Michael Mandelbaum
The Frugal Superpower: America's Global Leadership in a Cash-Strapped Era
The Frugal Superpower begins with what Mandelbaum takes to be an important turning point in the history of U.S. foreign policy:
This book is not a work of declinism but an unsparing assessment of the constraints on American power in the years to come. No single power, or concert of powers, Mandelbaum warns, shall step forth to assume the American burden. Humanitarian interventions and military campaigns such as those in
What's Right with Islam: A New Vision for Muslims and the West
Nearly a decade after 9/11, communications between Muslims and the West (including Muslims in the West) remain plagued by mutual suspicion and ignorance. Efforts to remedy this have been useful in generating dialogue and good ideas, but there is still a long way to go. Rauf gets to the heart of the matter in What's Right With Islam Is What's Right With America. Of Egyptian heritage and now based in
13 Bankers: The Wall Street Takeover and the Next Financial Meltdown
This penetrating analysis of the economic and financial crisis of 2008-9 places the crisis' eruption and evolution and the policy response to it in the context of U.S. economic history. Emphasizing the "too big to fail" aspect of the financial problem, it relates the issue to past episodes of excessive concentrations of economic and political power in
Johnson and Kwak argue that the country is going through a similar period today. Financial markets have evolved well beyond the reach of current regulation and authority, jeopardizing the entire financial system and, through it, the economy. The authors document the evolution of this disastrous mismatch, analyze how its failures led to the crisis, and propose new policy approaches to avoid repeating the recent experience. The book provides a convenient one-stop shop for understanding both the crisis and the policy remedies, only a few of which have begun to take shape, that it necessitates.
THE MORAL EQUIVALENT OF WAR (UPDATED)
A Peace to End All Peace: The Fall of the Ottoman Empire and the Creation of the Modern Middle East.
Chinese Lessons: Five Classmates and the Story of the New China
Confessions: An Innocent Life in Communist China
Why the West Rules--for Now: The Patterns of History, and What They Reveal About the Future
It may seem at first sight a little odd to recommend a history book as a guide to the future. But Morris' new book illustrates perfectly why one really scholarly book about the past is worth a hundred fanciful works of futurology. Morris is the world's most talented ancient historian, a man as much at home with state-of-the-art archaeology as with the classics as they used to be studied. Here, he has brilliantly pulled off what few modern academics would dare to attempt: a single-volume history of the world that offers a bold and original answer to the question, Why did the societies that make up "the West" pull ahead of "the rest" not once but twice, and most spectacularly in the modern era after around 1500? Wearing his impressive erudition lightly -- indeed, writing with a wit and clarity that will delight the lay reader -- Morris uses his own ingenious index of social development as the basis for his answer. He also dares to pose explicitly some fascinating counterfactual questions. What if the Chinese had conquered the New World before the Europeans got there in the fifteenth century? What if the West had ended up subjugated by the East in the nineteenth century, instead of the other way around? Precisely because he has such a profound understanding of the ways that culture, technology, and geography interact over the very long run, Morris is better qualified than almost anyone else to answer the final question he asks: Is the world heading for "the Singularity" -- a technological quantum leap beyond our traditional limitations as a species -- or for a disastrous "Nightfall" brought on by climate change, famine, state failure, mass migration, pandemic disease, and nuclear war? Readers will find nothing better on the subject than his final, mind-blowing chapter.
The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order
After the fall of the
The balance of power among these civilizations, he argued, is shifting. The West is declining in relative power, Islam is exploding demographically, and Asian civilizations -- especially
The West's universalist pretensions are increasingly bringing it into conflict with the other civilizations, most seriously with Islam and
The greatest advantage of Huntington's civilizational model of international relations is that it reflects the world as it is -- not as one wishes it would be. It allows decision-makers to distinguish friends from enemies. And it makes it easier to identify the internal conflicts within civilizations, particularly the historical rivalries among the Arabs, the Turks, and the Persians for leadership of the Islamic world. The Clash of Civilizations is a classic that should be taught in every international relations and history class -- until a new world order emerges.
