The author brings a healthy Anglican approach to this ecumenical topic. A member of the Episcopal diocese of Indianapolis (p. x), Valliere directs the last two of the book's five chapters towards Anglican concerns, as indicated by their titles ‘Conciliarism in Anglican experience’ and ‘The Pan-Anglican Council’. The first three chapters provide the wider context: ‘The conciliar testament’, which examines the New Testament evidence; ‘The conciliar tradition’, which covers the early Church; and ‘The conciliar theory’, which focuses principally on the Middle Ages. There is a strong practical bent to the work: Valliere hopes that understanding past experiences will help church unity today. This hope is expressed openly in the introduction and conclusion and it surfaces frequently throughout the book.

Conciliarism is interpreted broadly, in three ways. First, while attention is given to gatherings which have traditionally been called ‘councils’, meetings and discussion outside these formal gatherings also receive proper attention. Surely it is a sound approach; though distinctions of grade and solemnity, regarding the meetings, which the participants themselves were usually well aware of, also need to be born in mind. This grading, as well as the extensive range of the study, is indicated in the index where ninety-one councils receive separate entries, all conveniently listed individually under the general heading of ‘councils, individual’. Seven councils are described in the index and elsewhere as ‘ecumenical councils’, following the traditional list of such councils beginning with Nicaea I in 325 and ending with Nicea II in 787. It is good to have the centrality of these seven councils highlighted: Chalcedon in 451 is seen as the ‘keystone’, even if its centrality was ‘accidental’ (p. 84). These councils are given appropriate individual attention in the book, as are the later councils that came to be regarded as ecumenical by the Roman Catholic Church: the ten medieval councils beginning with Lateran I in 1123 and the three councils of the modern era, Trent and the two Vatican councils.

Secondly, and reflecting the book's subtitle, while Valliere gives good attention to the juridical aspect of councils, he also takes into consideration many other dimensions, as the headings of various subsections within the chapters indicate: ‘Conciliarism and the Christian state’, ‘Councils as a tradition’, ‘Conciliar spirituality’, ‘Councils and conscience’, ‘Councils and constitutionalism’. Bringing together these various facets of ‘decision-making’ in conciliar history constitutes the originality of the work. Thus the book is a study of the form rather than the content of the meetings: it is not concerned, except incidentally, with the doctrinal definitions and disciplinary canons which formed the principal purpose and fruit of the meetings.

Thirdly, a wide spectrum of Churches are included in the considerations. In this way the book forms a comparative study with plenty of suggestions for the present ecumenical situation. The focus on the Anglican communion in the last two chapters has been mentioned, but other Churches linked to the Reformation are considered, notably the Lutheran and Methodist Churches. The Catholic and Orthodox traditions are central to the early chapters, both before and after the schism of 1054. Quite a wide range of Orthodox Churches are treated, including those in Russia, Ukraine and Latvia (p. x). The study is largely confined to Europe and western Asia, apart from the worldwide coverage of the Anglican Communion. Mutual interaction among the various Churches is well brought out, including the Orthodox and Reformed contributions to Vatican II, which is described as ‘the greatest event of the twentieth-century conciliar renaissance’ (p. 14).

Most of the considerations are set within a Christian framework. Church–State relations means largely the relationship between clergy and laity within a Christian society, as in medieval Byzantium for example. Not much attention is given to the influences of the non-Christian world upon Christian developments or vice-versa. Valliere regards many problems within Christianity today as the result of abandoning conciliar procedures, leading to a ‘hermeneutics of suspicion’ and the rejection of orderly resolutions (pp. 1–2). He hopes that the book may contribute to the revival of conciliar processes inside individual Christian Churches as well as between them. Here the only caution might be that the ‘golden age’ of church councils, the fourth and fifth centuries, was also a period when the Church was riddled with internal schisms which, arguably, were produced as well as resolved by the councils. In this respect Valliere's emphasis upon sound procedures is surely important: it is not enough to have meetings, they must be conducted well and wisely. But even then much depends on good fortune or, more religiously, upon the Holy Spirit.