"A comparative, interdisciplinary study of the robustness and fragility of political orders that focuses on leader understandings and their consequences. It includes studies of failed orders, like Weimar and the Soviet Union, current orders, like the United States, and regional - the European Union - and international orders"--

1. Introduction Richard Ned Lebow and Ludvig Norman; 2. Robustness and fragility of political orders Richard Ned Lebow; 3. End of democracy or recurrent conflict: minimalist democracy, legitimacy crisis, and political equality Peter Breiner; 4. Politics and the administrative state: perceptions of stability and fragility in Weimar Germany Paul Petzschmann; 5. Roots in common: the fragility-robustness of democratic and ecological regimes Andrew Lawrence; 6. The end of communist rule in Europe: a comparative perspective on the fragility and robustness of regimes Archie Brown; 7. Democracy's fragility and the European political order: functionalism, militant democracy, and crisis Ludvig Norman; 8. The American Fragility-Robustness Nexus Ariane Chebel d'Appollonia; 9. The perils of choice: structure and agency in EU crisis management Douglas Webber; 10. Conclusion Richard Ned Lebow and Ludvig Norman.