SNIPPETS

Robert Kaplan and Michael Lewis are two US journalists who epitomise the best of journalism – keen-eyed, they see what most of us miss.

Kaplan first came to my notice in an article about “the coming anarchy” he wrote in The Atlantic in 1994, using the title in a book he published in 2000 when he also produced Eastward to Tartary – travels in the Balkans, the Middle East and the Caucasus Robert Kaplan (2000)

He showed great sensitivity and insight with In Europe's Shadow - two cold wars and a thirty year trip to Romania and beyond Robert Kaplan (2016) which I reviewed when it first came out.

And his most recent book is Wasteland - a world in permanent crisis Robert Kaplan (2025) about which he was interviewed recently on “The Rest is Politics” (Leading)

Lewis is probably better known for his treatment of the global financial crisis – both as a book The Big Short – inside the doom machine (2010) and in a subsequent film. He has now produced Who is Government? The untold story of public service Michael Lewis (2025) which focuses on the individuals who are proud to serve the public.

And, on the very day that Cardinals assemble in Rome to elect a new Pope, let’s 

not forget the legacy of Francis who gave us an important Encyclical 

about the COMMON GOOD Fratelli Tutti (2020) - although the new Pope, in 

choosing the name LEO, seems to be reaching back to the last Pope who bore 

this name and who gave us the one about SOLIDARITY 

Rerum Novarum (1891 Vatican Library)