Blood Oil: Tyrants, Violence, and the Rules That Run the World

Natural resources empower the world's most coercive men. Autocrats like Putin and the Saudis spend oil money on weapons and repression. ISIS and Congo's militias spend resource money on atrocities and ammunition. For decades resource-fueled authoritarians and extremists have forced endless crises on the West - and the ultimate source of their resource money is us, paying at the gas station and the mall.

In this sweeping new book, one of today's leading political philosophers, Leif Wenar, goes behind the headlines in search of the hidden global rule that thwarts democracy and development - and that puts shoppers into business with some of today's most dangerous men. Listeners discover a rule that once licensed the slave trade and apartheid and genocide, a rule whose abolition has marked some of humanity's greatest triumphs - yet a rule that still enflames tyranny and war and terrorism through today's multitrillion-dollar resource trade. Blood Oil shows how the West can now lead a peaceful revolution by ending its dependence on authoritarian oil and by getting shoppers out of business with the men of blood. The book describes practical strategies for upgrading world trade: for choosing new rules that will make us more secure at home, more trusted abroad, and better able to solve pressing global problems like climate change. This book shows citizens, consumers, and leaders how we can act together today to create a more united human future.