Western State Terrorism examines the political uses to shich the U.S. and its allies have put the terrorism perpetrated by their official enemies-often small scale terrorism compared to that sponsored by the West. The contributors to this study place such retail terrorism in the context of U.S. supported wholesale violence and offer an analysis fo the ideological goals that have been served by mainstream discussions of terrorism. This timely and controversial study radically questions current ideas and definitions of terrorism.

Alexander L. George was Graham H. Stuart Professor of Political Science Emeritus at Stanford University and the author or coauthor of many books, most recently Presidential Personality and Performance (1998).