In today’s episode of Bookstack, host Richard Aldous sits down with Matthew C. Klein, economist, writer behind The Overshoot on Substack, and co-author. with Michael Pettis, of Trade Wars Are Class Wars: How Rising Inequality Distorts the Global Economy and Threatens International Peace (Yale University Press). Bookstack is now a production of Amer…

In this episode of Bookstack, host Richard Aldous sits down with Jonathan Rauch, journalist and author of Cross Purposes: Christianity's Broken Bargain with Democracy (Yale University Press). Bookstack is now a production of American Purpose at Persuasion. Follow Persuasion on X (Twitter), LinkedIn, and YouTube to keep up with our latest articles, …

In this episode of Bookstack, host Richard Aldous sits down with Nicole Karlis, award-winning journalist and author of Your Brain on Altruism: The Power of Connection and Community During Times of Crisis (University of California Press). Bookstack is now a production of American Purpose at Persuasion. Follow Persuasion on X (Twitter), LinkedIn, and…

In this episode of Bookstack, host Richard Aldous sits down with Nir Arielli, international historian and author, to discuss his new book, The Dead Sea: A 10,000 Year History (Yale University Press). Bookstack is now a production of American Purpose at Persuasion. Follow Persuasion on X (Twitter), LinkedIn, and YouTube to keep up with our latest ar…

In this week’s episode of Bookstack, host Richard Aldous sits down with economist and financial journalist Wolfgang Münchau to discuss his new book, Kaput: The End of the German Miracle (Swift Press). Bookstack is now a production of American Purpose at Persuasion. Follow Persuasion on X (Twitter), LinkedIn, and YouTube to keep up with our latest a…

In this week’s episode of Bookstack, host Richard Aldous sits down with Tevi Troy, presidential historian, former U.S. Deputy Secretary of Heath and Human Services, and prolific author to discuss Troy’s new book, The Power and the Money: The Epic Clashes Between Commanders in Chief and Titans of Industry (Skyhorse Publishing). Bookstack is now a pr…

In this week’s episode of Bookstack, host Richard Aldous sits down with Katherine C. Epstein, associate professor of history at Rutgers University-Camden and author of the new book, Analog Superpowers: How Twentieth-Century Technology Theft Built the National Security State (The University of Chicago Press). Bookstack is now a production of America…

In this week’s episode of Bookstack, host Richard Aldous talks to presidential historian Lindsay M. Chervinsky, author of the new book, Making the Presidency: John Adams and the Precedents That Forged the Republic (Oxford University Press).Note: this episode was recorded in early January 2025. Bookstack is now a production of American Purpose at Pe…

In this week's episode of Bookstack, host Richard Aldous talks to Michael Mandelbaum, author of the new book, The Titans of the Twentieth Century: How They Made History and the History They Made (Oxford University Press). Bookstack is now a production of American Purpose at Persuasion. Follow Persuasion on X (Twitter), LinkedIn, and YouTube to keep…

In this week's episode of Bookstack, host Richard Aldous talks to Johns Hopkins epidemiologist Caitlin Rivers, PhD, about her new book, Crisis Averted: The Hidden Science of Fighting Outbreaks (Viking). Bookstack is now a production of American Purpose at Persuasion. Follow Persuasion on X (Twitter), LinkedIn, and YouTube to keep up with our latest…

In this week’s episode of Bookstack, recorded in the week post-U.S. presidential election, host Richard Aldous chats with American historian Hyrum Lewis about his latest book, co-written with his brother Verlan Lewis, The Myth of Left and Right: How the Political Spectrum Misleads and Harms America (Oxford University Press) Bookstack is now a produ…

In this week’s episode of Bookstack, host Richard Aldous chats with Admiral James Stavridis, USN (Ret.), former NATO Supreme Allied Commander Europe, about his latest book, The Restless Wave: A Novel of the United States Navy (Penguin Random House). Bookstack is now a production of American Purpose at Persuasion. Follow Persuasion on X (Twitter), L…

In this week’s episode, host Richard Aldous talks to fellow Bard College historian Sean McMeekin about his new book, To Overthrow the World: The Rise and Fall and Rise of Communism (Basic Books). Bookstack is now a production of American Purpose at Persuasion. Follow Persuasion on Twitter, LinkedIn, and YouTube to keep up with our latest articles, …

Bookstack is back with its 150th episode! On this week's show, host Richard Aldous talks to Marsha E. Barrett, assistant professor of history at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, about her new book, Nelson Rockefeller's Dilemma: The Fight to Save Moderate Republicanism (Three Hills/Cornell University Press). Bookstack is now a production…

On this week's episode of Bookstack, host Richard Aldous is joined by Clara Bingham to discuss her new book, The Movement: How Women's Liberation Transformed America 1963-1973. Bookstack is now a production of American Purpose at Persuasion. Follow Persuasion on Twitter, LinkedIn, and YouTube to keep up with our latest articles, podcasts, and event…

Bookstack is back! On today's episode, host Richard Aldous talks to James Graham Wilson, historian at the U.S. Department of State, about James's new book, America's Cold Warrior: Paul Nitze and National Security from Roosevelt to Reagan (Cornell University Press). This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or ge…

