"Harnessing Disruption"

New from Oxford University Press: Harnessing Disruption: Building the Tech Future Without Breaking Society by Sarah E. Kreps.

About the book, from the publisher:

A timely and thought-provoking exploration of technological disruption, drawing on history's most transformative innovations--from nuclear power to AI--to offer a vital roadmap for navigating the future of technology.

In Harnessing Disruption, Sarah E. Kreps--a national security expert and military veteran--offers a fresh, clear-eyed framework for understanding the social and political dynamics that shape technological change. From nuclear weapons to AI, cryptocurrency, and social media, breakthrough innovations rarely arrive without backlash. Disruption is not collapse. History shows it is part of a recurring pattern.

With unmatched insight and authority, Kreps traces a five-stage cycle that technologies follow: emergence, early warnings, crisis, agenda-setting, and institutional response. Drawing on decades of research and real-world policy experience, she argues that disruption is neither inherently dangerous nor inherently self-correcting. Rather, it's a process we can steer, if we learn to see the signs and act decisively.

Harnessing Disruption challenges fatalistic narratives that cast AI and other technologies as uncontrollable forces. It makes the case for cautious optimism: that institutions can adapt, societies can recalibrate, and technologies can be governed in ways that protect both innovation and the public good. Timely, incisive, and grounded in both historical precedent and contemporary case studies, this book provides the tools for anyone, including policymakers, entrepreneurs, and citizens, to understand where we are in the cycle of disruption and how to shape what comes next.

Writers Read: Sarah E. Kreps (January 2011).

--Marshal Zeringue

"The River That Made Texas"

New from The University of North Carolina Press: The River That Made Texas: A Forgotten History of the Trinity by Scot McFarlane.

About the book, from the publisher:

Today, half of Texas’s expanding population, including the cities of Dallas, Fort Worth, and Houston, depends on the Trinity River, a river that has shaped the state’s politics, economy, and environment for centuries. From the prairies of North Texas to the Gulf of Mexico, the Trinity established Native nations, foiled Spanish and French imperialism, stood at the center of the Texas plantation system, and fueled the growth of the state’s largest cities.

In the first history of this vital river, historian Scot McFarlane illuminates how the Trinity has defined Texas history. Its floods enriched the soil and destroyed crops, its channel served as both a route and barrier to freedom, and its once-polluted waters now sustain a significant portion of the state. McFarlane’s captivating narrative brims with stories of the people who called the Trinity home over the centuries: the Comanche, steamboat pilots, enslaved and freed people, sharecroppers, inmates, and millions of urban residents. The result is a fresh perspective on economic development, slavery, and the environment—revealing the Trinity not as a backdrop to Texas history but as a force that shaped it.

Visit Scot McFarlane's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Last Invasion of England"

New from Princeton University Press: The Last Invasion of England: 1688 and the Dutch Armada by Arthur der Weduwen.

About the book, from the publisher:

An electrifying narrative history that reframes Britain’s constitutional revolution as a full-scale Dutch invasion

In popular accounts of the Glorious Revolution of 1688, the autocratic Catholic King James II was ousted by his subjects and replaced by his Protestant daughter Mary Stuart, wife of James’s nephew, the Dutch William III of Orange. Devoted to her husband, Mary would not accept the crown alone, and so William and Mary were crowned together, securing a smooth dynastic succession. The Last Invasion of England recounts the forgotten campaign that carried William and his army to English shores and led directly to James’s fall, bringing a revolutionary age vividly to life—and rewriting the history of Britain, Europe and the transatlantic world more widely.

In this bold work of revisionist history, Arthur der Weduwen tells the momentous story of the Dutch Armada, describing the immense risks and near failures of the last seaborne invasion of England—which occurred exactly one hundred years after the defeat of the Spanish Armada. The sixteen thousand Dutch troops who accompanied William were not on hand for moral support. They came with sword, musket and cannon. Der Weduwen argues that the political revolution in Britain could not have been achieved without the willpower, might and resources of William and the Dutch nation, and explains why the Dutch Republic, a small state that celebrated peace and commerce above all else, would dare to undertake a reckless preemptive military strike on its more powerful neighbour.

Transforming our understanding of the Glorious Revolution and Britain’s ascendancy as a global powerhouse, The Last Invasion of England relies entirely on contemporary sources, many from leading protagonists who prepared and executed the invasion, evoking the historical realities of the women and men who lived during turbulent and uncertain times.

Visit Arthur der Weduwen's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Gender Is a Weapon"

New from the University of Michigan Press: Gender Is a Weapon: Liberalism, Difference, and US Counterinsurgency by Elizabeth Mesok.

About the book, from the publisher:

Following the end of the draft in 1973, the US military increasingly offered women the opportunity to transform their lives—to obtain an education, receive healthcare, provide for their families, and prove their worth to the nation. By the time the US invaded Iraq and Afghanistan at the turn of the twenty-first century, the labor of women—and Black women in particular—was critical to the military’s ability to simultaneously wage two wars. Within the context of counterinsurgencies fought amid civilian populations, the US military discovered the value of women’s gender difference as a weapon of war.

