Balance of Power the Book
 International Politics as the Ultimate Global Game
Copyright 1986 Chris Crawford

I first wrote this book in 1986. This is a slightly edited version. For the most part, I have left the old text untouched, even though it often refers to events more than 30 years old, events that you may not recognize. Did you know that Mr. Reagan bombed Libya? Or that there was a big “people-power” revolution in the Philippines during that time? You’ll just have to brush up on your history. 

In some places I have added notes to give a present-day comment on the book’s statements. These all follow this format:

[2014: This is a comment from the present day.]


Introduction

Chapter 1: Balance of Power and the Real World

Chapter 2: The Wonderful World of Insurgency

Chapter 3: Coups d’Etat

Chapter 4: Finlandization

Chapter 5: Crises

Chapter 6: The Unincluded Factors

Chapter 7: Strategy for Balance of Power

Chapter 8: How Balance of Power was Created

Appendix: A Sample Expert-Level Game

Bibliography

[September 2015: Shpati Koleka has generously assembled the book into a PDF that you can download here. ]