The Global Chancellor: Helmut Schmidt and the Reshaping of the International Order Hardcover – 24 Mar 2016

Review

The Global Chancellor is more than a first rate biography; it is a seminal account of fundamental change in the international system during the 1970s. It should be read by everyone who tries to understand how today's world was created. (O. A. Westad, Harvard University)

This is truly novel: Helmut Schmidt consistently explored in an international perspective rather than from an inward-looking German viewpoint ― this is real progress not only for our understanding of the person, but of the whole history of the Federal Republic. (Andreas Rödder, Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz [Translated review of German edition])

Kristina Spohr's brilliant analysis succeeds thanks to its global view of Helmut Schmidt ― one that is rarely found in Germany. This book is the first to illuminate him in terms of his full significance for world politics. A must for anybody interested in contemporary history. (Sönke Neitzel, Potsdam University [Translated review of German edition])

A pioneering study which reveals Schmidt's unusual personal impact on the growth of West Germany's international significance during a time of great crises. It is based on the widest array of sources and couched in appealing biographical form. Those who want to understand how Germany returned to the realm of world politics will find in Spohr's book important cornerstones of an explanation. (Philipp Gassert, Mannheim University [Translated review of German edition])

seldomly has a historical study been so current as Kristina Spohr's book on Helmut Schmidt. (Niels Annen, Internationale Politik - Die Zeitschrift: Book of the Year 2016 [translated])

a must read (Wolfgang Ischinger, Internationale Politik - Die Zeitschrift: Book of the Year 2016 [translated])

About the Author

Kristina Spohr is Associate Professor of International History at the London School of Economics. German-Finnish by birth, she studied at the University of East Anglia, Sciences Po Paris, and Cambridge University and also worked for a year in the NATO Secretary General's Private Office in Brussels. Her publications include Germany and the Baltic Question after the Cold War: The Development of a New Ostpolitik, 1989-2000 (2004); Building Sustainable and Effective Capabilities: A Systemic Comparison of Professional and Conscript Forces (editor, 2004); and At the Crossroads of Past and Present: 'Contemporary' History and the Historical Discipline (co-editor, 2011).