The American Political Science Association (APSA) is delighted to announce that Kathrin Bachleitner (University of Salzburg), Sarah Bufkin (University of Birmingham), and Anne-Margret Wolf (University of Oxford) have been selected to lead the book review section of the journal Perspectives on Politics through May 31, 2026.
The incoming editorial team is excited to share their vision for the book review section of the journal:
“We are thrilled to serve as the new Book Review editors for the journal over the next three years. Perspectives on Politics has been at the center of the disciplinary conversation in political science for decades, and the book review pages have offered a vital guide to new work, from both established and emerging scholars. We seek to further build on the careful stewardship of past book review editors, who published thousands of reviews over their tenure. In that respect, we will continue to publish both single and double book reviews as well as Critical Dialogues in the journal’s four core areas — Comparative Politics, International Relations, American Politics and Political Theory.
Books are a key source of new ideas in the field, and we want to take seriously the contributions they make to political science. During our time at the helm, we are committed to further cultivating the rich and expansive debate that serious book reviews produce. In particular, we aim to actively seek out contributions from scholars from a broad range of backgrounds, institutions, methodologies, and career stages in hopes of capturing a plurality of perspectives — and the productive forms of epistemic friction that such diversity can introduce. It is important to us that we make space for underrepresented voices in the field, both in terms of the authors whose work we review and the scholars we invite to offer their critical engagement. But above all, we are excited to continue the conversations that drive the discipline’s scholarship forward as it tackles new challenges.”
Meet the Editors
Dr. Kathrin Bachleitner is a Political Scientist at the University of Salzburg, specializing in International Relations. Her research focuses on memories of war and the legacies that political violence leaves on countries and their global politics. She has published her findings in the monograph “Collective Memory in International Relations” (Oxford University Press 2021), and in numerous peer-reviewed IR journals such as International Security, Review of International Studies, Cooperation and Conflict, and Foreign Policy Analysis. She began her academic career at the University of Oxford, where she was the IKEA Foundation Research Fellow in International Relations between 2018 and 2023. She received an M.A. (in International Relations and Economics) from the School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS), Johns Hopkins University, and a D.Phil (in International Relations) from the University of Oxford.
Dr. Sarah Bufkin is an assistant professor in political theory in the Department of Political Science and International Studies at the University of Birmingham. She completed her doctorate in Politics at the University of Oxford, funded by a Rhodes Scholarship and a Prize Fellowship at All Souls College. Before that, she studied at The Queen’s University-Belfast and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Sarah works on political theories of racism and racialization, with specific emphases on the U.S. and the U.K. She has previously written about racial ideology, practices of inequality in racialized markets, death penalty sentencing in North Carolina, the politics of hunger striking, and the diagnosis of social pathologies. She is currently working on a book on Frantz Fanon’s sociogenic critique of racial hierarchies.
Dr. Anne Wolf is a Fellow at All Souls College, University of Oxford, where she researches and teaches Authoritarian Politics, with a focus on the Middle East and North Africa. She is the author of Ben Ali’s Tunisia: Power and Contention in an Authoritarian Regime (Oxford University Press 2023) and Political Islam in Tunisia: The History of Ennahda (Oxford University Press 2017), a CHOICE Outstanding Academic Title. Wolf has written about democratic backsliding, revolutions, and authoritarian institutions, and she is currently editing an OUP Handbook of Authoritarian Politics. Between 2014 and 2016, she was the Margaret Smith Research Fellow in Politics and International Relations at the University of Cambridge, Girton College. Wolf holds an M.Phil in Politics and International Relations from the University of Cambridge and a D.Phil in Oriental Studies from the University of Oxford.
Please send all books for review to: Perspectives on Politics Book Review Questions? Please email [email protected]. |