Doom: The Politics of Catastrophe

In his new book, the famous historian Niall Ferguson surveys a wide range of catastrophes that have occurred in human history: geological, geopolitical, biological, and technological. He examines the causes and consequences of specific disasters, including the COVID-19 pandemic, and more generally how people and societies respond to catastrophes and try to predict them. Drawing on several scientific disciplines—including economics, cliodynamics, and network science—Ferguson writes not only history, but also a general theory of catastrophe, showing why our increasingly bureaucratized and complex management systems are doing worse and worse in dealing with them.