A Peace to End All Peace: The Fall of the Ottoman Empire and the Creation of the Modern Middle East
The philosopher Søren Kierkegaard once observed that "life must be understood backward. But . . . it must be lived forward." This applies to more than one's own life: what is past is more than prologue; it is essential for anyone wanting to understand how today's world was created. This is especially true of the critical region between the Mediterranean and the Himalayas. Without knowledge of its backstory, no policymaker will get the region right: history is continuous, even if, relatively speaking, Americans just tuned in.
Of the vast array of books on this region, none is more relevant than Fromkin's sweeping epic, A Peace to End All Peace. Fromkin states his theme starkly at the outset: "The European powers at that time [1914-22] believed they could change Moslem Asia in the very fundamentals of its political existence, and in their attempt to do so introduced an artificial state system into the
Other historians have challenged Fromkin on specific details. That is to be encouraged: history is not only continuous; it also needs to be continuously reexamined. And it should never be ignored, as American policymakers have done so often in the past, at their own -- and everyone else's -- peril.
Ever since the recent global financial crisis broke out, experts and officials have taken great pains to identify the causes, hoping to avoid similar crises in the future. Now, as the global economy gradually recovers, comes Sheng's clear and complete analysis of the recent crisis and the Asian financial crisis of the 1990s. In his view, unfettered finance was the core cause of these crises.
But the real picture is far more complex. In reality, governments tend to overregulate and underregulate the financial sector at the same time. This is especially true in
The financial challenges faced by
On Rumors: How Falsehoods Spread, Why We Believe Them, What Can Be Done
A key question about the future is whether new information technologies -- the Internet and its search engines and social media -- will strengthen or weaken democracy. New media are powerful tools of civic engagement in democratic societies, and they will bring new freedoms to closed societies such as
Sunstein's On Rumors raises fundamental questions about the troublingly ambiguous impact of social media on the marketplace of democratic ideas. The ancient Greek philosophers warned of Sophists in the public square. The new technologies have given these sophists a megaphone of unparalleled power. It is up to democrats to use the new media to fight back and defend a public square where truth, however inconvenient to one's own prejudices, remains the ultimate arbiter of democratic argument.
The Bottom Billion: Why the Poorest Countries are Failing and What Can Be Done About It
The challenges of global poverty are getting more attention lately, but helping people is far harder than it looks. For example, humanitarian aid is often used in effect to finance military spending, so that about 40 percent of African arms spending may inadvertently be paid for by aid donors. Still, people are getting better at addressing the challenges of global poverty, and one of the most lucid guides to this terrain is Collier's landmark book, The Bottom Billion. Collier, a former
Collier is relentlessly empirical, acknowledging the many failures of aid (in 2004, a study found that only one percent of the money intended for rural health clinics in
No book explains this process better than Halberstam's The Best and the Brightest. First published in 1972 and dealing primarily with
Unfortunately, the U.S. political system is not especially effective at checking foolish ideas before they influence policy, even though the Founding Fathers designed it for that purpose. As Halberstam shows so well, presidents have many ways to manipulate the policy process so that they get what they want. This capacity sometimes produces good outcomes, but when
Captive: My Time as a Prisoner of the Taliban
A Rope and a Prayer: A Kidnapping from Two Sides
Dozens of reports appear every year on the Taliban insurgency in
Zaeef -- now "retired" in
An old metaphor to describe the behavior of complex systems is that a butterfly flapping its wings in
A blueprint to help leaders and decision-makers develop this perspective is presented in Thinking in Systems, a book that explores the subtle yet powerful components of systems thinking, such as feedback loops, nonlinear relationships, and leverage points. Meadows distills the essence of this important problem-solving paradigm, noting that systems demonstrate "adaptive, dynamic, . . . and sometimes evolutionary" behavior in which the whole proves to be greater than the sum of its parts. Presented in a clear and accessible manner, the book makes evident that in order to succeed in the world ahead, prediction, control, and siloed analysis must be transformed into a framework in which complexities are embraced, silos broken, and partnerships welcomed. Doing so will not be easy, but as Meadows notes, only then can we "use our insights to make a difference in ourselves and our world."
