The Wake-Up Call: Why the Pandemic Has Exposed the Weakness of the West, and How to Fix It

by John Micklethwait, Adrian Wooldridge

Overview

"[An] executive summary of modern political history studded with sweeping assertions and telling anecdotes." — The New York Times Book Review

"Thought-provoking." — Kirkus Reviews

“A shot in the arm...powerful.” — The Financial Times

"The Wake-Up Call, refreshingly concise and eminently readable, highlights how the modern crisis of governance compounded the challenges of the pandemic." — Bloomberg

"The Wake-Up Call argues that Covid-19 has exposed not just one president's shortcomings but a much more profound degeneration of governance dating back long before 2016...You will read no more interesting book on the political consequences of the pandemic than this." — Niall Ferguson, author of Civilization: The West and the Rest 

NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF 2020 (BLOOMBERG)

An urgent and informed look at the challenges America and world governments will face in a post Covid-19 world.

The Covid-19 pandemic has revealed that governments matter again, that competent leadership is the difference between living and dying. A few governments proved adept at handling the crisis while many others failed. Are Western governments healthy and strong enough to keep their citizens safe from another virulent virus—and protect their economies from collapse? Is global leadership passing from the United States to Asia—and particularly China? 

The Wake-Up Call addresses these urgent questions. Journalists and longtime collaborators John Micklethwait and Adrian Wooldridge identify the problems Western leaders face, and outline a detailed plan to help them become more vigilant, better prepared, and responsive to disruptive future events. 

The problems that face us are enormous; as The Wake-Up Call makes clear, governments around the world must re-engineer the way they operate to successfully meet the challenges ahead. 

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780063065291
Publisher:	HarperCollins
Publication date:	09/15/2020
Pages:	176
Product dimensions:	8.50(w) x 5.70(h) x 1.00(d)

About the Author

John Micklethwait is the editor-in-chief of Bloomberg and was previously editor-in-chief at The Economist.

Adrian Wooldridge is the management editor and “Schumpeter” columnist of The Economist. He was educated at Balliol College, Oxford, and All Souls College, Oxford, where he held a Prize Fellowship. He was formerly The Economist’s Washington bureau chief and “Lexington” columnist. He is the coauthor, with John Micklethwait, of five books—including The Witch Doctors: Making Sense of the Management Gurus; A Future Perfect: The Challenge and Hidden Promise of Globalization; The Company: A Short History of a Revolutionary Idea; and The Right Nation: Conservative Power in America—and the author of Measuring the Mind: Education and Psychology in England c.1860-1990.

Table of Contents

Introduction: Weeks When Decades Happen 1

Chapter 1 The Rise of the West 15

Chapter 2 The Decline of the West 37

Chapter 3 The Overloaded State 57

Chapter 4 The Covid Test 77

Chapter 5 The Morbid Symptoms 99

Chapter 6 What Would Bill Lincoln Do? 115

Conclusion: Making Government Great Again 145

Acknowledgments 157

Notes 159

Editorial Reviews

09/14/2020

Economist columnist Wooldridge and Bloomberg News editor-in-chief Micklethwait team up again (after The Fourth Revolution) for this thought-provoking yet flawed look at how the Covid-19 pandemic exemplifies the decline of the “Western state” since the mid-1960s and what can be done to reverse course. They credit Asian nations such as South Korea and Singapore with steadily improving their governing systems, public infrastructure, and technological know-how over recent decades, allowing them to better respond to the pandemic, and explain how Western governments have been weakened by bureaucratic overreach, private interest group influence, and lackluster leadership. In the book’s last chapter, Micklethwait and Wooldridge imagine a hypothetical president named Bill Lincoln (after 19th-century U.K. prime minister William Gladstone and Abraham Lincoln) and his initiatives, including a carbon tax, police reform, reduced Social Security spending, and a mix of public and private health care options. The gimmicky imagining of a fantasy leader who is both a progressive “social reformer” and a conservative “small government man” allows the authors to skirt the considerable roadblocks standing in the way of their goals, which include somehow making America a “race blind society.” Nevertheless, this is a succinct and credible assessment of Western government dysfunctions. (Sept.)

