Examines international efforts to punish perpetrators of genocide and other war crimes, combining history, politics, and critical analysis. Traces efforts to create an institution to judge and punish such atrocities, and discusses international military tribunals in Nuremberg and Tokyo, the failure to stop Pol Pot in Cambodia, and tribunals convened to address genocide in the Balkans and Rwanda. Focuses on establishment of the International Criminal Court with the Treaty of Rome in 1998, and analyzes US reluctance to grant criminal justice jurisdiction to an international prosecutor. The author is a professor of political science and university scholar at the University of Vermont. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)