2014 in Foreign Policy: Six books for every student’s list (and that includes you)

Our favourite non-fiction from the past year.

By: /
24 December, 2014
By: OpenCanada Staff

This Changes Everything
By Naomi Klein

Was there ever any doubt this book would top our list? Klein spent several years on This — the best book this year to challenge our thinking, help put climate change back on the international agenda and provide examples of movements and policies that are taking an innovative, environmentally aware-approach on production. It’s part doom, part gloom, part bloom. Perfect.

No Place to Hide
By Glenn Greenwald

Whether or not you agree with Greenwald’s political views overall, this book is a must-read to get to know the back story on the Edward Snowden leaks and further context on U.S. surveillance. Greenwald’s role and voice has become a crucial perspective to understand, at the very least to contrast official state rhetoric.


World Order
By Henry Kissinger

The world is now less back-and-white, according to the world’s most prominent realist. Safe to say anything written by Kissinger — the architect of U.S. foreign policy, now 91 — will continue to be read by most global leaders and thinkers and we should all probably stay informed on what he espouses, especially when it comes to Russia, terrorism, and diplomacy.


China’s Second Continent: How a million migrants are building a new empire in Africa
By Howard W. French

The faces behind China’s turn to the continent make for an interesting read and bring a thread often left out of the narrative: from low-level workers to entrepreneurs and investors. Chinese interest in Africa is still on the rise, and the impact on regional dynamics should be on the radar of any policy nerd.


Capital in the Twenty-First Century
By Thomas Piketty

You likely already read Piketty’s exploration of inequality — arguably the biggest challenge facing communities across the board. And if you haven’t, well, get on it.


Bumf
By Joe Sacco

Cartoonist Joe Sacco, author of Safe Area Gorazde and Palestine, takes his thoughts and observations on U.S. foreign policy over the last few decades, adds some literally shady characters, and draws it up into one of the most fascinating if not scattered graphic novel experiences of this year.

Before you click away, we’d like to ask you for a favour … 

Journalism in Canada has suffered a devastating decline over the last two decades. Dozens of newspapers and outlets have shuttered. Remaining newsrooms are smaller. Nowhere is this erosion more acute than in the coverage of foreign policy and international news. It’s expensive, and Canadians, oceans away from most international upheavals, pay the outside world comparatively little attention.

At Open Canada, we believe this must change. If anything, the pandemic has taught us we can’t afford to ignore the changing world. What’s more, we believe, most Canadians don’t want to. Many of us, after all, come from somewhere else and have connections that reach around the world.

Our mission is to build a conversation that involves everyone — not just politicians, academics and policy makers. We need your help to do so. Your support helps us find stories and pay writers to tell them. It helps us grow that conversation. It helps us encourage more Canadians to play an active role in shaping our country’s place in the world.

Become a Supporter