Publishers Weekly

"[An] executive summary of modern political history studded with sweeping assertions and telling anecdotes." — The New York Times Book Review

"Thought-provoking." — Kirkus Reviews

"A succinct and credible assessment of Western government dysfunctions." — Publishers Weekly

"A shot in the arm...powerful.” — The Financial Times

"A readable and fascinating excursion." — The Economist

"With their customary wit and insight, John Mickethwait and Adrian Wooldridge offer a fresh take on an old theme: the decline of the West. The Wake-Up Call argues that Covid-19 has exposed not just one president's shortcomings but a much more profound degeneration of governance dating back long before 2016. Can the United States and whatever else remains of “the West” repair their broken systems sufficiently to compete with East Asia's alternatives? And who exactly is Bill Lincoln? You will read no more interesting book on the political consequences of the pandemic than this." — Niall Ferguson, author of Civilization: The West and the Rest 

"COVID-19 was a wake-up call for the West - especially the United States. Micklethwait and Wooldridge offer a masterful analysis of Western failure, and a clear program for the future."  — Anne Applebaum

From the Publisher

"COVID-19 was a wake-up call for the West - especially the United States. Micklethwait and Wooldridge offer a masterful analysis of Western failure, and a clear program for the future." 

Anne Applebaum

"A readable and fascinating excursion."

The Economist

"A shot in the arm...powerful.

The Financial Times

"[An] executive summary of modern political history studded with sweeping assertions and telling anecdotes."

The New York Times Book Review

"With their customary wit and insight, John Mickethwait and Adrian Wooldridge offer a fresh take on an old theme: the decline of the West. The Wake-Up Call argues that Covid-19 has exposed not just one president's shortcomings but a much more profound degeneration of governance dating back long before 2016. Can the United States and whatever else remains of “the West” repair their broken systems sufficiently to compete with East Asia's alternatives? And who exactly is Bill Lincoln? You will read no more interesting book on the political consequences of the pandemic than this."

Niall Ferguson

2020-07-28
A broad-ranging critique of the failure of the world’s leading states to respond effectively to the pandemic.

The pandemic has exposed many things, write Bloomberg News editor-in-chief Micklethwait and Economist columnist Wooldridge, especially the effectiveness of governments in trying to do something about it. “The arrival of the virus was like an examination of state capacity,” they write, and very few Western governments performed well (Germany, Switzerland, and Greece among them). Better still were nations in Asia: Though China’s initial response was somewhat confused, it borrowed epidemiological regimes from Singapore, perhaps the most successful state in Asia. Though the Chinese communist state is riddled with inefficiencies and corruption, “alongside the thuggish dictatorship there is another China: one that studies where government works and where it doesn’t; that is recruiting a cadre of highly-trained administrators and monitoring them through the Party’s Organizational Department.” These people are called into account every day while Western bureaucrats shunt off responsibility—which all plays into the hands of the authoritarians of the West, with Donald Trump leading the way in incompetency. Trump, with Boris Johnson in the U.K., botches everything to which he turns his hand; write the authors, “Trump and Johnson are undermining the idea that statecraft is a serious business; instead they have treated it as a branch of mass entertainment.” The pandemic may give faltering states the opportunity to retool—and to clean house. The authors decry excessive regulation that stifles innovation as well as a political culture driven by lawyers, as in the U.S., rather than by scientists and engineers, as in China. More likely, therefore, the pandemic, coupled with the ineptitude of Trump and company, will have a broad effect on power dynamics: “in terms of geopolitics, the crisis has left the West weaker and Asia stronger.”

Thought-provoking, somewhat wonky reading for those looking beyond the current plague toward future geopolitical trends.

Kirkus Reviews

It only takes a little bit of emphasis for narrator Kristen Scott Thomas to hit home the death tolls around the world from COVID-19 and the failures of the United States in fighting the pandemic. THE ECONOMIST’S John Micklethwait and Adrian Wooldridge explain that these pandemic failures have shown the weaknesses of government. By the end of the first chapter, listeners will be itching to hear their ideas for improving government. First, the authors outline philosophy about government and the history of its growth. Thomas sometimes takes a critical tone but delivers the background in a straightforward way. They point out the successes of "Asian Tigers," particularly Singapore, and create what they believe to be an ideal platform for a fictional U.S. president. J.A.S. © AudioFile 2021, Portland, Maine

MARCH 2021 - AudioFile

It only takes a little bit of emphasis for narrator Kristen Scott Thomas to hit home the death tolls around the world from COVID-19 and the failures of the United States in fighting the pandemic. THE ECONOMIST’S John Micklethwait and Adrian Wooldridge explain that these pandemic failures have shown the weaknesses of government. By the end of the first chapter, listeners will be itching to hear their ideas for improving government. First, the authors outline philosophy about government and the history of its growth. Thomas sometimes takes a critical tone but delivers the background in a straightforward way. They point out the successes of "Asian Tigers," particularly Singapore, and create what they believe to be an ideal platform for a fictional U.S. president. J.A.S. © AudioFile 2021, Portland, Maine

MARCH 2021 - AudioFile