Empires rise and empires fall. With the benefit of hindsight this is easy to see. It’s far more difficult to identify the trends of history when you’re living through it. This is the subject of To Govern the Globe, by Alfred McCoy. 

Alfred McCoy is a history professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and the author of several books including Torture and Impunity: The U.S. Doctrine of Coercive Interrogation and In the Shadows of the American Century: The Rise and Decline of US Global Power. His newest book, To Govern the Globe: World Orders and Catastrophic Change, was released on November 16th 2021.

Primarily focused on the Philippines, where his work has won a Philippine National Book Award, McCoy’s academic interests include US foreign policy, colonial empires in Southeast Asia, and CIA covert operations. He has received the Wilbur Cross Medal from the Yale Graduate School Alumni Association and the Hilldale Award for Arts & Humanities from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.