New Books Network
World Affairs
General History January 25, 2022

Blood and Iron

The Rise and Fall of the German Empire

Katja Hoyer

Hosted by Charles Coutinho
Before 1871, Germany was not yet nation but simply an idea. Its founder, Otto von Bismarck, had a formidable task at hand. How would he bring thirty-nine individual states under …

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Interviews with scholars of World Affairs about their new books.

Middle Eastern Studies January 25, 2022

Libya and the Global Enduring Disorder

Jason Pack

Hosted by James M. Dorsey
Libya stands out as an example of a complex, internecine Middle Eastern and North African conflict in which regional and global powers as well as jihadists exploit tribal and sectarian …
General History January 24, 2022

A Short History of War

Jeremy Black

Hosted by Charles Coutinho
Throughout history, warfare has transformed social, political, cultural, and religious aspects of our lives. We tell tales of wars--past, present, and future--to create and reinforce a common purpose. In A …
Environmental Studies January 21, 2022

Climate Chaos

Lessons on Survival from Our Ancestors

Brian Fagan and Nadia Durrani

Hosted by Galina Limorenko
Human-made climate change may have begun in the last two hundred years, but our species has witnessed many eras of climate instability. The results have not always been pretty. From …
Nordic Asia Podcast January 21, 2022

China's Environmental Foreign Relations

Heidi Wang-Kaeding

Hosted by Nordic Asia Podcast
Environmental protection and climate actions has embedded in China’s foreign policy and the Chinese government has recently pledged to make the Belt and Road Initiative “open, green, and clean”. How …
General History January 19, 2022

Quagmire in Civil War

Jonah Schulhofer-Wohl

Hosted by Miranda Melcher
In Quagmire in Civil War (Cambridge University Press, 2020), Dr. Jonah Schulhofer-Wohl provides the first treatment of quagmire in civil war, moving beyond the notion that quagmire is intrinsic to …
Political Science January 17, 2022

The Symbolic State

Minority Recognition, Majority Backlash, and Secession in Multinational Countries

Karlo Basta

Hosted by Christian Nielsen
In his new book, The Symbolic State: Minority Recognition, Majority Backlash, and Secession in Multinational Countries (McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2021), Karlo Basta argues that the nation-state is a double sleight …
Asian Review of Books January 6, 2022

Middle Class Shanghai

Reshaping U.S.-China Engagement

Cheng Li

Hosted by Nicholas Gordon
In mid-November, Washington and Beijing mutually agreed to start granting journalist visas again, putting an end to months of reciprocal visa rejections and denials. A perhaps minor, yet still important …
Van Leer Institute Series on Ideas with Renee Garfinkel January 5, 2022

Gaza Conflict 2021

Jonathan Schanzer

Hosted by Renee Garfinkel
Today I talked to Jonathan Schanzer about his new book Gaza Conflict 2021 (Foundation for Defense of Democracies, 2021). The May 2021 conflict between Israel and the terrorist group Hamas generated …
Literary Studies January 4, 2022

Strategic Occidentalism

On Mexican Fiction, the Neoliberal Book Market, and the Question of World Literature

Ignacio M. Sanchez Prado

Hosted by Bryant Scott
Ignacio M. Sánchez Prado is Professor of Spanish, Latin American Studies, and Film and Media Studies at Washington University in St. Louis. His areas of research include Latin American intellectual …
African Studies December 29, 2021

Making the World Global

U.S. Universities and the Production of the Global Imaginary

Isaac A. Kamola

Hosted by Sara Katz
Following World War II the American government and philanthropic foundations fundamentally remade American universities into sites for producing knowledge about the world as a collection of distinct nation-states. As neoliberal …
Literary Studies December 27, 2021

World Literature Decentered

Beyond the 'West' Through Turkey, Mexico and Bengal

Ian Almond

Hosted by Bryant Scott
Ian Almond is Professor of World Literature at Georgetown University in Qatar, and author of six books, including Two Faiths, One Banner: When Muslims Marched with Christians across Europe’s Battlegrounds …
Genocide Studies December 24, 2021

The Crime of Aggression

The Quest for Justice in an Age of Drones, Cyberattacks, Insurgents, and Autocrats

Noah Weisbord

Hosted by Jeff Bachman
On July 17, 2018, starting an unjust war became a prosecutable international crime alongside genocide, crimes against humanity, and war crimes. Instead of collective state responsibility, our leaders are now …
Political Science December 23, 2021

Criminalizing Atrocity

The Global Spread of Criminal Laws Against International Crimes

Mark S. Berlin

Hosted by Lilly Goren
Political Scientist Mark Berlin’s new book, Criminalizing Atrocity: The Global Spread of Criminal Laws Against International Crimes (Oxford UP, 2020), examines the process through which laws against international crimes are established …
General History December 22, 2021

Mapping, Connectivity, and the Making of European Empires

Luis Lobo-Guerrero, Laura Lo Presti, and Filipe Dos Reis

Hosted by Krzysztof Odyniec
Luis Lobo-Guerrero is one of the three editors of this volume—Mapping, Connectivity, and the Making of European Empires (Rowman and Littlefield, 2021)—and one of the six contributing authors. He wrote the …
British Studies December 22, 2021

Britain at Bay

The Epic Story of the Second World War: 1938-1941

Alan Allport

Hosted by Mark Klobas
Here is the many-faceted, world-historically significant story of Britain at war. In looking closely at the military and political dimensions of the conflict's first crucial years, Alan Allport tackles questions …
Chinese Studies December 21, 2021

Disaggregating China, Inc.

State Strategies in the Liberal Economic Order

Yeling Tan

Hosted by Keith Krueger
Once you understand that markets require public institutions of governance and regulation in order to function well, and further, you accept that nations may have different preferences over the shape …
Eastern European Studies December 17, 2021

International Intervention and the Problem of Legitimacy

Encounters in Postwar Bosnia-Herzegovina

Andrew Gilbert

Hosted by Christian Nielsen
In International Intervention and the Problem of Legitimacy (Cornell UP, 2020) Andrew C. Gilbert, who is assistant professor in anthropology at the University of Toronto-Mississauga, argues for an ethnographic analysis of international …
Intellectual History December 8, 2021

Crafting Enlightenment

Artisanal Histories and Transnational Networks

Jennifer Ferng and Lauren R. Cannady

Hosted by Alexandra Ortolja-Baird
A ground-breaking volume examining the transnational conditions of the European Enlightenment, Crafting Enlightenment: Artisanal Histories and Transnational Networks (Voltaire Foundation, 2021) argues that artisans of the long eighteenth-century on four different …
Nordic Asia Podcast December 6, 2021

COP26 from a Southeast Asian Perspective

Sharon Seah

Hosted by Quynh Le Vo
COP26 was billed as the make or break event in the fight against climate change. In conversation with Quynh Le Vo, Sharon Seah, coordinator of the ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute’s Climate …