NPQ

Today's date:

Special Issue 1997

• COMMENTARIES 2001-2007

• MADE IN CHINA

• THE TWO SOULS OF TURKEY

• THE NEW GLOBAL CINEMA

• MAKING GLOBALIZATION WORK

• DE-GLOBALIZE THE JIHAD

• THE THIRD WAVE'S THIRD WAY

• PLANET OF SLUMS

• THE GLOBAL IDEOLOGY
OF FEAR

• THE OTHER

• POST-NATIONAL
LITERATURE

• COLLAPSE OR MASSIVE
CHANGE?

• THE RISE AND FALL OF
AMERICA'S SOFT POWER

• THE SCIENTIFIC IMAGINATION

• PUBLIC DIPLOMACY

• THE HEADSCARF CONTROVERSY

• SCULPTURE AND THE
NEW SCIENCE

• BIOTECH AND THE
NEW BABEL

• WAR THROUGH THE
BACK DOOR

• ANTIAMERICANISM

• THE RISING SOFT POWER
OF CHINA & INDIA

• THE BUSH DOCTRINE

• FAIRNESS IN A FRAGILE
WORLD

• AMERICA'S MIGHT

• ISLAM IN THE 21ST CENTURY

• ANTIGLOBOS

• HOT PEACE

• MODUS VIVENDI

• LOOKING NORTH

• FROM WELL HAVING TO
WELL BEING

• POST-HUMAN HISTORY

• GLOBAPHOBIA

• THE GLOBAL MIND

• AFTER KOSOVO

• FROM VIETNAM TO KOSOVO

• DEGLOBALIZATION?

• THE RISE OF THE MEDIA-
INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX

• BOOM [NUCLEAR] AND
[BUST] ECONOMIC IN ASIA

• BEYOND CAPITALISM

• ASIAN CRISIS

• CHINA: THE ASIAN
RENAISSANCE

• SLOW IS BEAUTIFUL

• ECLIPSE OF THE BIG
PICTURE

• AFTER THE END OF
HISTORY

• THE EAST IS RED AGAIN

• HALF-A-HEGEMON

• THIRD WAVE TERRORISM

• HEIMAT

• Fall 1987

• Winter 1987

• Spring 1986

• Fall-Winter '84-'85

• Spring 1984

There Are No Shortcuts in History

Ryszard Kapuscinski, a member of NPQ's advisory board and war correspondent extraordinaire, is one of the great observers of the last half of the 20th century. He has spent the last 30 years covering wars, revolution and social collapse in the most remote zones of the planet, from Africa to Central America to Soviet Central Asia.

His classic works of literary journalism include The Emperor, Shah of Shahs, Imperium, and a three-part memoir entitled Lapidarium that will be published in English next year by Knopf.

Kapuscinski's reflections here are based upon a conversation with NPQ editor Nathan Gardels at Kapuscinski's studio attic in a quiet Warsaw suburb in February 1997.

Warsaw - Border used to mean fighting and hatred. They meant the division of territories, the separation of people. The Berlin Wall was a frontier of fear, a possibility of war.

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