The civilizing mission associated with nineteenth-century colonialism became harder to justify after the First World War. In an increasingly anti-imperialist culture, elites reformulated schemes for the "improvement" of "inferior" societies. Nation building, social engineering, humanitarianism, modernization or the spread of democracy were used to justify outside interventions and the top-down transformation of non-western, international or even domestic societies. The contributions in Civilizing Missions in the Twentieth Century discuss how these justifications influenced Polish nation building, Scandinavian disarmament proposals and technocratic social policies in the interwar years. Treatment of the second half of the century covers the changing cultural context of European humanitarianism, as well as the influence of American social science on US foreign policy, more particularly democracy promotion. Contributors are: Boris Barth, Rolf Hobson, Jurgen Osterhammel, Frank Ninkovich, Bianka Pietrow-Ennker, Karen Gram-Skjoldager, Esther Moeller, and Jost Dulffer.

Navies in Northern Waters is a collection of articles covering the roles played by the secondary navies of northern European powers and the United States within the maritime balance of power. The contributions covering the 18th and 19th centuries focus on their relations with each other as they sought to create a counterweight to the dominant naval power of Britain.
The inter-war years are treated from the perspectives of international disarmament efforts within the framework of collective security, and the subsequent naval rivalry in the Baltic area in the years leading up to the Second World War. For the post-1945 period, the contributions concentrate on superpower rivalry in northern waters during the Cold War, the changing aspects of security policy since the collapse of the Soviet Union and the particular challenges facing small coastal states policing extensive waters of increasing economic importance.

Navies in Northern Waters is a collection of articles covering the roles played by the secondary navies of northern European powers and the United States within the maritime balance of power. The contributions covering the 18th and 19th centuries focus on their relations with each other as they sought to create a counterweight to the dominant naval power of Britain.
The inter-war years are treated from the perspectives of international disarmament efforts within the framework of collective security, and the subsequent naval rivalry in the Baltic area in the years leading up to the Second World War. For the post-1945 period, the contributions concentrate on superpower rivalry in northern waters during the Cold War, the changing aspects of security policy since the collapse of the Soviet Union and the particular challenges facing small coastal states policing extensive waters of increasing economic importance.

Die Arbeit von Rolf Hobson wendet sich der Frage nach den maritimen Verteidigungsbedurfnissen des Deutschen Reiches zu und gelangt dabei zu einer neuen Deutung der deutschen Flottenrustung vor dem Ersten Weltkrieg. Dabei berucksichtigt sie vor dem Hintergrund des "industrialisierten Volkskrieges" besonders den Aspekt des Seerechtes. Als Ausdruck des realen maritimen Krafteverhaltnisses engte es in der Dreiecksbeziehung zwischen den beiden Kriegsparteien und den Neutralen den Gebrauch von Seemacht als Instrument eines Wirtschaftskrieges ein. Hobson gelingt der Nachweis, dass sich aufgrund einer selektiven Rezeption des Navalisten Mahan das ursprunglich militarisch begrundete Kalkul der deutschen Flottenrustung zu dem in sich widerspruchlichen Abschreckungskonzept der Risikoflotte wandelte. Rolf Hobson ist wissenschaftlicher Mitarbeiter am Institut fur Verteidigungsforschung in Oslo."