Can smaller countries achieve through cooperation what superpowers cannot achieve by force? The military forces of the United States are reluctant to engage in peacekeeping, stabilization, and nation building, and the complexity of working in a national bureaucracy that is bigger and more divided than the United Nations and European Union combined makes response by the world's superpower difficult. Still, the chaotic margins of international order need stabilizing if they are not to threaten western and global interests in perpetuity. Herein lies the challenge of expeditionary missions for smaller advanced democracies: reject the technological fantasy of future war scenarios, come to terms with the social context of violence and the human implications of managing it, and project stabilization globally in support of a consensus that will survive a changing world order. Mission Critical will appeal to scholars, military, and strategic planners in countries small and large with an interest in sharing the heavy lifting of international security more effectively.

Christian Leuprecht (Ph.D, Queen’s) is Class of 1965 Professor in Leadership, Department of Political Science, Royal Military College, on leave as Matthew Flinders Fellow at Flinders University in South Australia. He is a recipient of RMC’s Cowan Prize for Excellence in Research and an elected member of the College of New Scholars of the Royal Society of Canada. He is president of the International Sociological Association’s Research Committee 01: Armed Forces and Conflict Resolution, Munk Senior Fellow at the Macdonald Laurier Institute and cross-appointed to the Department of Political Studies and the School of Policy Studies at Queen’s University where he is also a fellow of the Institute of Intergovernmental Relations and the Queen’s Centre for International and Defence Policy. An expert in security and defence, political demography, and comparative federalism and multilevel governance, he has held visiting positions in North America, Europe, and Australia, and is regularly called as an expert witness to testify before committees of Parliament.

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