Rana Foroohar
Rana Foroohar is an award-winning global business columnist and associate editor at the Financial Times and a global economic analyst at CNN. Sought after for her astute analysis, Foroohar speaks to the changes occurring in business, politics, technology, economics and foreign affairs. Her weekly column is a real-time commentary on the world’s most important geoeconomic trends, and how business, politics, technology and culture intersect. She also pens the FT’s Swamp Notes alongside Ed Luce, discussing the intersection of money and power in the U.S. and beyond.
Praised by Publishers Weekly as “a piercing study of American economic decline” and named one of Fall’s Most Anticipated Nonfiction Books by Bloomberg, Foroohar’s new book Sea Change: America’s New Great Game in the Arctic Circle is an exploration of how melting ice will reshape trade, security and geopolitics in the decades to come. Foroohar was the first journalist to be given unfettered access to the Coast Guard cutter Healy and its crew on a three-week trip to the North Pole, where she discovered not only why ships are the new chips – a crucial source of geopolitical power in a changing world – but why no great national power has long endured without maritime power.
“Economic security is national security. Rana Foroohar makes that clear in this gripping account of competition between Russia, China, and the United States to shape the Arctic. The story she tells about shipbuilding, critical minerals, and the industrial base we let atrophy, is a must-read for policymakers, executives, and citizens alike.”
—Gina Raimondo, 40th United States Commerce Secretary
Foroohar’s first book, Makers and Takers: The Rise of Finance and the Fall of American Business, about financialization and why capital markets no longer support business, was shortlisted for the Financial Times McKinsey Book of the Year award. Her second book, Don’t Be Evil: The Case Against Big Tech, was the Porchlight Business Book of the Year. Homecoming: The Path to Prosperity in a Post Global World, on the fall of globalization and the rise of regionalization, was named one of the best books of the year by Kirkus Reviews. To accompany the book, she produced a three-part film series documenting her travels across the U.S. to explore how a new era of deglobalization will affect innovation in industries from farming to manufacturing.
In 2019, Foroohar was named the best columnist in the country by the Society for Advancing Business Editing and Writing (SABEW) for her tech and policy coverage at the Financial Times. Prior to joining the FT and CNN, Foroohar spent six years at TIME as an assistant managing editor and economic columnist. She also worked at Newsweek for 13 years as an economic and foreign affairs editor and a foreign correspondent covering Europe and the Middle East. During that time, she was awarded the German Marshall Fund’s Peter Weitz Prize for transatlantic reporting. She has also received awards and fellowships from institutions such as the Newswomen’s Club of New York, the Johns Hopkins School of International Affairs, and the East West Center. She is a life member of the Council on Foreign Relations and sits on the advisory board of the Open Markets Institute.
For more information on Rana Foroohar, visit ranaforoohar.com. More videos of Rana speaking are available upon request.
Rana Foroohar is an award-winning global business columnist and associate editor at the Financial Times and a global economic analyst at CNN. Sought after for her astute analysis, Foroohar speaks to the changes occurring in business, politics, technology, economics and foreign affairs. Her weekly column is a real-time commentary on the world’s most important geoeconomic trends, and how business, politics, technology and culture intersect. She also pens the FT’s Swamp Notes alongside Ed Luce, discussing the intersection of money and power in the U.S. and beyond.
Praised by Publishers Weekly as “a piercing study of American economic decline” and named one of Fall’s Most Anticipated Nonfiction Books by Bloomberg, Foroohar’s new book Sea Change: America’s New Great Game in the Arctic Circle is an exploration of how melting ice will reshape trade, security and geopolitics in the decades to come. Foroohar was the first journalist to be given unfettered access to the Coast Guard cutter Healy and its crew on a three-week trip to the North Pole, where she discovered not only why ships are the new chips – a crucial source of geopolitical power in a changing world – but why no great national power has long endured without maritime power.
“Economic security is national security. Rana Foroohar makes that clear in this gripping account of competition between Russia, China, and the United States to shape the Arctic. The story she tells about shipbuilding, critical minerals, and the industrial base we let atrophy, is a must-read for policymakers, executives, and citizens alike.”
—Gina Raimondo, 40th United States Commerce Secretary
Foroohar’s first book, Makers and Takers: The Rise of Finance and the Fall of American Business, about financialization and why capital markets no longer support business, was shortlisted for the Financial Times McKinsey Book of the Year award. Her second book, Don’t Be Evil: The Case Against Big Tech, was the Porchlight Business Book of the Year. Homecoming: The Path to Prosperity in a Post Global World, on the fall of globalization and the rise of regionalization, was named one of the best books of the year by Kirkus Reviews. To accompany the book, she produced a three-part film series documenting her travels across the U.S. to explore how a new era of deglobalization will affect innovation in industries from farming to manufacturing.
