A vast and unprecedented survey of societal collapse—stretching from the Stone Age to the age of silicon—that digs through the ruins of fallen societies to understand the root causes of their downfall and the most dire consequences for our future.

"A brilliant and insightful book.” —Eric Cline, author of 1177 B.C.

Stepping back to look at our precariously interdependent global society of today—with the threat of nuclear war ever present, the world getting hotter and hotter, and the rapid creation of dangerous algorithms—one couldn’t be blamed for asking: Will we make it?

Addressing this question with the seriousness it demands, Cambridge scholar Luke Kemp conducts a historical autopsy that stretches over 300,000 years, from our beginnings as a species to early attempts at cities to Egypt, Rome, and on into our cloudy future. He draws on multiple historical databases and the latest discoveries from archaeology and anthropology to reveal profound and often counterintuitive insights into why societies collapse, how those living through such collapses were impacted, and what it means for us today.

While books like Jared Diamond’s Collapse zoom in on only a few case studies, Kemp makes use of the largest datasets available, allowing him to identify the broader trends, and deeper causes, behind societal breakdown. Goliath’s Curse is not just a book about a few empires—it is a radical retelling of human history through collapse.

It is also a stark reminder that there are both bright and dark sides to societal collapse—that it is not necessarily a reversion to chaos or a dark age—and that making a more resilient world may well mean making a more just one.