Waste Land
A World in Permanent Crisis
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An urgent exploration of a world in constant crisis, where every regional disaster threatens to become a global conflict, with lessons from history that can stop the spiral--from the New York Times bestselling author of The Revenge of Geography
"Compelling and helpful . . . Kaplan's analysis has enormous implications for U.S. strategy abroad. . . . His conclusion is the only right one."--John Bolton, The Wall Street Journal
One of Financial Times' Most Important Books to Read This Year o One of Foreign Policy's Most Anticipated Books of the Year
We are entering a new era of global cataclysm in which the world faces a deadly mix of war, climate change, great power rivalry, rapid technological advancement, the end of both monarchy and empire, and countless other dangers. In Waste Land, Robert D. Kaplan, geopolitical expert and author of more than twenty books on world affairs, incisively explains how we got here and where we are going. Kaplan makes a novel argument that the current geopolitical landscape must be considered alongside contemporary social phenomena such as urbanization and digital news media, grounding his ideas in foundational modern works of philosophy, politics, and literature, including the poem from which the title is borrowed, and celebrating a canon of traditionally conservative thinkers, including Alexander Solzhenitsyn, Jeane Kirkpatrick, and many others.
As in many of his books, Kaplan looks to history and literature to inform the present, drawing particular comparisons between today's challenges and the Weimar Republic, the post-World War I democratic German government that fell to Nazism in the 1930s. Just as in Weimar, which faced myriad crises inextricably bound up with global systems, the singular dilemmas of the twenty-first century--pandemic disease, recession, mass migration, the destabilizing effects of large-scale democracy and great power conflicts, and the intimate bonds created by technology--mean that every disaster in one country has the potential to become a global crisis, too. According to Kaplan, the solutions lie in prioritizing order in governing systems, arguing that stability and historic liberalism rather than mass democracy per se will save global populations from an anarchic future.
Waste Land is a bracing glimpse into a future defined by the connections afforded by technology but with remarkable parallels to the past. Just as it did in Weimar, Kaplan fears the situation may be spiraling out of our control--unless our leaders act first.
About this Author
Robert D. Kaplan is the bestselling author of twenty-three books on foreign affairs and travel translated into many languages, including The Loom of Time, Adriatic, The Good American, The Revenge of Geography, Asia's Cauldron, Monsoon, The Coming Anarchy, and Balkan Ghosts. He holds the Robert Strausz-Hupé Chair in Geopolitics at the Foreign Policy Research Institute. For three decades he reported on foreign affairs for The Atlantic. He was a member of the Pentagon's Defense Policy Board and the Chief of Naval Operations Executive Panel. Foreign Policy twice named him one of the world's Top 100 Global Thinkers.
Reviews
"Mr. Kaplan's analysis has enormous implications for U.S. strategy abroad. . . . Compelling and helpful . . . Despite Mr. Kaplan's pessimism, his conclusion is the only right one."--former national security advisor John Bolton, The Wall Street Journal
"A welcome new beginning for an already remarkable career."--Applied Political Theory
"Timely . . . Heavyweight intellectual Robert D. Kaplan is an ideal guide to the madness."--The Evening Standard
"Readers tempted to look away now--on the grounds that they have had their fill of laments for the waning of the 'international rules-based order'--should, however, absolutely persevere."--Financial Times
"Rich and dense with speculative analyses . . . a good tonic for readers seeking to grapple with the geopolitical uncertainty of the world today."--The Strategist
"Waste Land is a well-written rumination on what may come next without very deft leadership working very smartly to avoid it."--Washington Examiner
"Kaplan's message is that our only hope as human beings in a chaotic and dangerous world moving at breathtaking speed is to act with moderation and restraint . . . Nothing is inevitable. The beginning of wisdom is to open our eyes."--Max Hastings, Bloomberg
"Robert D. Kaplan is one of the most sophisticated and incisive geopolitical analysts of today's world. His latest work is typically elegant, a tribute to the role that history can play in illuminating a path for policymakers in an ever-more-uncertain and chaotic world."--John Bew, professor of history, King's College London; author of Castlereagh and Clement Attlee; foreign policy adviser to three British prime ministers
"Provocative and wide-ranging."--The Sunday Times
"Darkly brilliant . . . In this deeply erudite literary, cultural, and historical narrative, Kaplan offers a warning but also a hope that America amid such confusion and danger will be all right."--Victor Davis Hanson, New York Times bestselling author of The End of Everything
"A compelling, stark, critically important book that conveys the urgency of the present moment and the unprecedented challenges that face mankind."--General David Petraeus, U.S. Army (Ret.), former commander of the surge in Iraq
"Kaplan is one of my favorite Neo-Malthusian pessimists. He has an incredible bandwidth--prodigious reader, inveterate traveler, journalist, thinker, writer. Waste Land's relevance manifests itself immediately."--Joe Klein, New York Times bestselling author of Primary Colors, writer of the Sanity Clause newsletter
"A cautionary tale of absolute brilliance."--Admiral James Stavridis, U.S. Navy (Ret.), 16th Supreme Allied Commander of NATO
"Kaplan challenges readers with the breadth of his vision and erudition, and his grasp of so many diverse strands of culture and history makes this a great read for those looking to make some sense of things."--Booklist, starred review
"A provocative thought experiment, of much interest to students of contemporary geopolitics."--Kirkus Reviews
"A provocative but penetrating diagnosis of the anomie that marks the evolving international order. The deconcentration of power, the fraying of authority, and the weakening of institutions. . . . All this together foreshadows a world crisis . . ."--Ashley J. Tellis, Tata Chair for Strategic Affairs, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
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