Best Book 2010
Previous Winners
The prize for Best Book has been awarded to Dr Urfan Khaliq for his book entitled 'Ethical Dimensions of the Foreign Policy of the European Union: A Legal Appraisal', Cambridge University Press (ISBN13-9780521870757).
The judges considered this should become a reference point for debates on the normative dimensions of EU external policy, bridging legal science and foreign policy analysis. A policy-maker review in JCMS also labelled the book “indispensable reading for anyone interested in human rights diplomacy”.
The author manages to forward arguments in a concise and accessible language even if the subject matter invites technical and detached styles of argument. This achievement demonstrates that the author masters the material and cares about presenting it to the community. This book is characterized by having a professional backbone, yet also a healthy dash of pragmatism combined with an excellent insight ino the subject matter, resulting in prudent interpretations and balanced conclusions.
This is one of the most comprehensive and elaborate studies on the topic.
 Stephen Wall and Urfan Khaliq |
The panel of judges comments noted that this ambitious book is set to become the ‘bible’ for anyone interested in European citizenship. Magisterial yet readable, this truly interdisciplinary book uses the case of electoral rights for non-nationals as the basis of a broader enquiry into the transformation of the nature of citizenship in contemporary Europe. Uniting theory and empirical investigation, the book should act as an ambassador for European studies to other fields. It is expected to be a future classic.
 Jo Shaw collecting her prize from Stephen Wall at the UACES Conference Dinner and Awards Ceremony, Edinburgh |
 Andrew Jordan, Adriaan Schout, Alex Warleigh-Lack & John Kerr |
Oxford University Press, ISBN 0-19-9286957 (Discount price available for UACES Members)
 Stephen Wall and Lynn Dobson |
Dobson’s book Supranational Citizenship was considered by the judges to demonstrate excellence in a different kind of scholarship from that of Jordan and Schout. Drawing neither on empirical work nor on tools adapted from the study of national citizenships, but rather on foundational principles of moral and political philosophy, the book makes an original contribution to the treatment of EU democracy and citizenship through close and rigorous theoretical argument. It also suggests how supranational forms of citizenship – such as that of the EU – might inspire rethinking of moral and political agency in other contexts and polities. Praised for its mastery of the normative political theory and more mainstream EU studies literatures, the book was considered by the judges to be an important contribution to EU studies, citizenship studies, and moral philosophy more generally.
Manchester University Press, ISBN 071-9069521 (Discount price available for UACES Members)
The UACES prize for the book making the most substantial and original contribution to knowledge in the area of European Studies published during 2005 was awarded by the judges to Dr Georg Menz of Goldsmiths College, London for his book Varieties of Capitalism and Europeanization National Response Strategies to the Single European Market.
Oxford University Press, ISBN: 0199273863 (Discount price available for UACES Members)
Commending the book, the judges noted that this was an outstanding piece of work. Based on wide and rigorous empirical research, the analysis examines the impact of the liberalisation of services on the national labour markets and regimes of labour market regulation. The ostensibly narrow focus on ‘posted workers’ might seem a little restricting, but Menz succeeds very well in drawing out the broader implications of the study. In that sense, it is a text on the Europeanisation of public space in response to deeper market integration. It also delivers a range of core critiques of the types of concepts that social scientists working in the field tend to assume. It paints a much bigger picture of ‘capitalism’ under a process of transformation in three countries (France, Germany, Austria), although the research is not confined to those three. The singular importance of this work is that it takes forward a key debate on de-regulation and re-regulation in a detailed manner which has not been done so often – and certainly seldom so well. In that sense it tells us much about shifting currents in capitalisms, both at the level of relations between ‘capital’ and ‘labour’, and at the level of the institutional response to those shifting currents.
The judges also decided to make a ‘Special Award of Distinction’ to Dr Zara Steiner of New Hall, Cambridge, for her book The Lights that Failed: European International History 1919-1933.
Oxford University Press, ISBN: 0198221142 (Discount price available for UACES Members)
The judges agreed that this was a very important book the publication of which should be marked in some way. It covers the European international history of the period 1919 to 1933. It is underpinned by a clear argument which is that the 1920s should not be seen as the decade that led to the disasters of the 1930s and thence to the Second World War, but as a decade in which decision-makers sought to find a way through the often competing claims of nationalism, and the demands for a greater internationalism. The hinge-years of 1929-33 revealed how order carefully nurtured can nevertheless collapse under massive economic, social and political pressures. The book is very clearly written. It eschews point-scoring, but combines authoritative narrative, analysis and pen-portraits in a way that ensures it will have a long shelf-life. However, it is not only authoritative, but it is also accessible, and requires no previous historical background. Finally, the book is highly relevant to those who are interested in contemporary Europe: for example, it teases out the ambitions, strengths and weaknesses of the League of Nations as an international organisation, and, focusing in particular on disarmament and rearmament, it has ‘lessons’ about the potential and limitations of international institutions.
 John Kerr and Stefan Auer |
The 2005 prize winner was Dr Stefan Auer for his book Liberal Nationalism in Central Europe, published by RoutledgeCurzon. Stefan Auer was awarded his prize at the UACES Annual Conference Dinner, in Zagreb, September 2005, by UACES Honorary President, John Kerr (Lord Kerr of Kinlochard).
Routledge Curzon, ISBN: 0415314798 - (Discount price available for UACES Members)
This book develops an argument about the positive value of liberal nationalism in contemporary European politics, asserting en route that the categories of civic nationalism and ethnic nationalism do not tell the whole story and can be misleading. The author also takes aim both at those who see an historical dividing line in Europe between the barbarians to the east, and western Europe; as well as at those would re-invent the European fissure-lines to put central Europe in with western Europe and shift the frontier of ‘civilisation’ further to the east (and south). He has three case studies on Poland, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, through which he develops his argument about the existence and strengths of liberal nationalism. What impressed the jury was that that the author engages - with equal ease - the (essentially Western) literatures on nationalism (including liberal nationalism), and then goes on to interrogate these ideas with reference to particular political developments in the countries themselves – including the literatures therein.
Auer’s book is a serious and important book with a genuine intellectual argument, and takes forward the wider debates about the European continent. It can itself be imagined as a reference source for further work in this important area – an area of scholarship which is bound to be highly relevant in the coming years.