The Long View from Delhi: To Define the Indian Grand Strategy for Foreign Policy
The elusive quest for a grand strategy, long a preoccupation inside
Kumar, who heads an economic think tank, and Menon, one of the country's premier security specialists, are cogent in their analyses and trenchant in their opinions. Their work is a major contribution to the intellectual transition from
How Enemies Become Friends: The Sources of Stable Peace
One of
In How Enemies Become Friends, Kupchan discusses how and why peace breaks out. He takes on the notion that stable peace can only be the product of liberal democratic development, an idea he calls unnecessary and unwise, and uses a rigorous theoretical framework and a wealth of historical evidence to elucidate pathways to stable peace. These include unilateral accommodation, reciprocal restraint, societal integration, and the generation of new narratives and identities.
Kupchan's findings are particularly relevant to Euro-Atlantic relations. Two decades after the end of the Cold War,
The End of the Free Market: Who Wins the War Between States and Corporations?
Ever since the fall of the
Bremmer has best identified this new twist to the story of globalization in his book The End of the Free Market. The title is a misnomer. The book is really about the rise of state capitalism, also the subject of a recent essay by him in this magazine. Whereas 20 years ago, the list of the largest companies in the world was dominated by private firms, it is now dominated by state-owned entities, many from emerging markets.
This age-old tussle, between the rise of the state and the pervasive influence of the market, has taken a new form in modern times, and Bremmer has written an important account of it in his book.
Available at Amazon.com:
The End of History and the Last Man
The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order
The Tragedy of Great Power Politics
The End of the Free Market: Who Wins the War Between States and Corporations?
Running Out of Water: The Looming Crisis and Solutions to Conserve Our Most Precious Resource
Bottled and Sold: The Story Behind Our Obsession with Bottled Water
Water: The Epic Struggle for Wealth, Power, and Civilization
At War with the Weather: Managing Large-Scale Risks in a New Era of Catastrophes
Friendly Fire: Losing Friends and Making Enemies in the Anti-American Century
Dining With al-Qaeda: Three Decades Exploring the Many Worlds of the Middle East
- G20 Summit: Hitting Singles in Seoul
- The Consequences of Fiscal Irresponsibility
- GDP Now Matters More Than Force: Policy for the Age of Economic Power
- What Population Growth and Decline Means for the Global Economy
- Leading Through Civilian Power: Redefining Diplomacy and Development
- The Future of American Power: Dominance and Decline in Perspective
- Who Do You Call If You Want to Divide Europe?
- The Game Changer: Coping With China's Foreign Policy Revolution
- Why the Retirement Age Is Increasing
- Religion's Growing Influence in International Politics
- The Difficulty of Integrating Rising Powers
- Ban-ki Moon Has United Nations 'Drifting Into Irrelevance'
- Bachelet Faces Uphill Battle at U.N. Women
- Murderous Tactics Fueling Terrorist Propaganda
- Benjamin Netanyahu: A Hawk in the Ointment
- Diminished Capacity
- Moscow's Modernization Dilemma: Is Russia Charting a New Foreign Policy?
- NATO Summit Unlikely to Answer the Most Important Questions
- Franco-German Call for Change in the EU Meets with Much Opposition
- A Tenuous Deal in Iraq
- Conflict or Cooperation? Three Visions Revisited
- A New Global Player: Brazil's Far-Flung Agenda
- Pax Ottomana? The Mixed Success of Turkey's New Foreign Policy
- Rise of the Mezzanine Rulers
- Globalizing the Energy Revolution
- Democracy in Cyberspace
- The Digital Disruption
- Africa: Agriculture's Final Frontier
- A Reading List for the Twenty-first Century
- Latin American Leaders Could Have Learned From South Korea
- Region Ignoring Venezuela Coup Threats
- To Fight Corruption, Start Cutting Red Tape
- New Congress Won't Lead to 'Fortress America'
- The Shifting Balance of Power
- Checking China's Territorial Moves
- Why China Has a Point About Quantitative Easing
- China's Rate Hike: Winners and Losers
- Taiwan's Shadow
- Fools Rush in Where Europe Rushes Out
- Germany to Muhammad: Go Home
- Can NATO Nudge Russia Westward?
