If living next to the United States is like sleeping with an elephant, that bedmate has lately become insomniac and cranky. In a fascinating investigation Alasdair Roberts explores the forces behind this shift, warning that smaller states such as Canada should expect more unpredictability in the decades ahead, not only from the US but also from China, India, Russia, and the evolving European Union.

Great states are not entirely new configurations; in some ways they are like empires of the past. And like empires, great states are more fragile than they appear. Roberts argues that the weakness of great states is their tendency to centralize power: upward to national capitals and inward to chief executives. This has increased the risk of catastrophic mistakes, political gridlock, and bureaucracies too large to manage or reform. Failures like these have fueled public frustration and the rise of strongmen, leaving great states even more vulnerable to shocks and strains, and volatile in their behaviour.

An essential guide to deciphering the uncertain world we now inhabit, Why Great States Fail presents a crisp argument about the internal pressures that cause great states to behave erratically and, eventually, to collapse.