Zachary Shore is a professor in the department of National Security Affairs at the Naval Postgraduate School and a National Security Visiting Fellow at the Hoover Institution. He earned a DPhil from Oxford in history, served as a postdoctoral fellow at Harvard University, and held a fellowship at Stanford’s Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences. Shore is the author of six books: What Hitler Knew: The Battle for Information in Nazi Foreign Policy (2003); Breeding Bin Ladens: America, Islam, and the Future of Europe (2006); Blunder: Why Smart People Make Bad Decisions (2008); A Sense of the Enemy: The High Stakes History of Reading Your Rival’s Mind (2014); Grad School Essentials: A Crash Course in Scholarly Skills (2016), and, most recently, This Is Not Who We Are: America’s Struggle Between Vengeance and Virtue (2023). His articles have appeared in Time, Politico, Foreign Policy, Los Angeles Times, The National Interest, and elsewhere. Shore’s work has been supported by the Council on Foreign Relations, Kurt A. Körber Foundation, and Institute of International Education, among others. Blind since adolescence, Shore is an advocate for improving opportunities for blind people.
In his book project “A Wiser World,” Shore asks what history can teach us about making wise decisions. Drawing on global case studies from the twentieth century, he explores how wise national policies have emerged; he is particularly intrigued by the interplay of folly, friction, and pain. Some of the best decisions were often complete reversals of foolish ones, resulted from individuals working in opposition to each other*, and required empathy for human suffering. Understanding the conditions from which wise policy decisions arise, Shore argues, can help point us toward lasting solutions to our current global crises.
Meet Zachary Shore
A short portrait filmed at the Hans Arnhold Center, introducing the work and ideas behind fellows’ projects in Berlin.
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A Wiser World: The Global Quest for Good Judgement
Historian Zachary Shore looks at recent political history for examples and models of wise decision-making.
Fellow Spotlight: Zachary Shore
In his book project “A Wiser World,” Zachary Shore asks what history can teach us about making wise decisions.
Explore Past Fellows
Hakim Abderrezak
Marco Abel
David Abraham
