Dancing in the Glory of Monsters: The Collapse of the Congo and the Great War of Africa

Jason Stearns

History / Africa

Stearns reconstructs the Congo Wars of 1996-2003—the deadliest conflict since World War II—through interviews with commanders, child soldiers, politicians, and survivors. He shows how a resource-rich failed state became a proxy theater for nine African nations' rivalries, with no clear villains and no clean ending. Collison flagged it as particularly great; the book is a case study in institutional collapse and what follows.