Historical interest in the League of Nations has long been limited. This applied to both the number of studies and the scope of research, which focused primarily on the dramatic failure of the League as an international security system. The League of Nations could not prevent Japan’s invasion of Manchuria, nor the rise of totalitarian and belligerent regimes in Germany and Italy, nor the outbreak of World War II in 1939. The only positive point sometimes mentioned, including by Eric Hobsbawm (cited by the authors), concerns the pioneering work done within the League in collecting and processing statistical data on a global scale. Over the past three decades, the situation has changed: the number of studies has increased, and the scope of research has expanded to include other areas in which the League was active in addition to maintaining the international security order – a theme that has become even more relevant in the light of current international political developments.

The League of Nations Experience: Overlapping Readings fits within this trend. This volume is the result of an international symposium held in Portugal in 2019 on the occasion of the centenary of the founding of the League, under the auspices of, among others, NOVA University of Lisbon. Edited by Aurora Almada e Santos, a specialist in international organizations and decolonization, and Yvette Santos, a specialist in migration, international governance, and Portuguese history, it comprises ten contributions by various authors, somewhat arbitrarily divided into four parts describing the genesis and underlying ideas (“A contentious idea”); the ambitions and strategies of selected participating states (“Hopes and aspirations”); the attitudes of internationalists and the role of the main non-member state, the United States (“Decentering the view”); and several practical fields of activity and achievements of the League (“A plethora of varied initiatives”).

Although the contributions vary in style and thematic impact, the collection as a whole is successful. Remarkably, the contributions contain hardly any systematic descriptions of the League itself. A wide range of perspectives, descriptions, and analyses of external and internal actors and developments paints a kaleidoscopic picture of the functioning of the League, which is highly informative about the organization and its significance. For example, the contribution by Dolf-Alexander Neuhaus, senior research fellow at the German Institute for Japanese Studies in Tokyo, “Korea and the League of Nations: from Versailles to the Manchurian Crisis, 1919–1933”, focuses primarily on the Korean independence movement, which aimed at obtaining League membership. Opinions differed: membership could represent the pinnacle of international recognition, prompting several lobbying efforts; yet frustration with Western dominance – colonially oriented and not devoid of racist ideas – also spurred the founding of the Korean Communist Party and contributed to an Asian counter-movement advocating universal rights grounded in regional values, such as Confucian or Buddhist principles.

The structural flaw in the League’s system – Western dominance combined with a colonial mentality – is also articulated in the article by Thomas Gidney, researcher at the Geneva Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies, “The accession of British colonies to the League of Nations and the ‘Third’ British Empire”, on the admission of non-sovereign parts of the British Empire. Membership was attractive because it allowed these territories to raise their international profile, yet the form this membership took was largely dictated by British imperial ambitions. Significant differences in status and self-determination existed between, on the one hand, the dominions or “white colonies” and, on the other hand, India and mandated Egypt, based on racial divisions. For Indian independence activists, it soon became clear that the League would not help achieve their goals. Egypt became the last country to join the League in 1936, after a difficult period with Britain. Its membership retained symbolic value, although the League had become a “paper tiger”.

An earlier article, “The Institut de Droit International’s response to the birth of the League of Nations”, by Philippe Rygiel, Professor of Modern History in Lyon, likewise highlights the colonial context in describing the rapid rise of the internationalist movement in Europe and the United States in the second half of the nineteenth century. These cosmopolitan, peace-oriented “Victorian Liberals”, staunch supporters of colonialism, had high expectations of international law. The leaders of this movement were not unworldly idealists but found themselves at the centre of power as board members of international organizations and as ministers in national governments. The goal was to create an international peace and security system, in which states would refrain from armed conflict and instead choose to prevent and resolve disputes through international cooperation, law, and justice. A major driving force in the field of international law was the – still very active – IDI, co-founded in 1873 by Dutch legal scholar Tobias Asser. Rygiel outlines the IDI’s work and objectives and its seemingly paradoxical stance towards the League, whose creation raised concerns because it challenged the centrality of international law. Rygiel also points to another weakness of the League and international institutions in general: the hegemony of the Great Powers, which undermined the principle of state equality.

