Selected as a Financial Times Best Book of 2013

In Strategy: A History, Sir Lawrence Freedman, one of the world's leading authorities on war and international politics, captures the vast history of strategic thinking, in a consistently engaging and insightful account of how strategy came to pervade every aspect of our lives.

The range of Freedman's narrative is extraordinary, moving from the surprisingly advanced strategy practiced in primate groups, to the opposing strategies of Achilles and Odysseus in The Iliad, the strategic advice of Sun Tzu and Machiavelli, the great military innovations of Baron Henri de Jomini and Carl von Clausewitz, the grounding of revolutionary strategy in class struggles by Marx, the insights into corporate strategy found in Peter Drucker and Alfred Sloan, and the contributions of the leading social scientists working on strategy today. The core issue at the heart of strategy, the author notes, is whether it is possible to manipulate and shape our environment rather than simply become the victim of forces beyond one's control. Time and again, Freedman demonstrates that the inherent unpredictability of this environment-subject to chance events, the efforts of opponents, the missteps of friends-provides strategy with its challenge and its drama. Armies or corporations or nations rarely move from one predictable state of affairs to another, but instead feel their way through a series of states, each one not quite what was anticipated, requiring a reappraisal of the original strategy, including its ultimate objective. Thus the picture of strategy that emerges in this book is one that is fluid and flexible, governed by the starting point, not the end point.

A brilliant overview of the most prominent strategic theories in history, from David's use of deception against Goliath, to the modern use of game theory in economics, this masterful volume sums up a lifetime of reflection on strategy.

被选为《金融时报》2013年最佳图书

在《战略。劳伦斯-弗里德曼爵士是世界上研究战争和国际政治的权威之一，他捕捉到了战略思维的广阔历史，以一贯的吸引力和洞察力阐述了战略如何渗透到我们生活的各个方面。

弗里德曼的叙述范围非常广泛，从灵长类动物群体中令人惊讶的先进战略，到《伊利亚特》中阿基里斯和奥德修斯的对立战略，孙子和马基雅弗利的战略建议，亨利-德-约米尼男爵和卡尔-冯-克劳塞维茨的伟大军事创新，马克思将革命战略建立在阶级斗争之上，彼得-德鲁克和阿尔弗雷德-斯隆的企业战略见解，以及当今从事战略研究的主要社会科学家的贡献。作者指出，战略的核心问题是，是否有可能操纵和塑造我们的环境，而不是简单地成为超出自己控制的力量的受害者。弗里德曼一次又一次地证明，这种环境固有的不可预测性--受制于偶然事件、对手的努力和朋友的失策--为战略提供了挑战和戏剧性。军队、公司或国家很少从一种可预测的状态进入另一种状态，而是在一系列的状态中摸索，每一种状态都不尽如人意，需要重新评估原来的战略，包括其最终目标。因此，本书中出现的战略图景是流动的、灵活的，受起点而非终点的制约。

本书对历史上最突出的战略理论进行了精彩的概述，从大卫使用欺骗手段对付歌利亚，到现代博弈论在经济学中的应用，这本杰作总结了作者一生对战略的思考。