American policymakers have long sought to meet international challenges and manage threats to U.S. national interests with a simple formula: engage your friends and isolate your enemies. Weighing their options, those states still debating whether to adopt the role of friend or foe will choose profitable cooperation over damaging confrontation.

So the theory goes.

The J curve reveals why this approach has never yielded positive results. It is a tool designed to help us understand how the world's political decision-makers make choices - and why nations rise and fall. It demonstrates why and how the U.S. can re-imagine its foreign policy.

Some states remain stable only because their governments isolate their citizens, both from the outside world and from one another. Others states are stable because their political, economic, and social institutions are fueled by globalization and thrive on change. The J curve reveals that for a nation that is "stable because it is closed" to become "stable because it is open," it must survive a period of dangerous instability. In an age of global terrorism, weapons proliferation, religious conflict, and other transnational threats, these countries' transitions toward openness are everyone's business.

Why does North Korea invite international isolation? Which internal pressures erode stability in Saudi Arabia? How might shifting demographics fundamentally change Iran and Israel? Why is Indian democracy so durable, and how is it changing? How long can China resist domestic pressure for fundamental political reform? To what extent can U.S. policymakers influence change within these states? The J curve offers counterintuitive insights into all these questions.