Powerful Times


Book Description

From terrorism and nuclear proliferation to emerging technologies and economic globalization, Eamonn Kelly weaves together seven powerful 'dynamic tensions' that will reshape human life in the coming decades.




Powerful Times


Book Description

Understand the most revolutionary human transformation in four centuries... and prepare for it! We're not just living through an age of change: we're living through a 'change of age': the most profound inflection point in human history since the Enlightenment. That's the thesis of Eamonn Kelly's remarkable new book Powerful Times. From terrorism and nuclear proliferation to emerging technologies and economic globalization, Kelly weaves together 7 powerful 'dynamic tensions' that will reshape human life in the coming decades. Kelly offers breakthrough insights into how these tensions will conflict -- and how they'll resonate, creating giant waves of change beyond anything we've ever faced. He takes on the truly big questions. To answer pivotal questions, Kelly draws on breakthrough 'scenario planning' techniques he pioneered: techniques hundreds of top organizations now rely on. Simply put, this book will help you prepare for humanity's most profound transition in 400 years. For every executive, strategist, manager, entrepreneur, public policymaker, and citizen interested in the trends that will most powerfully impact business and life in the coming decades. Eamonn Kelly, the CEO and president of Global Business Network, the renowned future-oriented network and consulting firm, has for over a decade and has been at the forefront of exploring the emergence of a new, knowledge-intensive economy, and its far-reaching consequences for society, organizations and individuals. He has consulted with senior executives at dozens of the world's leading corporations in virtually every leading business sector; with key global and national public agencies, and with major philanthropic foundations. Kelly co-authored What's Next: Exploring the New Terrain for Business and The Future of the Knowledge Economy, and authored GBN's 2003 Scenario Book.




The Best of Times, The Worst of Times


Book Description

A unique, highly readable approach to the environmental crisis, with alternating chapters outlining the effects on society if left unchecked, and the radical actions we can take to prevent it Now includes updated sections on COVID-19 and COP26 The environmental emergency is the greatest threat we face. Preventing it will require an unprecedented political and social response. And yet, there is still hope. Academic, physicist, environmental expert and award-winning science communicator Paul Behrens presents a radical analysis of a civilization on the brink of catastrophe. Setting out the pressing existential threats we face, he writes, in alternating chapters, of what the future could look like at its most pessimistic and hopeful. In lucid prose, Behrens argues that structural problems need structural solutions, and examines critical areas in which political will is required, including women's education, food and energy security, biodiversity and economics. The book was printed with two different jackets, to illustrate the unique duality of the author's approach.




The Best of Times, The Worst of Times


Book Description

In the decades since the end of the Second World War, it has been widely assumed that the western model of liberal democracy and free trade is the way the world should be governed. However, events in the early years of the twenty-first century – first, the 2003 war with Iraq and its chaotic aftermath and, second, the financial crash of 2008 – have threatened the general acceptance that continued progress under the benign (or sometimes not so benign) gaze of the western powers is the only way forwards. And as America turns inwards and Europe is beset by austerity politics and populist nationalism, the post-war consensus looks less and less secure. But is this really the worst of times? In a forensic examination of the world we now live in, acclaimed historian Michael Burleigh sets out to answer that question. Who could have imagined that China would champion globalization and lead the battle on climate change? Or that post-Soviet Russia might present a greater threat to the world’s stability than ISIS? And while we may be on the cusp of still more dramatic change, perhaps the risks will – in time – bring not only change but a wholly positive transformation. Incisive, robust and always insightful, The Best of Times, The Worst of Times by Michael Burleigh is both a dazzling tour d’horizon of the world as it is today and a surprisingly optimistic vision of the world as it might become.




The Best of Times


Book Description

A Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist looks back on the 1990s--the tumultuous era that led the nation from an age of innocence into an age of terrorism. Features a new Foreword, Afterword, and postscript by the author. A "New York Times" Notable Book of the Year.




