Profile Books acquires After the West by Sam Olsen
Profile Books has acquired After the West: The Fight for the Next World Order by geopolitical and intelligence expert Sam Olsen.
Publisher Rowan Cope acquired UK Commonwealth (excluding Canada) and audio rights from Tom Killingbeck at AM Heath in a significant pre-empt. Rights have sold to DTV in Germany and Bookie Publishing House in Korea, with further deals under consideration.
The synopsis says: “After the West reveals not only how the global great power balance is shifting away from the western liberal democratic order, led by Washington, and towards China, but also what that shift means for the world we all inhabit. Drawing on historical and strategic research and original on-the-ground intelligence, Olsen examines how China is reconfiguring global power structures through its growing domination of physical and digital infrastructure development, supply chains, financial networks and geopolitical chokepoints.
“Sam Olsen explores what it will feel like to live inside a Chinese-centred order, as our dependence on their systems and technology normalises Beijing’s autocratic, high-surveillance approach. We are living through a transition that will likely not result in an outright rupture and the outcome remains uncertain – but will the West be agile enough to adapt its own legitimacy, strategic independence and institutions in order to protect its democracies?”
Cope said: “We are thrilled to publish After the West, a timely and incisive analysis of our new reality, in which established systems and shared rules are collapsing from within, and China has adopted a novel approach to supremacy, abetted by Russia’s disruptive influence. Sam Olsen’s expertise and meticulous research are indispensable to understanding the greatest upheaval in the world order since 1945. This book promises to be a major publication in 2027.”
Olsen said: “I’m delighted that After the West has found such a fitting home at Profile – a list that encompasses so many writers I admire, from Ian Morris to Francis Fukuyama. The history of world orders is a revealing lens with which to understand present events, and I look forward to working with Rowan and her team to bring this urgent vision to as many readers as possible – because as global power tilts away from Washington, the effects will be felt not in distant capitals but in the daily lives of ordinary people.”
Olsen is a geopolitical strategist, intelligence expert and authority on US–China relations. He is chief analyst at the strategic risk consultancy Sibylline and former head of the Adarga Research Institute, and has lectured at universities including Cambridge, Manchester and the London School of Economics. He is the creator of the States of Play podcast and newsletter.
After the West will be published in spring 2027.
