2025 book releases, must-read books 2025, upcoming books 2025, editor picks 2025 books, Andrea Bonime-Blanc Governing Pandora, Karen Hao Empire of AI, Hal Brands The Eurasian Century, Robert Kaplan Waste Land, Nicholas Carr Superbloom, Alexander Karp Technological Republic, Omar El Akkad One Day Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This, Patricia Owens Erased, Ezra Klein Derek Thompson Abundance, Amitav Acharya Once and Future World Order, international relations books 2025, tech and governance books, geopolitics books 2025, thought-provoking reads, leadership and innovation books. pretty common New Year resolution in this day of fast media is to read more. If you’re resolved to read more this year, or if you’re simply still browsing to decide what you’ll add to your wishlist, Diplomatic Courier is here to help! Here, you can find our editors’ picks of books we’re looking forward to this year.
Hope you find this useful, and happy reading!
Governing Pandora
Andrea Bonime–Blanc
Georgetown University Press [late 2025]
Bonime–Blanc is a long–time member of our World in 2050 network of experts. For years, she has been tracking major global trends and how leaders around the world—public sector, private sector, and otherwise—can most effectively and ethically respond. In “Governing Pandora,” Bonime–Blanc lays out what she calls the “exponential governance mindset”—a set of five key interconnected organizational practices focused on leadership, ethos, impact, resilience, and foresight. Her writing is always engaging and offers real, concrete recommendations for leaders to think about and implement, and is highly recommended reading for leaders of any organization.
Empire of AI: Dreams and nightmares in Sam Altman's OpenAI
Karen Hao
Penguin Books [Jul. 15, 2025]
In general, the “experts” space is male dominated, and that’s especially true in tech. Enter journalist Karen Hao, an acknowledged expert on AI. In “Empire of AI,” Hao explores what went wrong with generative AI powerhouse OpenAI—with a behind–the–curtains look at Sam Altman’s firing and subsequent return. One way or another, OpenAI is going to be influencing our social and technological landscape for years to come, so a better understanding of the social and power dynamics behind the company’s decision–making feels like a must.
The Eurasian century: Hot wars, cold wars, and the making of the modern world
Hal Brands
W. W. Norton & Company [Jan 14, 2025]
Coming out in early 2025, “The Eurasian century” takes a step away from U.S.–centric ways of understanding the international order. It is a particularly useful perspective today, as straining alliances and geopolitical turmoil seemingly move us closer toward multi–polarity. Brands’ arguments that geopolitics throughout the modern era have been driven by events in Eurasia rather than U.S. strategy—an argument that, whether you find it compelling or not, should offer useful new ways of thinking about power dynamics today.
Waste land: A world in permanent crisis
Robert Kaplan
Random House [Jan 28, 2025]
Robert Kaplan is basically required reading, whether you agree with him or not, for geopolitics aficionados (nerds) everywhere. He brings his approach of deep culturally– and historically–informed political analysis to, essentially, the polycrisis. With how much debate on global affairs policy has turned to untangling the mess of interconnections between technology, climate, conflict, trade, and economies more widely, expect his ideas to be points of debate all year.
Superbloom: How Technologies of Connection Tear Us Apart
Nicholas Carr
W.W. Norton & Co. [Jan. 28, 2025]
There is great value in pessimism to better improve our individual and societal well-being amid the digital future. It’s a familiar path for Nicholas Carr, author of the upcoming “Superbloom: How Technologies of Connection Tear Us Apart,” who also authored “The Shallows: What the Internet is Doing to Our Brains,” a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in 2011. Carr is unafraid to point out the very real downside of technology, a boon in an era of relentless tech utopianism in which many of the richest and most powerful people on earth promote (profitable) positivity. In “Superbloom,” Carr promises to show the downside of the ‘superbloom’ of information provided by new technology and reveals what it costs our humanity.
The Technological Republic: Hard Power, Soft Belief, and the Future of the West
Alexander C. Karp and Nicholas W. Zamiska
Crown Currency [Feb. 18, 2025]
For those unfamiliar with Alexander C. Karp, he is co-founder and CEO of Palantir, one of the biggest movers and shakers in Silicon Valley, with unique and flourishing ties to the U.S. federal government. So that makes what he has to say in his upcoming book, “The Technological Republic: Hard Power, Soft Belief, and the Future of the West,” important to consider, especially as tech billionaires ensconce themselves in the pending Trump administration. In “The Technological Republic,” Karp will argue the U.S. and its allies need to pull the tech world closer, realizing anew that their fortunes are shared and their enemies the same. This thinking will define the ongoing fusion between tech giants and policymakers defining the U.S. national interest in the battle for exponential technologies.
