The Courts of International Trade: Judicial Specialization, Expertise, and Bureaucratic Policymaking. By Isaac Unah. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1998. 233p. $47.50

In The Courts of International Trade: Judicial Specialization, Expertise, and Bureaucratic Policymaking, Isaac Unah has ventured into territory that has remained largely uncharted by scholars of judicial politics. With the prominent exception of Lawrence Baum's work on specialized courts, few researchers in political science have chosen to explore courts that fall outside the federal judiciary's core hierarchy. Yet as Unah points out, these specialized courts, including the U.S. Tax Court, Claims Court, Court of International Trade, Bankruptcy Courts, and the Federal Circuit, perform critical functions that have the potential to affect business interests and shape bureaucratic performance in highly complex regulatory and economic areas. In this book, and in his previous published research, Unah has initiated an important expedition into unfamiliar but promising terrain.