Iran’s Grand Strategy: A Political History
By Vali Nasr
Nature, Culture, And Inequality: A Comparative And Historical Perspective
By Thomas Piketty, Translation by Willard Wood
China’s Underground Historians and Their Battle for the Future
By Ian Johnson
Waste Land: A World in Permanent Crises
By Robert D. Kaplan
Shots Heard Round The World: America, Britain, and Europe in The Revolutionary War
By John Ferling
Iran’s Grand Strategy: A Political History
By Vali Nasr
Princeton University Press, May 2025
408 pages
From the New York Times bestselling author of The Shia Revival
A gripping account that overturns simplistic portrayals of Iran as a theocratic pariah state, revealing how its strategic moves on the world stage are driven by two pervasive threats—external aggression and internal dissolution
Iran presents one of the most significant foreign policy challenges for America and the West, yet very little is known about what the country’s goals really are. . .
Drawing on memoirs, oral histories, and original in-depth interviews with Iranian decision makers, Nasr brings to light facts and events in Iran’s political history that have been overlooked until now. He traces the roots of Iran’s strategic outlook to its experiences over the past four decades of war with Iraq in the 1980s and the subsequent American containment of Iran, invasion of Iraq in 2003, and posture toward Iran thereafter. Nasr reveals how these experiences have shaped a geopolitical outlook driven by pervasive fear of America and its plans for the Middle East.
Challenging the notion that Iran’s foreign policy simply reflects its revolutionary values or theocratic government, Iran’s Grand Strategy provides invaluable new insights into what Iran wants and why, explaining the country’s resistance to the United States, its nuclear ambitions, and its pursuit of influence and proxies across the Middle East.
REVIEWS
“. . . Vali Nasr dispels the notion that Iran is motivated primarily by ideology or theology and instead writes a sophisticated account of a state that has developed a grand strategy based on the legacy of colonialism and the drive for independence and security. Nasr makes a compelling case that places Iran’s dedication to resisting US power over several decades in this broader framework.”—Leslie Vinjamuri, SOAS University of London
“An indispensable analysis of Iranian grand strategy under the ayatollahs. Nasr shows how regional strategic considerations decide the outcome of Iranian policy and how concerned the leaders are with subversion at home.”—Odd Arne Westad, author of The Cold War: A World History
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Vali Nasr is the Majid Khadduri Professor of International Affairs and Middle East Studies at Johns Hopkins University’s School of Advanced International Studies. His books include The Dispensable Nation: American Foreign Policy in Retreat, The Shia Revival: How Conflicts within Islam Will Shape the Future, and (with Ali Gheissari) Democracy in Iran: History and the Quest for Liberty. His writing has appeared in leading publications such as the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, and Foreign Affairs.
Nature, Culture, And Inequality: A Comparative And Historical Perspective
By Thomas Piketty, Translation by Willard Wood
Other Press, September 2024
96 pages
A bestselling economist’s history of inequality and guide to a more just, sustainable world, distilled into an engaging and accessible pocket-sized text.
In this unique work, Thomas Piketty presents a synthesis of his historical and comparative research on inequality. He challenges the idea that there could be natural inequalities and shows that the march toward equality has always depended on political and social struggles, addressing diverse topics such as:
- education,
- inheritance,
- the climate crisis,
- the taxation of wealth, and
- gender disparities.
Adapted from Piketty’s 2022 lecture at the Musée du Quai Branly – “Jacques Chirac, Nature, Culture, and Inequality” — makes his important argument available to a wider audience for the first time. With a clear, conversational tone, he provides a strong foundation of data and concrete examples of how we can continue to level the playing field.