One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This
Omar El Akkad
Penguin Random House [Feb. 25, 2025]
Omar El Akkad has a unique and valuable perspective on what “The West” is, what it stands for, and with what it must grapple. He was born in Egypt, grew up in Qatar, emigrated to Canada in his teens, and is now a U.S. citizen. He has had a career shaped by his reporting amid crises and war zones, then working as a novelist, chronicling the near-future breakdown of the United States and the journey of Syrian refugees. The title of his latest book, “One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This,” was part of an October 2023 tweet he wrote just weeks after the start of Israel’s assault on Gaza. This book is what his publisher is calling his “breakup letter with the West” – and promises to be a difficult, raw read from an important point of view.
Erased: A History of International Thought Without Men
Patricia Owens
Princeton University Press [March 11, 2025]
It’s thanks to scholars like Patricia Owens, a professor of international relations at Oxford University, that women are finally getting their due in many academic fields. One such field is international relations, which, if you scanned the list of noted scholars, you would see a lot of men—most white, most elite. But of course there’s more to the story, and Owen’s upcoming “Erased: A History of International Thought Without Men,” sounds like a bracing corrective to better our understanding of the field. As Owens’ publisher notes: “She argues that the creation of international relations was a highly gendered and racialised project that failed to understand plurality on a worldwide scale.” Understanding this failure is a key step for the field of international relations to renewal amid a world of declining trust in institutions.
Abundance
Ezra Klein, Derek Thompson
Simon & Schuster [March 18, 2025]
Many elements of our ongoing global polycrisis are centered around both perceived and actual systemic scarcity. So a very different perspective is a welcome one. Journalists Ezra Klein and Derek Thompson are ready to serve up just a brain-shifting perspective in their upcoming book, “Abundance.” Both are well-known for not just identifying issues, but proposing solutions, and their new book is no different. Thompson coined the term “abundance agenda” in a 2022 magazine column and the book builds upon his central idea that has gained a fair amount of traction: Achieving abundance will require a rejection of fear and a focus on outcomes, not methods—a challenge to all sides of the political spectrum.
The Once and Future World Order
Amitav Acharya
Hachette [April 8, 2025]
If you’re looking for a big-picture perspective to better contextualize our current moment in history, how about 5,000-years worth? In the upcoming “The Once and Future World Order,” Amitav Acharya surveys history to put a positive spin on the possible impending end of Western dominance in the global world order. Acharya’s book could come as a challenge for the haves who may become the have-lesses—losing dominance is hard to do and adjusting to a multi-polar world comes with a host of challenges. But a deep historical perspective might help us better understand why the decline of the West doesn’t preclude the future from arriving well.
a global affairs media network
Books our editors look forward to reading in 2025
Image by Bibliotheek Bornem from Pixabay
January 11, 2025
The new year is here, so it’s time for our annual look ahead to the global affairs books our editors are looking forward to reading in 2025. Happy reading!
A
2025 book releases, must-read books 2025, upcoming books 2025, editor picks 2025 books, Andrea Bonime-Blanc Governing Pandora, Karen Hao Empire of AI, Hal Brands The Eurasian Century, Robert Kaplan Waste Land, Nicholas Carr Superbloom, Alexander Karp Technological Republic, Omar El Akkad One Day Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This, Patricia Owens Erased, Ezra Klein Derek Thompson Abundance, Amitav Acharya Once and Future World Order, international relations books 2025, tech and governance books, geopolitics books 2025, thought-provoking reads, leadership and innovation books. pretty common New Year resolution in this day of fast media is to read more. If you’re resolved to read more this year, or if you’re simply still browsing to decide what you’ll add to your wishlist, Diplomatic Courier is here to help! Here, you can find our editors’ picks of books we’re looking forward to this year.
Hope you find this useful, and happy reading!
Governing Pandora
Andrea Bonime–Blanc
Georgetown University Press [late 2025]
Bonime–Blanc is a long–time member of our World in 2050 network of experts. For years, she has been tracking major global trends and how leaders around the world—public sector, private sector, and otherwise—can most effectively and ethically respond. In “Governing Pandora,” Bonime–Blanc lays out what she calls the “exponential governance mindset”—a set of five key interconnected organizational practices focused on leadership, ethos, impact, resilience, and foresight. Her writing is always engaging and offers real, concrete recommendations for leaders to think about and implement, and is highly recommended reading for leaders of any organization.
Empire of AI: Dreams and nightmares in Sam Altman's OpenAI
Karen Hao
Penguin Books [Jul. 15, 2025]
In general, the “experts” space is male dominated, and that’s especially true in tech. Enter journalist Karen Hao, an acknowledged expert on AI. In “Empire of AI,” Hao explores what went wrong with generative AI powerhouse OpenAI—with a behind–the–curtains look at Sam Altman’s firing and subsequent return. One way or another, OpenAI is going to be influencing our social and technological landscape for years to come, so a better understanding of the social and power dynamics behind the company’s decision–making feels like a must.
