In his landmark international bestsellers 'Guns, Germs and Steel' and 'Collapse', Jared Diamond transformed our understanding of what makes civilisations rise and fall. Now, at a time when crises are erupting around the world, he reveals what makes certain nations resilient in the face of tremendous upheaval. In a riveting journey into the recent past, he traces how six countries have survived defining catastrophes - from the forced opening of Japan to the Soviet invasion of Finland to Chile's brutal Pinochet regime - through selective change, a coping mechanism more commonly associated with personal trauma. He identifies unique patterns in the way that these distinctive modern nations - all countries in which he has lived - have recovered from these upheavals.