This open access book repositions neutrality as a globally embedded political practice, legal instrument and identity-forming strategy across a wide array of historical and geopolitical contexts. Focusing explicitly on the experiences of individual neutral and non-aligned states, it offers in-depth discussions about the conceptual challenges faced in the past by actors who tried to chart a viable third-party course towards belligerent environments, and offers a fresh, global and cross-disciplinary look into the practice of neutrality.

Interrogating the legal and political agency of states under occupation, such as Hawai'i and China, it revisits the role of neutrality in the Pacific War, the First World War and Cold War diplomacy. Investigating examples such as the tensions between ideology and pragmatism in Indonesian and Irish foreign policies, and the empirical shifts in public perception toward neutrality in places like Switzerland and Luxembourg, it offers case studies from around the globe.

By tracing how states from diverse historical trajectories used neutrality to navigate imperial pressures, shifting alliances, and great power politics, the volume highlights both the adaptability and vulnerability of neutrality as a global concept. Collectively, the chapters argue that neutrality has been-and remains-an active expression of agency within an unequal international order, and that its global history must be reclaimed to better understand the possibilities of non-alignment in the present.

The ebook editions of this book are available open access under a CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 licence on bloomsburycollections.com. Open access was funded by Kyoto University, Japan

Pascal Lottaz is Assistant Professor for Neutrality Studies at the Waseda Institute for Advanced Study, Kyoto University, Japan, where he researches neutral actors in international relations. He heads the research network neutralitystudies.com, which organizes regular academic conferences and publications. He has published 4 edited volumes and a monograph on neutrality.

Eric Golson is an Associate Professor of Economics at the University of Surrey, UK. He has co-authored three books on historical cases of economic warfare, small states and neutrality.
Hillary Briffa is a Senior Lecturer in National Security Studies and Assistant Director for the Centre for Defence Studies at King's College London, UK. She has published extensively on small state neutrality, particularly the neutrality of small European states such as Malta.

Naman Karl-Thomas Habtom defended his PhD thesis at the University of Cambridge where he researched contemporary military and diplomatic history. Habtom has been a guest researcher at the Swedish Defence University, Université Libre de Bruxelle, and Stockholm University, and the University of Luxembourg.