Fareed Zakaria, in Conversation with Ian Bremmer, on “Age of Revolutions”

Featured Events | Jun 17, 2024 | Gabelli School of Business

On April 16, 2024, two of the world’s most influential thought leaders in international affairs—Fareed Zakaria and Ian Bremmer—took to the stage of the Gabelli School of Business McNally Amphitheatre to discuss a broad range of pressing topics and Zakaria’s newly released book Age of Revolutions: Progress and Backlash from 1600 to the Present. The pair focused on everything from continuous global unrest and conflict to the upcoming U.S. elections, but came back repeatedly to the theme of Zakaria’s book—revolution. The book connects the dots between historical eras and movements that have shaken norms while shaping the modern world, and four present-day revolutions: globalization, technology, identity, and geopolitics, which have produced profound disruptions and pervasive anxiety and our identity. Zakaria explained that, while we seem to be entering a world in which the U.S. may no longer be the dominant power—one where populism is growing and our democracy is being tested, pessimism may be premature. He asserted that if we act wisely, the liberal international order can be revived and populism relegated to the ash heap of history.