- French Demonstrations Tell a Familiar Tale
- Chavez a Pain for Spain
- Nestor Kirchner's Death May Mark End of an Era
- Petraeus Follows Iraq Formula in Afghanistan
- Heavy Handed Intervention Has Stalled Arab-Israeli Peace Process
- George Clooney Urges Obama and Media To Focus On Sudan
- Fighting Hunger in Des Moines
- Rise in Tourism to Miami May Signal Danger Ahead
- Peru May Be Next Latin American Success Story
- Nobel Winner Right About Risks of e-Books
- Nestor Kirchner's Death May Mark End of an Era
- Chavez a Pain for Spain
- Economic Woes Put Brittle Nations on Edge
- A Divided and Insular European Union
- Do not Expect China to Budge on the Yuan
- Why on Earth Does America Want a Stronger Chinese Currency?
- Nuclear Club Has Yet Another Applicant
- Nuclear Armament Still Our Central Issue
- Embattled Islam
- 'Europe Looks East' Hints at the Future
- Choosing Between the Evil of Two Lessers In Afghanistan
- Chavez Lost Ground but Will Fight Back
- Education Too Important to Be Left in Government Hands
- Latin America In Denial About the Quality of Its Schools
- Millennium Development Goals for Women Largely Unmet
- North Korean Succession Plans Are Shrouded in Mystery
- Rogue BFFs North Korea and Iran Make Quite a Pair
- American Role in Israeli-Palestinian Talks Is a Problem
- Iraq Reluctant to Pay Its Fair Share of Security Costs
- Iran's 'Shaky' Ahmadinejad
- United States Could Be Alone as Europe Turns Inward
- Hugo Chávez May Lose Even if He Wins
- Brazil Needs Dose of Constructive Paranoia
- Latin American Commodity Exporters Need to Diversify
- Stoned on Righteousness
- Our Man in Moscow
- Widening Divide in American-Chinese Commercial Interests
- The New Old World Order
- Global Human-Rights Cause Gets a Shot in the Arm
- Obama's Foreign Policy Performance
- New Russia Takes Root in Saint Petersburg and Moscow
- Dismantling Worst-Case Proliferation Scenarios
- A Numbers Game in the Middle East
- Middle East Peace Talks: Here We Go Again
- Obama and Clinton Revive Middle East Peace Talks
- Guess Who's Coming to the Table
- Iraq: Unanswered Policy Questions on U.S. Troops
- Iraq: Implications of a Pointless War
- Iraq: Book Review
- Iraq: No Drums and No Bugles: None Dare Call It Victory
- Pakistan's Leadership Sustains Flood Damage
- A French Leftist Ritual Takes on Sarkozy
- United States Losing Latin America Market Share
- The Power of Being Multilingual
- Chavez's Obsession With Past Turns Creepy and He's Not Alone
- Obama Could Help Stop Mexico's Bloodshed
- Interdependency Theory: China, India and the West
- The Dangerous Dog Days of Summer
- The Next 500 Years
- A New Plan For Nuclear Postures
- Strengthening the Political - Military Relationship
- Hydraulic Pressures: Into the Age of Water Scarcity?
- South Korea: Prosperity and Anxiety
- China Wealthy? That's Rich!
- Islamism Unveiled: From Berlin to Cairo and Back Again
- Beyond Moderates and Militants: Charting a New Course in the Middle East
- Middle East Peace Talks: Pointless Talks
- Why Israel Can't Rely on Deterrence Against Iran's Nuclear Program
- How to Handle Hamas
- Bringing Israel's Bomb Out of the Basement
- Iraq: Anxious Iraqis Look at Uncertain Future
- Iraq: U.S. Combat Troops' Departure Leaves Uncertainty in its Wake
- Iraq: A Promise Kept?