The typical Black American family has fifteen cents of wealth for every comparable dollar that a White American family holds. Exploring the historical expansion of the wealth gap, journalists Louise Story and Ebony Reed join Richard Aldous to reveal how their investigation into the U.S. financial system uncovered scores of setbacks that continue to…

The global pandemic unmasked not just the many vulnerabilities in the world’s supply chain, but also its hidden innerworkings. Reporting on the world from an economic lens for over twenty-five years, award-winning New York Times journalist Peter S. Goodman joins Richard Aldous to share insights from his latest book, How the World Ran Out of Everyth…

How did Dwight D. Eisenhower, a man of simple Kansas-bred beginnings, inspire implicit trust by his historical peers, from FDR and Churchill, to Stalin and DeGaulle? And how did he become a shaper of a new world order, asserting America’s post-war dominance? Michel Paradis, author of The Light of Battle: Eisenhower, D-Day, and the Birth of the Amer…

Is there hope to be found amidst the current political climate? How to generate solidarity in an atmosphere of growing difference? Renowned sociologist James Davison Hunter tackles these questions in his new book, Democracy and Solidarity: On the Cultural Roots of America's Political Crisis (https://yalebooks.yale.edu/book/9780300274370/democracy-a…

When President Joe Biden stated in 2022 that the United States would defend Taiwan military in the event of a Chinese invasion, he crossed a line of ambiguity that had been purposefully danced around for decades. And yet, even though such a scenario would pit two nuclear powers against each another, “The United States does not know why Taiwan is im…

In divided times, many Americans are sealing themselves off from those who think differently. Diana McLain Smith tells a different story in her new book, Remaking the Space Between Us: How Citizens Can Work Together to Build a Better Future for All (https://www.remakingthespace.org/book), focusing on the tens of thousands reaching out to fellow Ame…

Thanks to American missionaries’ successes around the globe, the face of evangelicalism is no longer White America. In Soul by Soul: The Evangelical Mission to Spread the Gospel to Muslims (https://globalreports.columbia.edu/books/soul-by-soul/), Adriana Carranca reveals an extraordinary tale that has been under the radar: Missionaries from Latin A…

Harry Truman was educated in Missouri public schools, never went to college, and spent a number of his adult years as a dirt farmer. Yet eleven years after first being elected to the Senate he became President of the most powerful nation on earth in the midst of momentous world events. In his new book Ascent to Power: How Truman Emerged from Roosev…

Ian Fleming heroicized for all the world the British intelligence agent in James Bond. In his new book Ian Fleming: The Complete Man (https://www.harpercollins.com/products/ian-fleming-nicholas-shakespeare?variant=41070483832866), renowned biographer Nicholas Shakespeare digs into the legend of Fleming himself. Like his most famous character, Flemi…

In surveying dysfunction across America, the question arises: Is the source of the trouble at the local or the national level? Seth D. Kaplan has shifted his analytical gaze from fragile nations abroad to examine the fragility of his home country. He believes America’s problems from health to politics are downstream of individuals becoming increasi…

Solidarity has been at the root of social change throughout history, bringing people together across their differences to challenge injustice within societies. In their new book, Solidarity: The Past, Present, and Future of a World-Changing Idea (https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/740355/solidarity-by-leah-hunt-hendrix-and-astra-taylor/), Lea…

There are now over a million Russians living in exile, spurred on by the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. Unable to safely oppose their own government at home, they often find themselves subject to harassment and disdain as immigrants. In his new book, Putin’s Exiles: Their Fight for a Better Russia (https://globalreports.columbia.e…

Rejected in official circles in his day and embraced in modern times by a motley array of admirers, Spinoza was in many ways ahead of his time. His commitment to truth, universal principles, and freedom lie at the heart of Western liberal thinking. As those ideas come under attack on both the left and the right, Spinoza’s philosophical thinking is …

Following the collapse of the Soviet Union, Ukraine and Russia not only embarked on very different political paths at home, but they viewed the future of their relationship in starkly divergent terms. In [Russia and Ukraine: Entangled Histories, Diverging States](https://www.politybooks.com/bookdetail?bookslug=russia-and-ukraine-entangled-histories…

Large threats to the well-being of humankind such as the pandemic and climate change have cemented the notion that scientists across the globe naturally work together to solve the world’s most pressing problems. In Rivals: How Scientists Learned to Cooperate (https://globalreports.columbia.edu/books/rivals/), historian of science Lorraine Daston tr…

Amidst all the positive and negative ink dedicated to Winston Churchill, Cambridge emeritus professor of international history David Reynolds offers a new dimension. He places the leader for whom history was determined by “great men” among the other greats who both inspired and enervated him. Reynolds joins host Richard Aldous to discuss his latest…

The remarkable shift in the economic ideas at the heart of the Democratic Party—from the embrace of neoliberalism in the ’90s to the left-wing populism that Joe Biden accommodates today—traces its origins to the 2008 financial crisis. Elizabeth Warren, and Bernie Sanders and AOC after her, put the economic frustrations of ordinary Americans at the …

