Table Of Content

Most people Jifiiieye-tliai the political earth since 1"89T|fas~dergone im mense xhanjie._Bui il Ls_miQûr com pared ^ m t i f ^ w l f t" i? " fflr come. The breaking apart and remakina of crack and •U8H^ T ^ f t GSmei R f n f tre OF THE POST COLD WAR of the Arab-Israel m i l i t a^ Qngp^tj^n^areQnerely prologues^tothe realU Ina changes that lie ahead. . . . Author of BALKAN GHOSTS U.S.A. $21.95 Canada $33.00 When "The Coming Anarchy" was published in The Atlantic Monthly in 1994, it was hailed as among the most important and influential articulations of the future of our planet, along with Francis Fukuyama's "The End of History" and Samuel P. Huntington's "The Clash of Civilizations." Since then, Robert Kaplan's anti-utopian vision of the fault lines of the twenty- first century has taken on the status of a paradigm. "The Coming Anarchy" has been hailed as the defining thesis for understanding the post-Cold War world. At the heart of this book is a question as old as America and one that is crucial to our national self-definition: what can and should we do when violence breaks out in countries far from our borders? A work of uncompromising honesty, The Coming Anarchyis the first book to present a coherent picture of the political views of a man who has shaped national dia logue in this decade on key issues of international relations. {The New York Times called Kaplan's Balkan Ghosts "the best- known volume associated with the Clinton Presidency.") The Coming Anarchy takes on some of the most difficult issues we will be grappling with and living through in the next century. When we speak about the resurgence of ethnic vio lence, the social pressures of disease, environmental scarcity and overpopulation, and the rise of criminal anarchy, we are using language that Robert Kaplan brought into our homes. In "Was Democracy Just a Moment?" Kaplan offers a fierce indictment of American plans to export democracy abroad, in places where it can't succeed. In "Idealism Won't Stop Mass Murder," he looks with a clear eye at the conse quences of the new Holocaust mentality in American foreign policy. In "Proportionalism," he lays out boundaries for a suc cessful policy toward the developing world. And in "The Dangers of Peace," he proposes a theory of war and peace in the modern world and a vision of the future of the United Nations that will be as controversial as "The Coming Anarchy" was when it first appeared in The Atlantic Monthly. Impassioned, iconoclastic, visionary, and stubbornly original, The Coming Anarchy will be one of the most impor tant and controversial books of the new century. ROBERT D. KAPLAN is a correspondent for The Atlantic Monthly and the author of six previous books on travel and for eign affairs, translated into a dozen languages. His bestseller Balkan Ghosts was chosen by The New York Times as one of the Best Books of 1993 and by Amazon.com as one of the top ten travel books of all time. An Empire Wilderness and The Ends of the Earth were also national bestsellers; the former was chosen by The Washington Post and the Los Angeles Times as Best Book of the Year. Kaplan lectures frequently to the U.S. mili tary, was a consultant to the U.S. Army's Special Forces Regiment, and is a fellow at the New America Foundation. He has written the Introduction to the Modern Library's edition of Joseph Conrad's Lord Jim & Nostromo. Kaplan lives with his wife and son in western Massachusetts. " A particular nightmare, for most human beings, would be to live in a society without order of any kind, without predictabil ity: in a country that has no effective government, subject to crime and disease and primitive rapacity without recourse to any saving authority. That is the future foreseen for much of the world in 'The Coming Anarchy' by Robert Kaplan . . . extraordinarily chilling and, alas, compelling." —ANTHONY LEWIS, The New York Times Jacket design: Abby Weintraub Random House New York, N.Y. 10022 www.atrandom.com Printed in U.S.A. 2/00 © 2000 Random House, Inc M 03 P R A I SE FOR T HE C O M I NG A N A R C HY 63 rl 'Thoughtful pessimists in the tradition of Hobbes, Conrad, Gibbon, j pp| - and de Tocqueville will love this, and Kofi Annan will hate it. Kaplan careens through the comfortable and popular assumption that peace and democracy, marching hand in hand, are leading us into an ever Ul g j rosier future and scatters sacred cows right and left. Fascinating. [) ITI ' Discomforting. Bracing." —R. JAMES WOOLSEY, former director of the CIA P3 rl "Filled with penetrating insight into the grim realities of today's world. ^Tl 6« Kaplan vividly describes conflicts and contradictions which too many policy makers and scholars attempt to ignore. His previously unpub- — - J lished essay, "The Dangers of Peace," is, in itself, reason enough to H © buy this book and to ponder its cogent and sobering truths." —SAMUEL P. HUNTINGTON, author of The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order t h [The GI "Robert Kaplan brings the eye of a journalist and the rigor of a philosopher to the task of explaining how tomorrow's world will emerge from today's. At a time when all too many leaders and Q thinkers are entranced by visions of perpetual peace and Utopian Q f| d prosperity, Kaplan reminds us that while countries can succeed or fail at power politics, none can afford to ignore its imperative." —MICHAEL LIND, author of Vietnam: The Necessary War the aeli "A brilliant and disturbing manifesto, a wake-up call to those who think our post-Cold War prosperity will last forever. It's impossible not • I « to take Robert Kaplan's dire warning seriously." nil I y —DOUGLAS BRINKLEY, director of The Eisenhower Center © prologues to the CURRENT MAC ISBN 0-375-50354-4 AFFAIRS \\j C 9 52 195 that lie ahead... 780375"503542 ALSO BY ROBERT D. KAPLAN An Empire Wilderness: Travels Into America's Future The Ends of the Earth: A Journey at the Dawn of the 21st Century The Arabists: The Romance of an American Elite Balkan Ghosts: A Journey Through History Soldiers of God: With the Mujahidin in Afghanistan Surrender or Starve: The Wars Behind the Famine THE COMING ANARCHY THE COMING ANARCHY Shattering the Dreams of the Post Cold War ROBERT D. KAPLAN RANDOM HOUSE NEW YORK Copyright © 2000 by Robert D. Kaplan All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. Published in the United States by Random House, Inc., New York, and simultaneously in Canada by Random House of Canada Limited, Toronto. RANDOM HOUSE and colophon are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc. All of the essays in this work were originally published in The Atlantic Monthly except as follows: "Conrad's Nostromo and the Third World" was originally published in The National Interest, and "The Dangers of Peace" has not been previ ously published. "Idealism Won't Stop Mass Murder" was originally published in the November 14,1997, issue of The Wall Street Journal. Copyright © 1997 by Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinted with per mission of The Wall Street Journal. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Kaplan, Robert D. The coming anarchy: shattering the dreams of the post Cold War/Robert D. Kaplan, p. cm. ISBN 0-375-50354-4 (acid-free paper) 1. World politics—1989- 2. Post-communism. I. Title. D860.K353 2000 909.82'9—dc21 99-41034 Random House website address: www.atrandom.com Printed in the United States of America on acid-free paper 24689753 First Edition Book design by Barbara M. Bachman