New Books in World Affairs

Michael Kwass‘s new book, Contraband: Louis Mandrin and the Making of a Global Underground is much more than an exciting biography of the notorious eighteenth-century smuggler whose name remains legendary in contemporary France. Focusing on the rise and fall of a mythic, early-modern French bandit, Kwass’s study moves between the micro- and the macro-historical, revealing the crucial role that smuggling played in a French economic and political landscape that must be understood in global perspective. The book shows how the underground economy that emerged during the ancien regime developed in close relationship to the trade practices and regulation attempts of the French state. The opposite was also true. State efforts to regulate trade in tobacco and calico from the reign of Louis XIV onwards contributed to the development of illicit activity and networks, and the desire to quash the economic underground, in turn, provoked changes in economic policy, legislation, and perceptions of the need for reform in the years leading up to the French Revolution. Revisiting the history of the “consumer revolution” of the eighteenth century, Contraband draws our attention to the violence and struggle that accompanied the proliferation of goods and markets associated with “modernity.” In our interview, Michael underlines his aim to write a history inspired by, and in conversation with, more recent events and debates about “the dark side of globalization”. This makes the book a must-read for anyone interested in the longer-term history of the forms of contraband, regulation, and resistance that shape the economic, political, and cultural networks (both legal and illicit) of the present on a global scale. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/world-affairs

We often think of South Africa or America when we hear the word ‘segregation.’ Or — a popular view — that social groups have always chosen to live apart.But as Carl H. Nightingale shows in his new book, Segregation: A Global History of Divided Cities (University of Chicago Press, 2012), the racial phenomenon is both modern and international. To be sure, laws and informal practices separating individuals by membership in a caste can be found everywhere in the ancient and medieval world. Those with or seeking wealth and power have always sought to preserve or increase their position by disuniting people on the grounds of social category. Yet the idea of “race” and the enduring belief that human beings can be distinguished in such terms has its origins in the rise of European colonialism, starting with British rule in Madras (Chennai) and the East India Company’s decision to split Calcutta (Kolkata) into “White Town” and “Black Town.” The word ‘segregation’ itself comes from techniques used in Hong Kong and Bombay (Mumbai) in the 1890’s, part of a viral “mania” that, Nightingale explains, pivoted around the challenges of mass urbanization and sent the institution north, south, east, and west — even to Latin American cities like Rio de Janeiro and Buenos Aires, where the distinction between ‘white’ and ‘black’ was murky at best. This globalization depended heavily on imperialist governments, and often just as importantly relied on multinational corporations (real estate especially) and intellectual networks, which provided in the first case institutional precedent and protocol and in the second rationalization and legitimacy for the pseudo-scientific notion of ‘race.’ Yet, as this ambitious work demonstrates, segregation appeared under every form of government, with and without the help of capitalism. The line betweende facto and de jure was often hard to tell or irrelevant. (One might note here, for example, that, contrary to popular belief, most businesses in the Old South were not forced by law to put up those ‘Whites Only’ signs.) Indeed, there is more than a bit of paradox and irony in this tragic story. And while the late 1900’s saw the rise of powerful movements opposed to segregation, the world’s population is now majority-urban for the first time, and still lives with these awful legacies. Attempts to rollback segregation will have to grapple with this complex and global history. Thankfully, Nightingale has given us a very useful starting point. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/world-affairs

A new chapter in the history of the Olympic Games appears to be opening. As one city after another has dropped out of the bidding for the 2022 Winter Games, the International Olympic Committee has been faced with the prospect that no one might be willing to host its wonderful, expensive party. Meanwhile, American cities have been submitting bids to the USOC for the opportunity to be the nation’s one candidate for the 2024 Summer Olympics. In an unusual twist, USOC members received letters from a group called No Boston Olympics that asked the committee to NOT name their city as the candidate for the 2024 Games. The opposition group’s website features counter-evidence to the Boston organizing committee’s claims about the Games’ benefits, including papers by academic economists that show the lack of financial gains in host cities. Anti-Olympic dissent is rising, as ordinary citizens and activist groups have pointed out the misuse of public funds for the Games, the heavy-handed actions of the IOC in host cities, the construction of athletics facilities without long-term viability, and the high costs of hosting an Olympics (costs that are not recouped by promised economic gains). Political scientist Jules Boykoff interviewed activists at the Games in Vancouver in 2010 and London in 2012, and he’s researched the history of activism surrounding the Olympics back to the 1960s.  His book, Activism and the Olympics: Dissent at the Games in Vancouver and London (Rutgers University Press, 2014), looks at the various groups that have protested at recent Olympics, their arguments and strategies, and the attention they’ve received from the press. As Jules acknowledges, there is not a sustained Olympics protest movement. But the work of activists has been successful, as fans and potential organizers are gaining the awareness that the cost of the Games doesn’t outweigh the gains. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/world-affairs

