The Jungle Grows Back, Robert Kagan
The Jungle Grows Back, Robert Kagan
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The Jungle Grows Back
America and Our Imperiled World

Author: Robert Kagan

Narrator: Jason Culp

Unabridged: 5 hr 44 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 09/18/2018

Synopsis

"An incisive, elegantly written, new book about America’s unique role in the world." --Tom Friedman, The New York Times

A brilliant and visionary argument for America's role as an enforcer of peace and order throughout the world--and what is likely to happen if we withdraw and focus our attention inward.

Recent years have brought deeply disturbing developments around the globe. American sentiment seems to be leaning increasingly toward withdrawal in the face of such disarray. In this powerful, urgent essay, Robert Kagan elucidates the reasons why American withdrawal would be the worst possible response, based as it is on a fundamental and dangerous misreading of the world. Like a jungle that keeps growing back after being cut down, the world has always been full of dangerous actors who, left unchecked, possess the desire and ability to make things worse. Kagan makes clear how the "realist" impulse to recognize our limitations and focus on our failures misunderstands the essential role America has played for decades in keeping the world's worst instability in check. A true realism, he argues, is based on the understanding that the historical norm has always been toward chaos--that the jungle will grow back, if we let it.

About Robert Kagan

Robert Kagan is a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and a columnist for the Washington Post. He is the author of several books, including the New York Times bestseller Of Paradise and Power. He served in the US State Department from 1984 to 1988.

Reviews

Goodreads review by Murtaza

Robert Kagan is among the most capable apologists for the U.S.-led liberal international order. While the crimes and follies of the post-WW2 order weigh heavily on our minds (Vietnam, Iraq etc.), there are also genuine accomplishments that are less noticed by critics. Kagan takes a long view of hist......more

Goodreads review by Mbogo

In this essay Kagan prosecuted his case with such aplomb that if you have a marginal understanding of geopolitics you might wonder why his position is not the default position. The problem or lets say disagreement comes when you have a prior position... I agree with Kagan that America has a big role......more

Goodreads review by Dave

Mr. Kagan has written a very convincing tribute to the world order put together by the US and other democratic governments at the the end of World War II. He points out that it has brought the world 75 years of unprecedented peace and prosperity. He now fears that many beneficiaries of that world or......more

Goodreads review by Richard

If nothing in Kagan’s book surprises or terrifies you, then you’ve been unhappy for a long time. The Jungle Grows Back teaches and motivates without consoling anyone who believes in any version of “world peace.” It is bad news all around, and Kagan bluntly says that all of us who want a stable world......more

Quotes

"A devastating riposte to [Trump’s] careless, cynical and destructive approach to diplomacy….[Kagan] is right to detect a crisis of confidence in the democratic world. He sets out his case with characteristic brilliance and conviction."
—The Economist
 
"[I]t is time to say it: I am a Kaganite… There is no modern author who has taught me more, or changed the way I view the world more, than he has… For identifying and clearly explaining the chief forces driving human history, Bob is brilliant."
—Michael E. O’Hanlon, Brookings

"[S]o important… In clear and forceful language, [The Jungle Grows Back] makes the case for America continuing its role as the guarantor of a liberal world order."
—Eli Lake, Bloomberg
 
"[Kagan] has in many ways become the biographer of American power… He brings to the page a true sense of the stakes involved—not some abstract notion of the 'rules-based order,' but the basic security and prosperity of Americans."
—Commentary
 
"The Jungle Grows Back displays the characteristic Kagan virtues of lucid writing and thought—and a strong sense of history that adds drama and sweep to his argument."
—Gideon Rachman, The Financial Times

"This short book is a valuable read and makes a valiant effort to argue for America’s continued deep engagement in the world… The world order is not natural; it needed to be built and it needs to be carefully maintained."
—Doug Stokes, Quillette

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