Upheaval

In his international bestsellers "Guns Germs and Steel" and "Collapse " Jared Diamond transformed our understanding of what makes civilizations rise and fall. Now in his third book in this... trilogy he reveals how successful nations recover from crises while adopting selective changes -- a coping mechanism more commonly associated with individuals recovering from personal crises. Diamond compares how six countries have survived recent upheavals -- ranging from the forced opening of Japan by U.S. Commodore Perry's fleet to the Soviet Union's attack on Finland to a murderous coup or countercoup in Chile and Indonesia to the transformations of Germany and Austria after World War Two. Because Diamond has lived and spoken the language in five of these six countries he can present gut-wrenching histories experienced firsthand. These nations coped to varying degrees through mechanisms such as acknowledgment of responsibility painfully honest self-appraisal and learning from models of other nations. Looking to the future Diamond examines whether the United States Japan and the whole world are successfully coping with the grave crises they currently face. Can we learn from lessons of the past? Adding a psychological dimension to the in-depth history geography biology and anthropology that mark all of Diamond's books "Upheaval" reveals factors influencing how both whole nations and individual people can respond to big challenges. The result is a book epic in scope but also his most personal book yet.