In this exhilarating and bracing book, we learn the common logic driving vainglorious monarchs, dictators, mobs, pilots, football hooligans, ancient peoples and fanatics. Distilling decades of economics, political science, psychology and real-world interventions, and through his time studying Columbia, Chicago, Liberia and Northern Ireland, Christopher Blattman lifts the lid on the underlying forces governing war and peace. Why did Russia attack Ukraine? Will China invade Taiwan and launch WWIII? And what can any of us do about it?