REVIEWS
“The most important economics book of the year―and maybe of the decade.” —Paul Krugman, New York Times, on “Capital in the Twenty-First Century”
“Nature, Culture, and Inequality is a clear, incisive examination of one of the world’s major economic problems—extreme income and wealth inequality. In this short, readable volume, Thomas Piketty explains how extreme inequality hurts millions of people worldwide and why some nations have far worse inequality than others. Piketty also makes the case that the high levels of inequality in countries like the United States are not part of the natural order and can—and should—be greatly reduced to create fairer economies for all.” —Steven Greenhouse, author of Beaten Down, Worked Up: The Past, Present, and Future of American Labor
“This brilliant little book distills years of world-class research on inequality into a punchy argument with wonderful insights on every page. For anyone interested in the problem of inequality and how to solve it, this is the perfect place to start.” —Jason Hickel, author of The Divide and Less Is More
“In a hundred engaging and easy-to-read pages, Thomas Piketty paints a vivid portrait of economic inequality’s many faces—as it relates to income, wealth, gender, education, taxation, inheritance, debt, and climate change. Throughout, Piketty documents the collective choices that have charted inequality’s past path in order to challenge democratic politics to build a more equal future. If you have one hour to devote to thinking about economic inequality today, spend it with this book.” —Daniel Markovits, author of The Meritocracy Trap
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Thomas Piketty is a professor at the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales (EHESS) and the Paris School of Economics, and codirector of the World Inequality Lab. He is the author of the landmark New York Times bestseller Capital in the Twenty-First Century (2014), as well as Capital and Ideology (2020) and A Brief History of Equality (2022).
ABOUT THE TRANSLATOR
Willard Wood grew up in France and has translated more than thirty works of fiction and nonfiction from the French. He has won the Lewis Galantière Award for Literary Translation and received a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship in Translation. His recent translations include Camille de Toledo’s Theseus, His New Life (Other Press 2023) and Patrick Boucheron’s Trace and Aura (Other Press 2022). He lives in Norfolk, Connecticut.
Waste Land: A World in Permanent Crises
By Robert D. Kaplan
Random House, January 2025
212 pages
. . .. In Waste Land, Robert D. 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. . . . and celebrating a canon of traditionally conservative thinkers. . . .
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
REVIEWS
“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
“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
“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
“A cautionary tale of absolute brilliance.”—Admiral James Stavridis, U.S. Navy (Ret.), 16th Supreme Allied Commander of NATO
ABOUT THE 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.
Shots Heard Round The World: America, Britain, and Europe in The Revolutionary War
By John Ferling
Bloomsbury Publishing, April 2025
560 pages
A major, global reappraisal of the Revolutionary War on its 250th Anniversary.
Shots Heard Round the World is a bold, comprehensive rendering of the world war that erupted out of America’s battle for independence. Ferling highlights underestimated pivotal moments to reveal why the British should have put down the rebellion within a couple years of fighting. As European rivals France, Spain, and the Dutch Republic entered the fray, Britain’s problems grew, but after seven long years, the war’s outcome remained very much in doubt. Ferling assesses military and civilian leaders, the choices they faced, and the political, tactical, and strategic decisions they made as the war raged in North America, the Caribbean, Central America, Europe, Asia, and on the high seas, affecting peoples and countries miles from American soil.
REVIEWS
“Engagingly written, Shots Heard Round the World reminds us of the critical role of foreign support in the winning of the independence of the United States.” ―Andrew J. O’Shaughnessy, author of The Illimitable Freedom of The Human Mind
“An excellent history of the run-up and battles of the American Revolution . . . describing how other nations reacted . . . Scholars have not ignored European participation, but Ferling . . . pays more attention. . . From battles to international relations, an outstanding introduction to the American Revolution.” ―Kirkus Reviews
“John Ferling has long been a master historian of the Revolutionary era in America. Here he broadens the view to encompass the larger war of which the American Revolution was a part . . .” ―H.W. Brands, two-time Pulitzer Prize finalist and New York Times bestselling author of The General VS. The President
“Ferling illuminates the multifaceted conflict from all angles, showing how America won and could have just as easily lost. An essential and welcome addition to the literature on the war.” ―Eric Jay Dolin, author of REBELS AT SEA
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
John Ferling is professor emeritus of history at the University of West Georgia. He is the author of many books on the American Revolution, including The Ascent of George Washington; Almost a Miracle; A Leap in the Dark; Whirlwind, a finalist for the 2015 Kirkus Book Prize; and, most recently, Apostles of Revolution: Jefferson, Paine, Monroe, and the Struggle Against the Old Order in America and Europe.