Through ethnographic and archival research with women soldiers and Marines, as well as military and government officials, Gender Is a Weapon contextualizes women’s service in Iraq and Afghanistan against the promises of liberal inclusion unfolding throughout the late twentieth and early twenty-first century. Centered on narratives of Black and Indigenous women, women of color, immigrant women, and queer women, the book analyzes the transformations of martial citizenship; the racialized language of cultural difference in the US’s revitalized counterinsurgency doctrine; the gendered performances of women in combat and civilian engagement missions; and ultimately, the irreparable injuries of body and mind with which these women returned home. The epilogue discusses the recent dismantling of DEI in the military and US government more broadly, reflecting on what we can learn from the violent history of military liberal inclusion to help us better understand our contemporary moment. By carefully attending to both the discursive construction and performative enactment of gender in militarized and securitized contexts, the book advances theoretical frames for studying gender in state militaries, militarism, and late liberalism.

Visit Elizabeth Mesok's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Politics of Authenticity"

New from the University of Chicago Press: The Politics of Authenticity: First-Personal Truths and Democratic Claims by Nina Hagel.

About the book, from the publisher:

A qualified defense of authenticity claims in contemporary politics.

On both the Left and Right, we see a range of political claims cast in terms of authenticity, from transgender persons seeking recognition of who they truly are to religious business owners requesting exemptions from antidiscrimination laws. For claimants, what is often at stake is an inner self that would be harmed if changed or concealed. At the same time, many scholars are skeptical of authenticity claims, with some worrying that they are too nebulous and inward-looking and others fearing that they contain too much anti-democratic potential. There is also the added difficulty of determining when and on what grounds to accept a claim of authenticity.

Nina Hagel argues that while invoking authenticity has serious risks, it remains a crucial democratic resource. Through an engagement with canonical and contemporary political theorists, and an analysis of current political struggles centering on authenticity, Hagel advances a defense of authenticity’s democratic potential, alongside a practice for interpreting and invoking such claims. While one might assume that this perspective clashes with the post-modern view that there is no true self outside of politics and history, Hagel puts forward a non-essentialist understanding of authenticity that emphasizes subject formation and emancipation. Hagel argues that authenticity claims best support democracy when they collectively steward, rather than overcome, the social powers that shape our identities. We ignore authenticity claims at our peril, since the objects of such claims are the norms and practices that make us who we are.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Living Just Enough for the City"

New from Oxford University Press: Living Just Enough for the City: Experiments in Urban Political Theory by Joe Hoover.

About the book, from the publisher:

Today, most of us call the city home. The city is also the context in which we come to understand ourselves, build relationships with others, and negotiate our collective lives. Many authors have recognised this transformation entails new social and political challenges. What is less often acknowledged is how this alters the way we think about ourselves, as well as politics and social life more broadly. Humanity's move to the city entails a philosophical transformation as well as a physical relocation. Placing the city at the centre of our thinking challenges contemporary political theory, giving rise to distinctive problems, suggesting new ways of thinking, and calling for innovative methods.

Living Just Enough for the City develops an urban political theory by asking "where are we?" and "where should we be going?". By using the city as both a site for theorising and a focal point it reconstructs key concepts in political theory and provides important insights into contemporary political life and the democratic possibilities of the city. It argues the central political problems facing cities, such as gentrification, growing inequality, and conflicts over citizenship, demonstrate the need for a people-centred conception of legitimate authority that challenges state sovereignty. Drawing on urban experience for insights into the nature of contemporary politics and the prospects for positive change, it argues that as individuals and communities are shaped by urban life, the city's denizens have a right to participate in its democratic remaking. Philosophising from and about the city, which is defined by change and contingency, suggests a new approach is needed. To do this, Living Just Enough for the City develops an innovative situationist methodology drawn from Pragmatism, which begins with practical problems arising in everyday experience, and incorporates personal reflection, original empirical research, and artistic representations of the city to understand, critique, and improve our shared urban lives.

Visit Joe Hoover's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Arms Control Paradox"

New from Stanford University Press: The Arms Control Paradox: Managing Uncertainty in an Insecure World by Amy J. Nelson.

About the book, from the publisher:

Arms control is eroding amid a rapidly changing and increasingly uncertain security environment. In addition to a spate of treaty withdrawals and demises that have occurred since 2002, major powers are militarizing space, and private actors are developing technologies at lightning speed. Thus, there is an urgent need for arms control agreements that incorporate multiple actors and weapons to mitigate uncertainty; yet conditions of increasing uncertainty make reaching such agreements extremely challenging, if nearly impossible. This is what Amy J. Nelson calls the arms control paradox. Drawing on years of research and policy experience, Nelson explores why traditional arms control strategies often fall short in today's security environment. Most past agreements were built on assumptions of transparency, reciprocity, and predictability that no longer hold in a multipolar world shaped by advanced technologies and strategic opacity. By focusing narrowly on eliminating known dangers through rigid verification and technical controls, arms control has inadvertently neglected uncertainty management—the ability to acclimate to the unknown. This book proposes an adaptive approach: one that focuses on managing ambiguity rather than eliminating it and reflects how real-world decisions unfold under pressure. The Arms Control Paradox provides valuable insights and policy-relevant guidelines for twenty-first-century arms control.

