My rating: 5 of 5 stars
No event in recent history has been as disruptive to the world as the COVID-19 pandemic that, as of this writing, is still ongoing. Millions have died and millions more have been infected by this disease. In the United States, the number of deaths from COVID are comparable to the number of combat deaths during the Civil War. And the recession caused by the pandemic and subsequent lockdowns is on a par with the 2008 financial crises that we had only just recovered from. Much has been laid bare by this once in a century catastrophe, but fortunately Mr. Zakaria has written a fabulously book to guide us through this pandemic and look forward beyond our current crisis to see what the world may look like afterwards.
Best known for his book The Post-American World and his Sunday international news show on CNN, Mr. Zakaria is the right man to take a global perspective on this pandemic. But, rather than disprove the central theses of globalization and relative American decline, Mr. Zakaria argues in this book that the pandemic proves both the necessity of globalization and America’s continued to decline. He even goes beyond that to reveal how important quality government is to daily living, the need for two-way dialogue between experts and average citizens, and the overwhelming necessity for global cooperation. All of these “lessons” are very well backed up by statistics and figures from an incredibly wide variety of authoritative sources. And yet, despite all the overwhelming citations, Mr. Zakaria’s writing style is both engaging and easy-to-follow. Both experts and laymen should be able to pick up this book and learn something.
The only drawback of this book is how outdated some of the information is. Published in October 2020, some events have accelerated since then. The COVID vaccine was still in development, though close to completion, when this book went to press and, of course, the 2020 U.S. presidential election and Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol had not happened yet either. Though this book in hindsight is quite prescient, I do hope Mr. Zakaria does update this book when it comes out in paperback.
Overall, though only slightly out of date, this is one of the best books to examine these current times and try to project into the future. Though the pandemic has scarred nearly all of us, this book can help us make sense of this current crisis and what is necessary to build back better in the future. I highly recommend this book to both policy wonks and laymen alike.
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