My guest today, Graham Allison, is a legendary scholar of international relations. The last time we spoke was just after the release of his 2017 book Destined for War: Can America and China Escape Thucydides’s Trap? The book examined over a dozen historic cases in which global power shifts resulted in wars, and a few cases in which it did not. The book makes a compelling case, that war between the US as established power and China as the rising power –while not inevitable– is far more likely than we might think.
I wanted to re-connect with Graham Allison to see if he thinks world events are confirming or refuting his thesis. This includes the role of this pandemic in shaping trends that might lead to war.
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Three years ago we had a long conversation about his life and career, this included the story behind his writing of “The Essence of Decision” in 1971. The book used the Cuban Missile Crisis as a case study to understand how organizations and governments make decisions — sometimes very bad ones.
That conversation is now available for premium subscribers.
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