Visit Amy J. Nelson's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Red Mecca"

New from Princeton University Press: Red Mecca: The Life and Afterlives of the Arab-Soviet Romance by Margaret Litvin.

About the book, from the publisher:

The first literary study of the Arab world’s Soviet entanglements, examining how Arabic writers have retold and reimagined their Soviet and Russian sojourns

During the Cold War, tens of thousands of Arab students journeyed to study in the USSR, drawn by socialism’s red beacon or simply the chance to study abroad for free. For these students, the Soviet Union was not an Evil Empire but a Red Mecca—a relatively free third space, far from home and away from the influence of the West. In this groundbreaking book, Margaret Litvin analyzes how Arab intellectuals understood and narrated their experiences of studying in the Soviet Union, particularly in Russia and Ukraine. Drawing on novels, letters, interviews, Soviet faculty meeting minutes, a student film, and other sources, Litvin reconstructs these Arab students’ lifeworld in all its political tension and human depth. She shows that, far from disappearing in 1991, the legacy of Cold War–era study abroad has offered rich material to twenty-first-century Arab writers, who use Russian or Soviet themes to explore minoritization, rigid gender identities, jihad, dictatorship, and war.

Tracing the unexpected trajectories of people, literary genres, and fantasies, Litvin offers the counterintuitive but illuminating argument that throughout the Soviet and post-Soviet periods, Arab intellectuals have used Soviet educational ties to gain cultural freedom—and that this often worked in spite, not because, of policymakers’ plans. Combining cultural history and literary criticism, Red Mecca recovers a long-overlooked historical conjunction and shows how Arabic novelists have transmuted it into art.

Visit Margaret Litvin's website.

The Page 99 Test: Hamlet's Arab Journey.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Consent Under Pressure"

New from Oxford University Press: Consent Under Pressure by Mollie Gerver.

About the book, from the publisher:

Everyone faces pressure. Pressure can come from your boss to work late, from your friends to go partying, from your government to join the military, and from a mugger demanding your wallet or your life. The pressure can be from individuals, groups, and even society as a whole, as when millions of people spread stigma against those remaining unmarried, pressuring singles to marry, or when millions of voters support candidates rounding up migrants, pressuring these migrants to repatriate home. This is a book about when pressure--whether implicit or explicit, from individuals or groups--leads to invalid consent.

Invalid consent occurs when someone's consent fails to dissolve another person's duty. For example, if a mugger holds you up at gunpoint and demands your money, and so you consent to hand it over, the mugger maintains a duty to not take your money, such that your consent is invalid. Yet, sometimes pressure--even quite explicit and deadly pressure--is perfectly compatible with valid consent. For example, if a refugee is held up gunpoint by a soldier demanding that he leave the country, and he consents to an aid worker smuggling him to safety, his consent to the aid worker seems valid: he makes it the case that the aid worker rescuing him violates no duty in carrying him across the border. The question, then, is why sometimes consent is valid despite extreme pressure, and other times it is not. To answer this question, we must pull apart different types of pressure, different duties people owe each other, and different rights people have when giving consent to others.

Visit Mollie Gerver's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"For Customers Only"

New from the University of Chicago Press: For Customers Only: Public Bathrooms and the Making of American Inequality by Bryant Simon.

About the book, from the publisher:

Public toilets determine who gets everyday dignity, freedom of movement, and civic belonging―and who doesn’t.

Americans have nowhere to go. Nationwide, countless public spaces lack one crucial thing: bathrooms, never mind ones that are safe and functional. Yet in the past, political leaders celebrated the opening of public bathrooms with boisterous press conferences and showy ribbon-cutting ceremonies.

For Customers Only is the first book to tell the larger history of public bathrooms in the United States, a fascinating story characterized by persistent discrimination, squeamishness about unknown bodies, and disinvestment in public amenities. Acclaimed writer and historian Bryant Simon argues that restrooms aren’t only an architectural feature, but an emblem of control and inequality. In the late nineteenth century, cities vied for the newest and biggest comfort stations to meet the demands of their bustling economies and accommodate a broad and growing public. They built restrooms with gold-domed entrances and ornamented stall doors to inspire cleanliness and order.

But officials soon grew anxious about who might take advantage of this privacy: gay men, the unhoused, and eventually drug users. And as the civil rights movement challenged segregation, officials in the north and south closed public toilets rather than integrate them. By the end of the twentieth century, only people with means could use private bathrooms while out and about―provided they made a purchase at a business. Today, as the fights over trans rights reveal, bathroom access remains a flash point across the country. Meanwhile, some municipalities are again calling for widely available public toilets, but as a tool for economic revitalization, not a public necessity.

The political and cultural history of a squirm-inducing subject, For Customers Only reveals the real and symbolic power of the most ordinary of things. Bathrooms, Simon shows, have always reflected our fragmented national values. Whether these spaces will ever become more accessible and inclusive is ultimately up to us.

The Page 99 Test: Everything But the Coffee.

--Marshal Zeringue