- An Unlikely Trio: Can Iran Turkey and the United States Become Allies?
- Staying Power: The U.S. Mission in Afghanistan Beyond 2011
- Long Road Ahead for Afghan Security Forces
- Afghanistan's Dirty Little Secret
- Russia's New Nobility
- Mexico Needs U.S. Help But Not Troops
- Mexico's Narco Problems Are Our Problems, and Vice Versa
- No 'I' in 'Team,' but Plenty of 'I' in India
- Afghanistan - There Can Be No Graceful Exit
- Afghanistan Timetable Remains a Factor of Uncertainty
- We Are Playing Fidel Castro's Game
- Has the Time Come to Legalize Drugs?
- Handling Tensions on the Korean Peninsula
- Richard C. Holbrooke: Pakistan Aid Inadequate
- Afghanistan Leaks Answer Few Questions
- Afghanistan & The Karzai Problem
- Afghanistan - Winds of Changing Policy
- Obama's Juggling Act in the Middle East
- Defusing Lebanon's Powder Keg
- Germany's Good Fortune Tips the Scales Against its Neighbors
- End Poverty: Export Capitalism
- Haitian Quake Hasn't Dislodged Status Quo
- Why We Go Back to Haiti
- Iraq - Mission Accomplished II
- The Fight Escalates Against Fake Drugs
- China's Coal Addiction
- Afghanistan: The Pentagon's Lost War
- Afghanistan: The Cost of Nation Building
- Afghanistan: Pentagon Papers Redux?
- Behind Iraq's Long Political Indecision
- Venezuela - Colombia Spat to Pass, Return
- Will China Rule the World?
- NATO's Future Involves More Global Partnerships
- Gloom Awaits U.S. Climate Diplomacy
- U.S. - U.K.: Difficult Duet in Afghanistan
- 'Pariah of the Pacific' Has Ham-handed Grip on Fiji
- Turkey Takes the Veil
- For Israel a Two-State Proposal Starts With Security
- Is It Too Late to Stop Iran
- The Middle East's Private Little War
- Reality and Reform for How the EU Keeps Its Peace
- Chancellor Angela Merkel's Sinking Support
- The Real Reason Why Afghanistan Is a Lost Cause
- The War Drones On
- When the 'Right War' Goes Wrong
- The Afghanistan Paradox
- Pakistan's Gambit in Afghanistan
- Obama Wasting Opportunities in Latin America
- Stopping Nuclear Proliferation Before It Starts
- Veiled Truths: The Rise of Political Islam in the West
- Steps to Stop Iran From Getting a Nuclear Bomb
- Iran: The Nuclear Containment Conundrum
- Iran: The Right Kind Of Containment
- China Is the Key to Handling Nuclear North Korea
- Coping With China's Financial Power
- What China's Currency Reform Means For Investors
- Russian-American Obstacles Overshadow Obama-Medvedev Meeting
- Russia's Courtship of Silicon Valley
- Ukrainian Blues: Viktor Yanukovych's Rise and Democracy's Fall
- Russia: Prisoners of the Caucasus
- The Afghan Challenge Is Far Tougher
- New Guard, Old Policy on Afghanistan
- Fear and Uncertainty in Afghanistan
- Afghanistan: Bribing the Enemy
- Afghanistan Poses Difficult Challenges
- Defining Success in Afghanistan
- Sad Stan, Famous Petraeus
- The Challenge of Reconciliation in Kenya
- The Tyranny of Unity in Zimbabwe
- Mexico: The New Cocaine Cowboys
- Under Santos Colombia Could Rise to the Next Level
- Autocrats' Latest Weapon: Indirect Censorship
- Latin America's Rich Should Be More Generous
- Castrocare in Crisis
(C) 2010 Foreign Affairs