Book excerpt: In Brazil, the United States, and the South American Subsystem: Regional Politics and the Absent Empire, Carlos Gustavo Poggio Teixeira challenges several typical assumptions on U.S.-Latin American relations, beginning by questioning the very usefulness of the concept of Latin America for the field of international relations. Instead of concentrating upon the instances when the United States pursued imperial policies in Latin America, this study seeks to explain the instances when it did not. Teixeira accomplishes this by shifting the focus of the research from the United States to Brazil and the regional dynamics of South America. Brazil, the United States, and the South American Subsystem is a unique investigation of how Brazil has been a status quo power in the region, increasing the benefits of limited U.S. involvement in South American affairs.