Lyman Johnson‘s book Workshop of Revolution: Plebian Buenos Aires and the Atlantic World, 1776-1810 (Duke University Press, 2011) analyzes the economic, political, and social lives of working people in Argentina’s colonial capital.  Johnson traces the economic challenges facing plebian workers in Buenos Aires, including competition from foreign goods, the arrival of enslaved Africans into the city’s economy, difficulties in labor organization, and transformations in colonial governance.  It provides a vibrant explanation of the factors that helped to create an organized working class on the eve of Latin America’s independence movements.  In many ways, his study provides a much-needed introduction to the social and economic factors that eventually resulted in Argentinian revolution. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/world-affairs

During the past several years, numerous books and articles have appeared that grapple with the legacy and lessons of the recent U.S. wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. This development should surprise few. The emergence of the jihadist group ISIS in Iraq and Syria raises profound questions about what the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003 accomplished. It also raises important questions about the manner in which the United States left Iraq, including the decision to evacuate all American troops from the country in 2011. As the U.S. continues to withdraw troops from Afghanistan, commentators continue to debate the future of this country in light of the Taliban’s enduring strength and doubts about the effectiveness of the Afghan government. In his new book Why We Lost: A General’s Inside Account of the Iraq and Afghanistan Wars (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2014), the retired General Daniel Bolger analyzes the U.S. wars in Iraq and Afghanistan from the perspective of a retired general who commanded troops during these conflicts. Written in a clear, easy-to-follow style, Bolger explains how a mixture of flawed assumptions, arrogance, and poor strategic decisions doomed the United States to “lose” these wars. Instead of blaming civilian leaders for botching the execution, he explains how the military leadership failed to develop a long-term strategy well suited to winning these wars as they turned into counterinsurgency conflicts. He even criticizes U.S. military leaders, including himself, for not driving home the point that building stable, prosperous countries in Iraq and Afghanistan would probably require a permanent commitment of U.S. troops (i.e., like Korea) and the expenditure of American resources well into the future. Along with taking military leaders to task, Bolger also addresses a number of misconceptions about the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.For example, he shows the limitations of suggesting that the United States “missed” an opportunity to capture Osama bin Laden before he escaped to Pakistan near the end of 2001. He also helps clear up misapprehensions about the U.S. failure to find WMDs in Iraq after the invasion took place and the successes of the Iraqi “surge.” In sharp contrast to accounts that focus on destructive impact of U.S. military might, Bolger provides an excellent account of how fears of civilian casualties in Afghanistan limited the use of firepower in ways that increased the casualty rates of American troops. However readers evaluate Bolger’s arguments and insights, they will benefit from reading his book. With humility and candor, he makes the important point that there is no time like the present to begin analyzing the lessons of the past so American military leaders and politicians will not repeat the mistakes that they made in Iraq and Afghanistan. Drawing on the lessons of history and limitations of human nature, he also reminds Americans that the do not have it within their grasp to transform “foreign” societies into liberal-democratic states in the near future and rid the world of terrorism once and for all. Recognizing the limits of their power, Americans can best serve the world by conducting “limited” military operations designed to “contain” threats, thereby buying time for groups of people like the Iraqis and Afghans to build their own brighter futures. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/world-affairs

The recent wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have raised important questions about the future direction of U.S. foreign policy and how Americans can best exercise power abroad in the coming years. Commentators have not shied away from offering advice. Some defend the record of the George W. Bush administration and blame Barrack Obama’s “weakness” for the current disorder that wracks large sections of the Middle East. In their view, the United States must continue to carry out “unilateral” military campaigns when necessary to preempt “terrorist” threats and work to spread democratic government all over the world. It also needs to maintain unquestioned military superiority to deter the aggressive plans of countries like China, Russia, and Iran. Many authors reject the general thrust of these arguments.  For some, Americans need to focus more attention on implementing “a realistic” foreign policy that avoids “crusades for democracy” and protects genuine U.S. interests as the world becomes multipolar. No doubt influenced by authors who have either predicted or announced the arrival of a “post-American world,” others have implored U.S. policymakers to address important domestic problems like income inequality and strengthen international institutions designed to promote “global governance.”  In a similar vein, a number of commentators have rejected any suggestion that George W. Bush’s policies represent a legitimate form of “Wilsonianism.” If Americans policymakers want to become the  “true heirs” of Wilson, they need to strengthen “global governance” and work through the United Nations to gain the “legitimacy” needed when the exercise of military power abroad becomes unavoidable. The political scientist Henry R. Nau (George Washington University) enters debates about the conduct of U.S. foreign policy in his new book Conservative Internationalism: Armed Diplomacy under Jefferson, Reagan, Truman, and Polk (Princeton University Press, 2013). Not one to shy away from controversy, Nau argues that authors have made a fundamental mistake when they offer advice to U.S. policymakers without reference to an important American foreign policy tradition that he defined as “conservative internationalism.”  To help readers gain a better grasp of this approach, he includes detailed case studies that highlight the foreign policy successes of Thomas Jefferson, James Polk, Harry Truman, and Ronald Reagan. More than most realize, Nau contends, these Presidents combined the use of force and effective diplomacy in ways that expanded the boundaries of freedom and handled threats in ways that did not allow them to become more costly problems for their successors. Although many critics will question the lessons that Nau draws from his Presidential case studies and analysis of events from 1991 to the present, they will be hard pressed to deny the relevance of his new book. He reminds readers that this “imperfect” world will not necessarily become a better place if the United States chooses to turn inward and fails to deal with the wide array of threats that could potentially undermine the contemporary global order. Nau also offers thought provoking insights on how the disciplined use of military power and “realistic” promotion of democratic government can serve U.S. interests quite well in the years ahead.  Enjoy. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/world-affairs