The Powerful and the Damned


Book Description

'Extraordinary' TONY BLAIR 'Riveting' - PHILIPPE SANDS 'Brutal, brilliant and scurrilously funny' - MISHA GLENNY The real scoop isn't on the front page 'As FT editor, I was a privileged interlocutor to people in power around the world, each offering unique insights into high-level decision-making and political calculation, often in moments of crisis. These diaries offer snapshots of leadership in an age of upheaval...' Lionel Barber was Editor of the Financial Times for the tech boom, the global financial crisis, the rise of China, Brexit, and mainstream media's fight for survival in the age of fake news. In this unparalleled, no-holds-barred diary of life behind the headlines, he reveals the private meetings and exchanges with political leaders on the eve of referendums, the conversations with billionaire bankers facing economic meltdown, exchanges with Silicon Valley tech gurus and pleas from foreign emissaries desperate for inside knowledge, all against the backdrop of a wildly shifting media landscape. The result is a fascinating - and at times scathing - portrait of power in our modern age; who has it, what it takes and what drives the men and women with the world at their feet. Featuring close encounters with Trump, Cameron, Blair, Putin, Merkel and Mohammed Bin Salman and many more, this is a rare portrait of the people who continue to shape our world and who quite literally, make the news.




The Best Times


Book Description

A record of his childhood, young adulthood, and twenties, The Best Times is a collage of cherished memories. He reflects on the joys of an itinerant life enriched by new and diverse friendships, customs, cultures, and cuisines. Luminary personalities and landscapes abound in the 1920s literary world Dos Passos loved. F. Scott Fitzgerald, Ernest Hemingway, E.E. Cummings, Gerald and Sara Murphy, Horsley Gantt—they are his beloved friends. Spain, the French Riviera, Paris, Persia, the Caucasus—they are his beloved footpaths.




What Your Soul Needs for Stressful Times


Book Description

Stress is inevitable, but letting it control your life is optional. As a bestselling author, counselor, and life coach, Holley Gerth has learned a lot about dealing with stress and what truly helps. What Your Soul Needs for Stressful Times is your invitation to pause for a few moments of encouragement, peace, and strength each day. This 60-day devotional offers spiritual truth to soothe your soul alongside practical tools to apply that will truly make a difference. Each day, Holley offers Scripture, a prayer, questions for reflection, and inspirational quotes to help you learn to live with more peace and less pressure, more calm and less chaos, more worship and less worry.




A Tale of Two Cities Illustrated by (Hablot Knight Browne (Phiz))


Book Description

A Tale of Two Cities (1859) is the second historical novel by Charles Dickens, set in London and Paris before and during the French Revolution. It depicts the plight of the French proletariat under the brutal oppression of t+E3he French aristocracy in the years leading up to the revolution, and the corresponding savage brutality demonstrated by the revolutionaries toward the former aristocrats in the early years of the revolution. It follows the lives of several protagonists through these events, most notably Charles Darnay, a French once-aristocrat who falls victim to the indiscriminate wrath of the revolution despite his virtuous nature, and Sydney Carton, a dissipated English barrister who endeavours to redeem his ill-spent life out of love for Darnay's wife, Lucie Manette.




Best Times Ever


Book Description

Feeling like things are worse than ever before? That the world is spinning out of control on its axis? Our economy is woeful, kids have no respect and politics is a joke. Life is as tough as it could be. Or is it? Best. Times. Ever. explains why almost everything is far better than it used to be, and is an optimistic answer to those who say that everything is getting worse. With conflicts around the globe, rampant environmental damage, economic struggles, poverty, and the ongoing threat of terrorism, the world isn't perfect right now. But is everything really going to hell in a handbasket? Should we really be feeling so miserable? This book concisely goes through 100 things that we currently complain about, and explains why - believe it or not - things aren't as bad as they used to be. In fact, we're actually improving! From the serious (the number of people dying in wars is 2,000 a year; in the 1950s, it was 65,000 a year) to the frivolous ("Vertigo" had bad reviews in 1957, was considered a cinema classic by 1987, and was recently voted the greatest movie ever made - so even movies get better), this is an optimistic answer to those who say that everything is getting worse. There is definite room for improvement, but we're heading in the right direction... humorous, light reading, peppered with useful information and trivia.