Keith Robbins' accessible and stimulating account of world history since 1945 provides a framework for making sense of the political and social developments of the period. The focus is firmly on global political interaction. The underlying theme of the book is the tension between the world conceived as a unity and as a diversity. From this perspective, the author discusses the impulse towards globalization in the aftermath of the Second World War, the divisions inherent in the Cold War, and the shifting allegiances and conflicts in the decades which followed.