Posted by: Michael Schellenberg - Associate Publisher, Knopf Canada

Timing is a crucial and tricky thing in publishing. In the case of The Sun Climbs Slow: Justice in the Age of Imperial America, it turns out that the publishing gods have smiled upon us. One of the threads of the book is about the establishment of the International Criminal Court and in telling that story, Erna Paris has tracked down a group of passionate people who on one side have come together to establish the ICC and on the other side are using their considerable means of power to thwart it. Surprisingly, the United States does not support the court and hasn’t become a member. But Erna makes the point that the US is following the well-trod path of the most powerful countries and empires throughout history: they don’t want to be held accountable, but they are certainly willing to hold the rest of the world accountable.

But our dilemma was that we might have to publish the book long after the first trial was heard—there had been ongoing rumours that it could have been last year. We gambled and chose to publish this month. As it turns out, the ICC is just about to hear their first case at the end of March (Congolese militia leader Thomas Lubanga is accused of recruiting and using thousands of child soldiers to fight for the armed wing of his party—The Union of Congolese Patriots—during the Democratic Republic of Congo’s civil war). Also going on at the same time, the legacy of the Bush government is being torn apart by critics and journalists during this extremely interesting election season (go Obama!). The more we hear about the actions of the Bush government and their alleged undermining of human rights, it isn’t a stretch to imagine some key Americans hauled in front of the ICC—oh, but wait a minute, that can’t happen. They aren’t subject to the treaty that founded the ICC. It’s a complicated world we live in, but this book provides a crucial and timely understanding of what has brought us to this moment in our history, and what might be possible if we learn from what history has to teach us.