The Masks of the Political God. Religion and Political Parties in Contemporary Democracies

True, such an abundance of evidence could have been investigated further, but this does not challenge the argument per se. In conclusion, just one issue needs to be raised: while the author systematically delves into the realist scholarship, other approaches are neglected. Borrowing from Lakatos’ terminology, one may be tempted to question whether the argument presented stands up to a threecornered fight. Constructivism in particular is almost absent from the investigation, despite the many contributions published from this perspective on both US foreign policy and the international order. Nonetheless, Natalizia’s book deserves praise for the theoretical and methodological rigour underlying the analysis. The reader is guided by the author’s sober prose through the conceptual subtleties of the IR literature, a number of compelling critiques, his working hypothesis and, finally, a historical tour-de-force. For sure, this volume makes a welcome addition to the growing Italian scholarship on this topic.