Category Archives: Book Review

A review of Political Risk: Facing the Threat of Global Insecurity in the Twenty-First Century

Posted on by Assistant Editor

Journal of Political Risk, Vol. 12, No. 6, June 2024

Ndzalama Mathebula
University of Johannesburg
The image shows the cover of a book titled "Political Risk: Facing the Threat of Global Insecurity in the Twenty-First Century." The authors listed at the top are Condoleezza Rice and Amy Zegart. The cover features a globe, cracked open in the middle, revealing a fragmented and divided world map. At the bottom, there is a quote from Eric Schmidt, the former CEO of Google, praising the book as "Smart. Informative. Overdue." The overall design is clean, with a predominantly white background and blue and black text.

Source: Weidnfeld&Nicolson

The book Political Risk: Facing the Threat of Global Insecurity in the Twenty-First Century by Condoleezza Rice and Amy Zegart provides a remarkable overview of the political risk discipline, demonstrating its evolution and growing literature. The ten-chapter book is carefully curated to identify the importance of stakeholders understanding political risk and its evolution in the present century. The writings presented in the book are relevant, but not limited to, businesspersons, government actors, international relations practitioners, corporate personnel, policymakers, organizations, and students – especially given the rate at which the world is changing.

Continue reading →

Chinese Communist Party Cooperation with Gangs and Politicians in Canada: Book Review

Posted on by admin

Journal of Political Risk, Vol. 9, No. 5, May 2021

The book cover depicts the words "Wilful blindness" in white against a red backdrop and a world map in black.

The book cover of Wilful Blindness, by Sam Cooper.

Anders Corr, Ph.D.

Publisher of the Journal of Political Risk

Wilful Blindness How a Network of Narcos, Tycoons and CCP agents Infiltrated the West, by Sam Cooper, Optimum Publishing International, 2021, $28.95 CAD.

An investigative reporter in Canada, Sam Cooper, is at the tip of the spear, where China injects money, drugs, spies, and underage prostitutes into all of North America. Cooper provides us with a front-row seat of China’s espionage, drug supercartels, support to terrorism, money laundering, and, for a pledge of support to Beijing, campaign donations to the politicians who lurk around China’s United Front groups in Vancouver, Toronto, and Ottawa. Add to that investigations of trafficking in weapons. Heads of state, including Donald Trump and Justin Trudeau, are linked by the author to the nefarious characters from China who are doing this dirty business.

It sounds too crazy to be true.  

But Cooper’s new book, Wilful Blindness, is nonfiction, and based on five years of his investigative reporting on the topic, and confidential sources in Canadian intelligence and police agencies. It vindicates, and brings up to date, a joint Canadian Security and Intelligence Service (CSIS) and Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) report that in 1997 made many of the same claims. That report, called “Sidewinder”, was suppressed by Ottawa, which at time was trying to ink new trade deals with Beijing. 

Continue reading →