Rev. Paul F. McCleary is a graduate of Olivet Nazarene University, Bourbonnais, Illinois, Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary, and Northwestern University, both in Evanston, Illinois. He has an honorary Doctorate of Divinity from MacMurray College, Jacksonville, Illinois. Paul served student appointments in Illinois Great Rivers Conference of the United Methodist Church before going to Bolivia as a missionary, where he served as district superintendent and executive secretary of the Annual Conference. He has served denominational posts as executive secretary of the Structure Study Commission of the General Conference, assistant general secretary for Latin America of the Board of Global Ministries, and as associate general secretary of the General Council on Ministries. He also served as executive director of Church World Service of the National Council of Churches of Christ. For several years, he served with nongovernmental organizations, such as Save the Children, Christian Children’s Fund, and Feed the Children. He served two terms as president of the NGO Committee to UNICEF and chair of the Board of InterAction. He served as a consultant to the World Bank and the Inter-American Development Bank. McCleary served for eight years as an advisor to the Bishops’ Task Force on Children and Poverty of the United Methodist Church. McCleary is married to Rachel P. and has four children, seven grandchildren, and five great-grandchildren. They currently reside in Tempe, Arizona.

A thoughtful critic of his denomination who sees its future bound to the way in which it reacts to reformers and reform movements. In times of social change, social institutions feel the stress to be faithful to their purpose as well as the tension to be relevant to innovation. The institutions that survive will be those which are capable of responding to change as well as continuing to be faithful to its loyal supporters. The best way to manage that tension is by understanding the organizations history in dealing with prior encounters with reform movements.

The US commitment to stability—both domestically and abroad—has been a consistent feature in the way Washington, DC carries out international relations. This commitment is complimented by the increased overlap between the economic and political spheres in international affairs. Consequently, this US approach to foreign interaction is informed by an assumption that foreign policy tools can influence global stability for the better. In order to investigate this assumption, this book details the foundations of what Amir Magdy Kamel refers to as the US Stability Policy—how it evolved over time and how it was implemented in Egypt. He finds that domestic and global forces were left unaccounted for by the Stability Policy, ultimately leading to a failure to achieve the self-stated stability goals. Kamel’s analysis is informed through a unique mixed-method approach that sheds light on how and why this policy fared so poorly under Mubarak’s Egypt. He develops and tests a unique and particular way of examining the Stability Policy and presents a framework for future work to replicate and build on in the quest to understand other state-on-state relationships and the effectiveness of other foreign economic policies in achieving stability goals. Floundering Stability reflects on what Kamel’s findings mean for the relationship between the US and Egypt, as well as specific US foreign policy suggestions on how the same mistakes can be avoided in the future.