Peter Frankopan

Peter Frankopan is Professor of Global History at Oxford University, where he is Senior Research Fellow of Worcester College and Director of the Oxford Centre for Byzantine Research. He works on the history of the Eastern Mediterranean, Russia, the Middle East, Central Asia and China. His work on the history of the Crusades as ‘overturning a millennium of scholarship’ and making ‘the most significant contribution to rethinking the origins and course of the First Crusade for a generation.’

His book, The Silk Roads: A New History of the world has been described as ‘magnificent’ (Sunday Times) ‘ dazzling’ (Guardian), ‘a rare book that makes you question your assumptions about the world’ (Wall St Journal), ‘a treasure’ (Libre Belgique), ‘phenomenal’ (Die Welt), ‘a joy’ (Le Point) and ‘not just the most important history book in years, but the most important in decades’ (Berliner Zeitung). A New York Times Bestseller, it has topped the Non-Fiction charts all around the world, including in the UK, India and China.

His second book The New Silk Roads: The Present and Future of the World was published in November 2018. It is a ‘masterly mapping out of a new world order’ (Evening Standard) and nothing less than ‘a state of the world address’ (The National).

Peter’s most recent book The Earth Transformed: An Untold History, traces the history of the natural world, the disasters it has faced and our part in them – ‘The Earth Transformed is Sapiens for grown-ups … it holds lessons for a world grappling with rapid climate change caused by human industry’ (Sunday Times). This is a ‘spellbinding’ (Financial Times) ‘Elegant and cogently argued’ (Publishers Weekly) book with ‘the intellectual weight and dramatic force of a tsunami’ (The Times) – ‘A dazzling compendium of global research’ (Spectator).

He works with UNIDO (United Nations Industrial Development Organisation) on the future of sustainable cities and on the Belt and Road Initiative. In 2017, he was appointed Senior Advisor and Academic Expert to a major project for the World Bank and Department for International Development (DFID) on Transport Corridors in South Asia. Professor Frankopan advises governments, inter-government agencies, multi-lateral institutions and corporations around the world about geopolitics.

Peter writes regularly for the press in the UK, US, China and South Asia about international affairs. He has presented his own podcast series with Global, I’ve Been Thinking…with Peter Frankopan, meeting and debating with high profile and topical interviewees.

Peter is frequently interviewed on Channel 4 News and Sky News and has commented extensively on the state of current relations between the East and West.