• Study Group on U.S. Foreign Policy Phase II: With God on Our Side: American Apocalypse and the Mall at the End of the World

  Staff:	Timothy Samuel Shah, Adjunct Senior Fellow for Religion and Foreign Policy Walter Russell Mead, Henry A. Kissinger Senior Fellow for U.S. Foreign Policy

  July 1, 2002 - October 1, 2007

  Sessions of this study group provide feedback on draft chapters of a book by Walter Russell Mead examining America’s current position in the world (and the fight against terror) from the perspective of 400 years of Anglo-American history, and it proposes that the conventional narrative of modern history—the rise and fall of Europe—be replaced by an alternative: the continuing rise of a maritime, liberal world system based first on the power of Great Britain, then of the United States.

  The book further examines the implications of American power and social dynamism for the twenty-first century. Mead argues, contrary to writers like Fukuyama and Mandelbaum, that the twenty-first century could well be even bloodier and more tumultuous than the twentieth, and the United States had better prepare for this possibility. He contends that this is so because American dynamism and strength, technological and therefore economic and social change will accelerate. At the same time, the inability of many world cultures to adapt will generate instability, continued inequality, and conflict into the future even as technological progress makes weapons of mass destruction easier to acquire and deliver.

  
  

• The Global Finance Regime

  

  Explore the international finance regime with a new interactive from CFR's program on International Institutions and Global Governance.

  New Council Special Reports

  
  

  Enhancing U.S. Preventive Action

  Identifying international threats and acting on them may be the most difficult job for U.S. policymakers. This report provides an actionable road map for managing international threats before they erupt into crises and makes a strong case that preventive action is not a luxury but a necessity.

  The United States in the New Asia

  For more than a decade, the United States has mostly watched from the sidelines as Asian countries organize themselves into an alphabet soup of new multilateral groups. In this report, the authors review the relationship between pan-Asian and trans-Pacific institutions and suggest policy guidelines for a new U.S. approach to this new Asian landscape.

  Complete list of Council Special Reports

  New Books

  Start-Up Nation addresses the trillion-dollar question: How is it that Israel—a country of 7.1 million, only sixty years old, surrounded by enemies— produces more start-up companies than large, peaceful, and stable nations like Japan, China, India, Korea, Canada, and the UK? With the insights of geopolitical experts and investors, the authors examine this nation’s adversity-driven culture to answer this question and offer prescriptions for a global economy on the rebound.

  

  In Forces of Fortune, Vali Nasr presents a paradigm-changing revelation that will transform the understanding of the Muslim world at large. He reveals that there is a vital but unseen rising force in the Islamic world—a new business-minded middle class—that is building a vibrant new Muslim world economy and that holds the key to winning the cold war against Iran and extremists.

  In Cuba: What Everyone Needs to Know, Julia E. Sweig presents a remarkably accessible portrait of Cuba's unique place on the world stage over the past fifty years, including its internal politics, its often fraught relationship with the United States, and its shifting relationship with the global community.

  Complete list of CFR Books

  David Rockefeller Studies Program Contacts

  For more information on the David Rockefeller Studies Program, contact:

  James M. Lindsay
  Senior Vice President, Director of Studies, and Maurice R. Greenberg Chair
  +1.212.434.9626 (NY); +1.202.509.8405 (DC)
  jlindsay@cfr.org

  Janine Hill
  Deputy Director of Studies Administration
  +1.212.434.9753
  jhill@cfr.org

   

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