Successive waves of migration brought thousands of Chinese laborers to Cuba over the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The coolie trade, which was meant to replace waning supplies of slaves, was but the first. In the twentieth century, a sugar boom in Cuba facilitated the entry of thousands more. Many of these itinerant workers stayed, and this book uses Chinese and Spanish languages sources and microhistorical methods to trace their lives as they married, raised children, formed associations and ran businesses. Kathleen Lopez‘s book Chinese Cubans, A Transnational History (University of North Carolina Press, 2013) asks questions about belonging and offers a nuanced interpretation of the ways people of Chinese descent could proffer loyalties to Cuba even as they were embedded in transnational Chinese networks. There are surprising stories here, about race, family and work. Next time you encounter a Chinese-Cuban restaurant, you’ll know a little more about how it got there. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/world-affairs

When George Lucas first began to write “The Star Wars”, as it was originally known, he had no idea that it would become his main life’s work. Beginning as a modern Flash Gordon-style space adventure, the eventual series would become arguably the most successful film franchise in history. In his book How Star Wars Conquered the Universe: The Past, Present, and Future of a Multibillion Dollar Franchise (Basic Books, 2014), Chris Taylor, Deputy Editor at Mashable.com, presents a history of the series, from its development when Lucas was a struggling filmmaker to its rebirth when Disney buys Lucasfilm. He presents the franchise as both a film and cultural phenomenon, with both multigenerational and multinational ties. Chris’s Twitter handle is @FutureBoy. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/world-affairs

Central Asia is one of the least studied and understood regions of the Eurasian landmass, conjuring up images of 19th century Great Power politics, endless steppe, and impenetrable regimes. Alexander Cooley, a professor of Political Science at Barnard College in New York, has studied the five post-Soviet states of Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, and Turkmenistan since the end of the Soviet Union and developed a strong reputation as a commentator on the region’s politics. His recent book Great Game, Local Rules: The New Great Power Contest in Central Asia (Oxford University Press, 2014) charts the course of the region’s engagement with Russia, the United States, and China in the decade following September 11th. It is a tale of great power competition, brazen graft, revolution, hydrocarbons, and authoritarian rule that serves as both an excellent introduction to the region’s current politics and a primer on where Central Asia may be headed in the 21st century. As the United States withdraws NATO forces from Afghanistan, Russia pushes its Eurasian Economic Community across the post-Soviet space, and China’s rapid industrialization leads Beijing to seek closer cooperation and trade with the region, Professor Cooley’s book could not be timelier. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/world-affairs

In the early days of the Internet, optimists saw the future as highly connected, where voices from across the globe would mingle and learn from one another as never before. However, as Ethan Zuckerman argues in Rewire: Digital Cosmopolitans in the Age of Connection (Norton, 2013), just because a connection is possible does not mean disparate voices are being heard. Instead, things and not ideas have become more connected; we now live in a world where is easier to get a bottle of water from a tropical island halfway around the world than it is to get (let alone comprehend) news from that island. Zuckerman, a media scholar and activist based at MIT, suggests despite our perceived “connectedness,” the wired world is actually becoming more provincial and narrow, as we shift from professionally curated news and information, to search engines and algorithmically selected information based on previous “likes” and those of our homogeneous social circles. In other words, we are getting more and more of what we already know we want with ever-greater efficiency, but not what we need to be informed participants in a global world. In an expansive analysis that takes on everything from the global response to modern pandemics, to Greek philosophy, to the “Arab Spring,” to musical hybridization across cultures, Zuckerman calls for a world of “digital cosmopolitans,” where those who can bridge between communities are called upon to foster deeper, more nuanced conversations around the globe in ways that fulfill the promise of expanding technological opportunities. At once a thoughtful analysis, an engaging history, and a bold call to arms, Rewire offers readers a deep understanding of how media is evolving to shape and be shaped by global voices. As such, it has vast implications at both personal and geopolitical levels for the future of information, technology. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/world-affairs