The article by Rebecca Shriver, Professor of Modern European History at Missouri Southern State University, ties into this. In “The League of Nations or European federation: The Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom’s decade of debate over a ‘United States of Europe,’ 1923–1933”, she focuses on a struggle that manifested itself in the 1920s and 1930s in the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom, a transnational women’s organization, founded in 1915 in The Hague, that was explicitly not concerned with charity but with international political change with the aim of achieving lasting peace. A major point of contention became the attitude to be adopted towards the League of Nations. Partly out of fear of Great Power hegemony and the erosion of the principle of state equality, a group of WILPF members recognized that the League of Nations was a major improvement on the old power system but argued that it did not go far enough to ensure lasting peace. They advocated a European – and ultimately world – federation. Geographical and political differences shaped these divisions: advocates tended to be found in continental Europe, especially in Germany and France, and were socially and politically radical, while more conservative opponents came largely from the Anglo-American world. Shriver also notes gender-related issues: women politicians from the WILPF seeking national or international influence struggled to be heard and had, as she writes, “limited allies”.

A recurring theme throughout the volume is the absence of the United States from the League. The book shows clearly that despite its non-membership, the US exerted great influence as a dominant political and economic power. This is explored in two articles comprising the third part. In “Plow shares into swords: The League of Nations as a weapon of internationalist war”, David Ekbladh, Professor of History at Tufts University, examines the growing American interest in the League’s “technical parts” during the 1930s, including sections dealing with economics, finance, food, health, housing, and migration. The importance of this work for restoring world trade, economic growth, and international stability gained increasing recognition, including by President Franklin D. Roosevelt. After the failures in Manchuria and Abyssinia, the US saw no future political role for the League and even considered abolishing its Council. But the technical organs were regarded as viable, and, under the influence of the Rockefeller Foundation, a reform of the League of Nations was pursued in the second half of the 1930s. The American desire for reform dovetailed with similar plans within the League, amid hopes in Geneva that reform could lead to US participation or at least permanent involvement. The result was a far-reaching reform programme drawn up by former Australian Prime Minister Stanley Bruce, which prioritized the social and economic work of the League. To this end, the plan also provided for a new main body, the Central Committee for Economic and Social Questions, to stand alongside the Council. The plan was adopted by the Assembly in September 1939, but its implementation was overtaken by the outbreak of war.

In the second article, “Survived on sufferance: Social policy, the ILO and the new ‘World Organisation,’ 1941–1945”, Geert Van Goethem, Professor of History at Ghent University and a specialist in the history of the international trade union movement and the ILO, explores subsequent developments. An isolationist counter-movement within the US State Department, opposed to socio-economic international cooperation and regulation, influenced the shape of post-war planning. After the outbreak of war, the new American policymakers no longer focused on reforming the organization but on a new international postwar system for peace and security. Under the influence of the nationally oriented American counter-movement, the main goal of the new system would be to maintain international security, which rendered the League obsolete in American eyes; attention shifted to designing a new peace and security system centred on a Security Council with reduced socio-economic competences. This paradigm shift had severe consequences for the ILO, which Roosevelt, during the reform movement in the 1930s, had regarded as essential in building a new world order based on social justice and peace. Instead, the ILO faced a dramatic reduction of its mandate in the postwar situation. The decline of the ILO – and with it the international trade union movement – was dramatically illustrated by the marginal role it played at the 1945 San Francisco Conference.

In addition to an earlier article on Portugal’s attempts to obtain a Council seat (Jesús Bermejo Roldán and Quintino Lopes), the final part contains three contributions by Arne L. Gellrich and Erik Koenen, Martin Bemmann, and Sara Ercolani. These address, respectively, the Secretariat’s Information Section, its renowned statistical department, and attempts at regulating international trafficking in women and children. They highlight the organizational strength of the Secretariat and underline a point also made by the editors in their “Introduction”: the League of Nations was never a finished product. As a completely new organization, it was in constant development – hence the title’s reference to the “League of Nations Experience”.

In summary, The League of Nations Experience: Overlapping Readings is an informative, engaging, and – given current events – significant book. The themes addressed, particularly economic inequality and living standards as drivers of global peace, and the rise of nationalist and anti-liberal forces in the United States and their implications for the international system, have strong contemporary resonance, although the authors do not themselves draw these parallels. The volume offers a wide range of perspectives making it a stimulating starting point for further research.