Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed: Revised Edition (Paperback)

InJared Diamonds follow-up to the Pulitzer-PrizewinningGuns, Germs and Steel, the author explores how climatechange, the population explosion and political discord create the conditionsfor the collapse of civilization. Diamond is also the author ofUpheaval:TurningPoints for Nations in Crisis

Environmental damage, climate change, globalization, rapid population growth,and unwise political choices were all factors in the demise of societies aroundthe world, but some found solutions and persisted. As inGuns, Germs,and Steel, Diamond traces the fundamental pattern of catastrophe, andweaves an all-encompassing global thesis through a series of fascinatinghistorical-cultural narratives. Collapse moves from the Polynesian cultures onEaster Island to the flourishing American civilizations of the Anasazi and theMaya and finally to the doomed Viking colony on Greenland. Similar problemsface us today and have already brought disaster to Rwanda and Haiti, even asChina and Australia are trying to cope in innovative ways. Despite our ownsocietys apparently inexhaustible wealth and unrivaled political power,ominous warning signs have begun to emerge even in ecologically robust areaslike Montana.

Brilliant, illuminating, and immensely absorbing,Collapseisdestined to take its place as one of the essential books of our time, raisingthe urgent question: How can our world best avoid committing ecologicalsuicide?