strategies by which states power balance, hedge, and bandwagon to increase their own security (pp. 34, 40–42, 89–90, 105–08, 116–19). Examples of “collective” or “common security systems” would have helped this reader (pp. 34, 117). In conclusion, Kamrava, a prolific author, provides a fearless examination of the persistent tensions in the most volatile region in the world, along with the security architecture that makes it persistently unstable. One hopes that the author plans to write a new book in which he applies this security analysis to the specific circumstances of the sanctions against Qatar.