For tens of thousands of people, living in Mexico today means living in a country where criminal violence begets state-sponsored violence, and where law and justice have so failed ordinary citizens that they often take matters into their own hands. In his new book Fear Is Just a Word: A Missing Daughter, a Violent Cartel, and a Mother's Quest for V…

Freedom Rider and Congressman John Lewis was widely viewed as a saint no less than a civil rights icon. How to capture the full humanity of such a legendary figure, whose life was intertwined with some of America’s lowest lows and highest highs? Civil rights historian Raymond Arsenault does just that in his new biography, John Lewis: In Search of t…

Joseph Nye’s prominent dual roles as policymaker and foreign affairs academic have rendered him one of the most important observers of U.S. foreign policy since World War II. In his new book, A Life in the American Century (https://www.politybooks.com/bookdetail?book_slug=a-life-in-the-american-century--9781509560684), the statesman-scholar looks b…

Long gone are the days of steak dinners, piano bars, and free alcohol on flights—not to mention widely expanding markets and strong competition. Vanderbilt Law professor Ganesh Sitaraman looks to the deregulation of the airline industry in the 1970s to explain the relatively dismal state of flying today. In his new book, Why Flying Is Miserable: An…

Travel is exhilarating and enlightening, but what happens when it becomes an escape from things that really matter? For acclaimed travel writer Nikki Vargas, travel has been her work, her dreams—and also her crutch. She joins host Richard Aldous to discuss her new book Call You When I Land (https://www.harpercollins.com/products/call-you-when-i-lan…

Rockefeller, Morgan, and Carnegie are household names, yet much less known are the Jewish “money kings” who came to America in the 19th century. In his new book The Money Kings: The Epic Story of the Jewish Immigrants Who Transformed Wall Street and Shaped Modern America (https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/541779/the-money-kings-by-daniel-sch…

The American economy is once again experiencing a concentration of financial power in a few hands, but this time around the actors are much less familiar. As John Coates shows in his new book, The Problem of 12: When a Few Financial Institutions Control Everything (https://globalreports.columbia.edu/books/the-problem-of-twelve/#:~:text=When%20a%20F…

The ambitious, larger-than-life character of Theodore Roosevelt is the stuff of legend. Outside of his connection with the League of Nations, much less is known about Roosevelt’s closest friend, Henry Cabot Lodge. Equally abundant in intellectual gifts, Lodge helped launch to the presidency the man whose vision he shared of a United States divinely…

Was there a moment after the Cold War when the United States “lost” Russia? Thomas Graham, senior director for Russia on the National Security Council under President George W. Bush, looks back to the period between 1991 and 2022 to grapple with what might have been—or, better, what was never meant to be. He joins host Richard Aldous to assess what…

The October 7 terrorist attacks by Hamas on Israel were launched fifty years and a day after the last great surprise assault on the country by its Arab neighbors. At the time of the Yom Kippur War, Israel was not only much poorer and weaker than it is today, but it was completely dependent for military aid on a United States preoccupied with oil an…

Betty Friedan and many of her NOW co-founders have become household names, but what of the women who built on their pioneering work? In her new book, The Women of NOW: How Feminists Built an Organization That Transformed America (https://us.macmillan.com/books/9780374601539/thewomenofnow), Katherine Turk looks at the second-wave feminists who broad…

Engaging with those who are different from us is essential to democratic life and politics. Alexandra Hudson argues that in order to improve the tenor of our interactions we must cultivate civility, which unlike mere politeness entails a respect for others as our moral equals. She joins host Richard Aldous to discuss her new book, The Soul of Civil…

Does the ability to produce great art depend upon living in a free country? For a time the rhetoric emanating from the United States—including from President John F. Kennedy himself—suggested it did. Classical music expert Joseph Horowitz delves into the sources of this Cold War-era hyperbole in his new book, The Propaganda of Freedom: JFK, Shostak…

Across America, from college campuses to corporate boardrooms, a set of ideas has taken hold affirming race, gender, and sexual orientation as the essential prisms through which we experience life. In his new book, The Identity Trap: A Story of Ideas and Power in Our Time (https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/712961/the-identity-trap-by-yascha-…

In an era when machines are progressing from thinking for us to learning for us, it’s worth asking what exactly the purpose of learning is. Michael Roth, president of Wesleyan University, looks back to students of some of history’s great inculcators to find a more foundational understanding beyond simply the accumulation of knowledge. He sits down …

“Bookstack” returns with renowned Oxford professor of European studies Timothy Garton Ash. In his latest book, Homelands: A Personal History of Europe (https://yalebooks.yale.edu/book/9780300257076/homelands/), Ash chronicles the spread of freedom across Europe since 1945 through his personal perspective as an “English European.” He sits down with …

Could there really be a straight line between the self-made person of talent and the branded personality made famous by reality TV and the internet? In Self-Made: Creating Our Identities from Da Vinci to the Kardashians (https://www.hachettebookgroup.com/titles/tara-isabella-burton/self-made/9781541789012/?lens=publicaffairs), Tara Isabella Burton …