This book by Al-Rodhan should be read, if possible, in connection with his book on symbiotic realism because both books address the theory by the author that international relations and conflicts arising between states can not be fully understood in their origins by looking at solely at states and their actions. Instead, the co-existence in the modern world can be only be peaceful and wars can be best and effectively avoided by understanding that security involves actors and interests besides those of states.
Security for their citizens and ensuring the further existence of states are not the sole driving forces for political decisions. Considerations leading to possible wars are not only focused on the desire of governments for a better future of their citizens and to ensure that their states can continue to exist. These reasons may have been considered the goals of national security in the past.
In the present, the considerations for security include additional factors such as environment, culture, human, and transnational factors. Because of the more complex security principle, states must govern in a way that addresses these additional aspects and thereby ensure that security is achieved with a focus on "justice for all individuals, states and cultures."
The author provides a clear and concise book in which he initially describes the more traditional security principles. This allows the reader to gain an overview of other security principles and fully appreciate how the author's multi-sum security principle is different from other proposed security principles. The author then goes on to develop his security principle by describing the five dimensions, with each aspect being developed in depth by the author. This chapter is crucial to understanding how the author arrives at his model. Together with the subsequent chapter, in which the author argues that justice is an important factor when trying to ensure security, these two chapter lay the foundation for the chapter on the multi-sum security principle. Justice and the five dimensions are equally important aspects of this new security principle. The final chapter is applying the new multi-sum security principle to governance both at the national and international level. At the national level, governance is best used to ensure civil and human rights. At the international level, a simple addition and merging of national governance will not due. States are not the sole players anymore, rather transnational or regional structures gain importance and must be encouraged. Larger players, ranging from regional to eventually multilateral bodies, are more suitable to ensure that justice is not just for the majority, but for all groups, including minority cultures. And it is this inclusion of minorities and all cultures in a just world that will, according to the author, be most suitable in ensuring a more stable world and thereby embody the multi-sum security principle.
