Gwinnett County Public Library

Flashpoints, the emerging crisis in Europe, George Friedman

eng

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non fiction

Flashpoints

George Friedman

the emerging crisis in Europe

"With remarkable accuracy, George Friedman has forecasted coming trends in global politics, technology, population, and culture. In "Flashpoints, " Friedman focuses on Europe--the world's cultural and power nexus for the past five hundred years . . . until now. Analyzing the most unstable, unexpected, and fascinating borderlands of Europe and Russia--and the fault lines that have existed for centuries and have been ground zero for multiple catastrophic wars--Friedman highlights, in an unprecedentedly personal way, the flashpoints that are smoldering once again. The modern-day European Union was crafted in large part to minimize built-in geopolitical tensions that historically have torn it apart. As Friedman demonstrates, with a mix of rich history and cultural analysis, that design is failing. "Flashpoints" narrates a living history of Europe and explains, with great clarity, its most volatile regions: the turbulent and ever-shifting land dividing the West from Russia (a vast area that currently includes Ukraine, Belarus, and Lithuania); the ancient borderland between France and Germany; and the Mediterranean, which gave rise to Judaism and Christianity and became a center of Islamic life. Through Friedman's seamless narrative of townspeople and rivers and villages, a clear picture of regions and countries and history begins to emerge. "Flashpoints" is an engrossing analysis of modern-day Europe, its remarkable past, and the simmering fault lines that have awakened and will be pivotal in the near future. This is George Friedman's most timely and, ultimately, riveting book."--Dust jacket flap

European exceptionalism. A European life ; Europe's assault on the world ; The fragmentation of the European mind -- Thirty-one years. Slaughter ; Exhaustion ; The American origins of European integration ; Crisis and division -- Flashpoints. The wars of Maastricht ; The German question once more ; Mainland and peninsula ; Russia and its borderlands ; France, Germany, and their ancient borderlands ; Mediterranean Europe between Islam and Germany ; Turkey on the edge ; Britain

adult

Flash points, the emerging crisis in Europe