Walsh School of Foreign Service
Mortara
Mortara

Lepgold Book Prize

The Georgetown University Lepgold Book Prize honors Joseph S. Lepgold, a Georgetown University Government and School of Foreign Service professor who died in a tragic hotel fire in Paris in December 2001. The prize honors exceptional contributions to the study of international relations, with particular emphasis on the resolution of critical policy challenges, published each calendar year.

The prize awards $1,000 to the author of the best book in international relations, broadly conceived, each year. To receive the award, the winning author agrees to give a lecture on his or her scholarship at the Mortara Center.

Learn more about the nomination process and the history of the Lepgold Book Prize. Watch the recording of the 2025 Award Ceremony and Lecture.

Winners of the Lepgold Book Prize

  1. Technology and the Rise of Great Powers by Jeffrey Ding
  2. The Geopolitics of Shaming: When Human Rights Pressure Works—and When It Backfires by Rochelle Terman
  3. Pawned States: State Building in the Era of International Finance by Didac Queralt
  4. Disaggregating China, Inc. by Yeling Tan
  5. Divided Armies: Inequality & Battlefield Performance in Modern War by Jason Lyall
  6. Constructing Allied Cooperation: Diplomacy, Payments, and Power in Multilateral Military Coalitions by Marina E. Henke
  7. Arguing About Alliances: The Art of Agreement in Military-Pact Negotiations by Paul Poast
  8. Secret Wars: Covert Conflict In International Politics by Austin Carson
  9. Fighting for Status: Hierarchy and Conflict in World Politics by Jonathan Renshon
  10. Violence and Restraint in Civil War: Civilian Targeting in the Shadow of International Law by Jessica A. Stanton
  11. Making and Unmaking Nations: War, Leadership and Genocide in Modern Africa by Scott Straus
  12. Networks of Rebellion: Explaining Insurgent Cohesion and Collapse by Paul Staniland
  13. The Company States Keep by Julia Gray
  14. Alliance Formation in Civil Wars by Fotini Christia
  15. Leaders and International Conflict by Giacomo Chiozza and H.E. Goemans
  16. The Clash of Ideas in World Politics by John Owen
  17. The Invisible Hand of Peace by Patrick J. McDonald
  18. Targeting Civilians in War by Alexander Downes
  19. The Nuclear Taboo by Nina Tannenwald
  20. Dangerous Nation by Robert Kagan
  21. The Remnants of War by John Mueller
  22. Electing to Fight by Edward D. Mansfield and Jack Snyder
  23. Power and Purpose: U.S. Policy Toward Russia After the Cold War by James Goldgeier and Michael McFaul
  24. A Problem from Hell: America and the Age of Genocide by Samantha Power
  25. The Tragedy of Great Power Politics by John J. Mearsheimer