Collapse: A World in Crisis and the Urgency of American Leadership - Hardcover

Schoen, Douglas E.

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1641770341 ISBN 13: 9781641770347

Publisher: Encounter Books, 2019

Synopsis

Collapse takes stock of a volatile and threatening international environment by looking at some of the underlying causes and flashpoints―the principal one being the failure of institutions and elites to respond to their constituencies and address the problems of our age. This is a problem spanning the increased polarization that bred nationalist and populist movements, the continued failure of Western leaders to come up with effective strategies for combating authoritarian rivals like Russia and China, and the ongoing Islamist threat.

Schoen makes clear that the indispensable ingredient for any constructive path forward is effective, engaged, and committed American leadership. This is discussed through the lens of the failed models of President Trump’s two recent predecessors, which reflected, respectively, an uncritical embrace of American power―lacking strategic insight and proportion―and an uncritical abandonment of American leadership that suggested an abject view of the U.S. moral example in the world. Instead, Schoen posits assertive democratic idealism―an embrace of U.S. moral leadership around the world but in ways that remain leavened by realism and a guiding understanding of our national interest. Whether President Trump can deliver on such a vision remains to be seen.

About this title

About the Author

Douglas E. Schoen has been one of the most influential Democratic campaign consultants for more than 40 years. A founding partner and principal strategist for Penn, Schoen & Berland, he is widely recognized as one of the co-inventors of overnight polling. His political clients include former New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg and President Bill Clinton, and his corporate clients include AOL Time Warner, Procter & Gamble, and AT&T. Internationally, he has worked for the heads of state of over 15 countries. He is the author of multiple books; his newest, America in the Age of Trump, was published in the summer of 2017. Schoen is a regular contributor to the Wall Street Journal, the Washington Post, and various other newspaper and online publications, as well as Fox News. He is based in New York City.

Review

“At a moment when chaos and disequilibrium seem to define politics and statecraft around the globe, Schoen has given us not only a way to understand how we got here, but also a prescription for how we find our way back to a more perfect union and a calmer world. A seasoned veteran of political combat, he has advised presidents, prime ministers, governors, and mayors for decades. In his newest book, Collapse, he gives us a roadmap for a new north star for global stability. During these anxious times, Schoen helps us imagine a path toward a more hopeful future. Part professor, part hardnosed political adviser, Schoen is the perfect tutor at the perfect time.”

―Richard Plepler, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of HBO
“This is a bracing, authoritative, and lucid account of the geopolitical crisis that is now afoot in the world and the need for clear-sighted, moral American leadership on the world stage. Schoen explains in an engaging, highly readable manner how the twentieth-century international alliances and pillars of Western democracy have been eroded―and surveys the rising threats posed by authoritarianism, extremist Islam, and other challenges. However, he does not succumb to defeatism; instead he appeals for a new type of American leadership known as ‘assertive democratic idealism,’ arguing that this could and should be supported by Democrats and Republicans alike. At a time when so much of the debate about domestic and global politics is deeply polarized, this vision of ‘assertive democratic idealism’ offers a welcome bipartisan call to arms, in the cause of common-sense policy making―and is precisely the type of sensible, clear-headed analysis which is so badly needed in Washington today.”

―Gillian Tett, U.S. Managing Editor, the Financial Times
“A remarkably comprehensive analysis of the challenges―internal and external―that we face today. Schoen is able to write intelligently about domestic and international issues alike, weaving them into one worrisome picture of the world. But Schoen ends up, like the man he worked for, Bill Clinton, optimistic about America’s ability to help the world out of the gloom and into broader sunlit uplands. Well worth reading.”

―Fareed Zakaria, author of The Post-American World

About this edition

• Publisher: Encounter Books
• Publication date: 2019
• ISBN 10: 1641770341
• ISBN 13: 9781641770347
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 264