The Eurasian century: Hot wars, cold wars, and the making of the modern world
Hal Brands
W. W. Norton & Company [Jan 14, 2025]
Coming out in early 2025, “The Eurasian century” takes a step away from U.S.–centric ways of understanding the international order. It is a particularly useful perspective today, as straining alliances and geopolitical turmoil seemingly move us closer toward multi–polarity. Brands’ arguments that geopolitics throughout the modern era have been driven by events in Eurasia rather than U.S. strategy—an argument that, whether you find it compelling or not, should offer useful new ways of thinking about power dynamics today.
Waste land: A world in permanent crisis
Robert Kaplan
Random House [Jan 28, 2025]
Robert Kaplan is basically required reading, whether you agree with him or not, for geopolitics aficionados (nerds) everywhere. He brings his approach of deep culturally– and historically–informed political analysis to, essentially, the polycrisis. With how much debate on global affairs policy has turned to untangling the mess of interconnections between technology, climate, conflict, trade, and economies more widely, expect his ideas to be points of debate all year.
Superbloom: How Technologies of Connection Tear Us Apart
Nicholas Carr
W.W. Norton & Co. [Jan. 28, 2025]
There is great value in pessimism to better improve our individual and societal well-being amid the digital future. It’s a familiar path for Nicholas Carr, author of the upcoming “Superbloom: How Technologies of Connection Tear Us Apart,” who also authored “The Shallows: What the Internet is Doing to Our Brains,” a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in 2011. Carr is unafraid to point out the very real downside of technology, a boon in an era of relentless tech utopianism in which many of the richest and most powerful people on earth promote (profitable) positivity. In “Superbloom,” Carr promises to show the downside of the ‘superbloom’ of information provided by new technology and reveals what it costs our humanity.
The Technological Republic: Hard Power, Soft Belief, and the Future of the West
Alexander C. Karp and Nicholas W. Zamiska
Crown Currency [Feb. 18, 2025]
For those unfamiliar with Alexander C. Karp, he is co-founder and CEO of Palantir, one of the biggest movers and shakers in Silicon Valley, with unique and flourishing ties to the U.S. federal government. So that makes what he has to say in his upcoming book, “The Technological Republic: Hard Power, Soft Belief, and the Future of the West,” important to consider, especially as tech billionaires ensconce themselves in the pending Trump administration. In “The Technological Republic,” Karp will argue the U.S. and its allies need to pull the tech world closer, realizing anew that their fortunes are shared and their enemies the same. This thinking will define the ongoing fusion between tech giants and policymakers defining the U.S. national interest in the battle for exponential technologies.
One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This
Omar El Akkad
Penguin Random House [Feb. 25, 2025]
Omar El Akkad has a unique and valuable perspective on what “The West” is, what it stands for, and with what it must grapple. He was born in Egypt, grew up in Qatar, emigrated to Canada in his teens, and is now a U.S. citizen. He has had a career shaped by his reporting amid crises and war zones, then working as a novelist, chronicling the near-future breakdown of the United States and the journey of Syrian refugees. The title of his latest book, “One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This,” was part of an October 2023 tweet he wrote just weeks after the start of Israel’s assault on Gaza. This book is what his publisher is calling his “breakup letter with the West” – and promises to be a difficult, raw read from an important point of view.
Erased: A History of International Thought Without Men
Patricia Owens
Princeton University Press [March 11, 2025]
It’s thanks to scholars like Patricia Owens, a professor of international relations at Oxford University, that women are finally getting their due in many academic fields. One such field is international relations, which, if you scanned the list of noted scholars, you would see a lot of men—most white, most elite. But of course there’s more to the story, and Owen’s upcoming “Erased: A History of International Thought Without Men,” sounds like a bracing corrective to better our understanding of the field. As Owens’ publisher notes: “She argues that the creation of international relations was a highly gendered and racialised project that failed to understand plurality on a worldwide scale.” Understanding this failure is a key step for the field of international relations to renewal amid a world of declining trust in institutions.
Abundance
Ezra Klein, Derek Thompson
Simon & Schuster [March 18, 2025]
Many elements of our ongoing global polycrisis are centered around both perceived and actual systemic scarcity. So a very different perspective is a welcome one. Journalists Ezra Klein and Derek Thompson are ready to serve up just a brain-shifting perspective in their upcoming book, “Abundance.” Both are well-known for not just identifying issues, but proposing solutions, and their new book is no different. Thompson coined the term “abundance agenda” in a 2022 magazine column and the book builds upon his central idea that has gained a fair amount of traction: Achieving abundance will require a rejection of fear and a focus on outcomes, not methods—a challenge to all sides of the political spectrum.
The Once and Future World Order
Amitav Acharya
Hachette [April 8, 2025]
If you’re looking for a big-picture perspective to better contextualize our current moment in history, how about 5,000-years worth? In the upcoming “The Once and Future World Order,” Amitav Acharya surveys history to put a positive spin on the possible impending end of Western dominance in the global world order. Acharya’s book could come as a challenge for the haves who may become the have-lesses—losing dominance is hard to do and adjusting to a multi-polar world comes with a host of challenges. But a deep historical perspective might help us better understand why the decline of the West doesn’t preclude the future from arriving well.
