Book excerpt: New political entities usually come into being in the midst of political wrangling, often accompanied by security problems and, not infrequently, violence. This book, taking the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as its starting point, goes on to deal with the general problems of new entities, including such core concepts as sovereignty, autonomy and legal personality. In exploring human rights issues, the complex notions of nationality and minority rights are examined. On a more practical level, several authors inquire into issues of legal assistance in civil and criminal matters, security arrangements, fiscal and monetary policies, foreign investment guarantees, economic privatization, and transboundary water pollution. On many of these topics, German and European legal experience is introduced to shed a useful comparative light. Altogether, this volume represents an attempt to provide a primer for those responsible for, or interested in, the various aspects of new political entities at the end of the second millennium.