In 2019, Foroohar was named the best columnist in the country by the Society for Advancing Business Editing and Writing (SABEW) for her tech and policy coverage at the Financial Times. Prior to joining the FT and CNN, Foroohar spent six years at TIME as an assistant managing editor and economic columnist. She also worked at Newsweek for 13 years as an economic and foreign affairs editor and a foreign correspondent covering Europe and the Middle East. During that time, she was awarded the German Marshall Fund’s Peter Weitz Prize for transatlantic reporting. She has also received awards and fellowships from institutions such as the Newswomen’s Club of New York, the Johns Hopkins School of International Affairs, and the East West Center. She is a life member of the Council on Foreign Relations and sits on the advisory board of the Open Markets Institute.
For more information on Rana Foroohar, visit ranaforoohar.com. More videos of Rana speaking are available upon request.
Sea Change – Economic and National Security in a New World
Pendulum shifts in political economy happen slowly, then all at once. While the last half-century was characterized by globalization, financialization, and a decreased focus on security, the next 50 years will be all about the opposite. In this thought-provoking talk, Foroohar explores what the quest for greater maritime security tells us about risk and opportunity in our changing world. 80 percent of the world’s commerce is done by ship, and yet America is no longer capable of making its own vessels, thanks to a variety of reasons ranging from the post-Cold War “peace-dividend,” to the theory of shareholder value and the failure to factor geopolitical risk onto the balance sheet. That’s a huge vulnerability at a time when there’s never been more economic and security risk in key logistics and transport hotspots, like the Panama and Suez Canals, the South China Seas, and the Arctic. Foroohar details the weeks she spent in the Arctic, reporting on US, European, Russian, and Chinese efforts to chart new commercial sea passages, tap rare earth minerals and energy resources, and grab territory in a new Great Game.
The Tripolar World
Economic and market volatility in the US and around the world has been a hallmark of Trump 2. And there is more to come, no matter what happens with trade, tariffs, interest rate policy, or employment. But there is a major signal in the noise. We are in the middle of a once-in-50-year swing in the global economy, away from hyper-globalization and towards more regionalization. The US, Europe, and Asia will each come to play a more balanced role in the global economy, as we move into a post-dollar world in which technological, political, demographic, and financial shifts will result in much more localized economies. While Trump has exacerbated this change, it will continue with or without him. Using reporting and analysis from her weekly Financial Times column as well as her three award-winning books, Foroohar outlines what the new world will look like, and what investors and business leaders need to know to succeed in it.
Decoding Trumpanomics
The conventional wisdom in mainstream liberal media is that Donald Trump will tank the economy, blow up the global order, start a trade war with China, and collapse the stock market. Supporters believe he’ll bring back law and order, lower inflation, and, of course, Make America Great Again. The truth is that neither side has it all right. While Trump’s actions will be all over the map, there are certain things we can count on, like a new approach to politics that is all about the art of the geopolitical deal, the use of the US consumer market as an economic bargaining chit with other countries, and the rise of a new kind of techno-determinism led by the Silicon Valley billionaires that helped propel Trump to the White House again. Financial Times columnist and critically-acclaimed author Foroohar’s astute analysis will help leaders understand the new political paradigm shift, and what it will mean for countries, companies, consumers, and citizens.
From Efficiency to Resiliency – Supply Chains in a New Era
Trade wars, pandemics, and global conflict have fundamentally changed the way we do business. Companies used to run on an efficiency model, putting money, goods and people wherever it was cheapest and fastest to produce. Now, resiliency is the order of the day, and that requires a new model for global corporations. Using real time reporting and colorful stories, as well as deep quantitative analysis and historical context from her three best-selling books, which critics have called a “trilogy for a new economic era,” Foroohar will lay out the major trends. First, a move from “anywhere” to “somewhere,” as supply chains shorten, shift, and become more dependent on place-based production and consumption. Secondly, a move from hyper-concentration to more decentralization as companies look to cut risk and increase global redundancy, no longer depending on a single company, country or currency at a time of increased political, economic, and climate-based disruption. And finally, a move from “just in time,” to “just in case,” as building resiliency – rather than just efficiency – emerges as a key C-suite goal.
What Worries Me and What Doesn’t in Global Financial Markets
Markets are at record highs, yet there are many risks on the horizon, from a massive run up in public and private debt, to the specter of inflation, bond market crisis and de-dollarization. How does our current political and economic moment compare to other periods of history, like the 1920s, 1970s, or 2000s? How is it different? And what’s really driving the markets today? While headlines are all about politics, there are deeper economic currents that businesspeople need to understand in order to navigate the next decade. Foroohar lays out the key issues that leaders need to consider, from the impact of AI and technological disruption to the end of cheap capital and regionalization of trade routes, to the emergence of a new currency order.
- Sea Change: America’s New Great Game in the Arctic Circle (Crown, 2026)
- Homecoming: The Path to Prosperity in a Post-Global World (Crown, 2022)
- Don’t Be Evil: How Big Tech Betrayed Its Founding Principles—and All of Us (Currency, 2019)
Selected Articles
How climate is driving new geostrategy, Financial Times
China bypasses shipping chokepoints with “Ice Silk Road” through Arctic, Financial Times
America’s Hidden M&A Boom, Financial Times
- 2023 Kirkus Reviews Best Book of the Year, Homecoming: The Path to Prosperity in a Post-Global World
- 2019 Porchlight Business Book of the Year, Don’t Be Evil: How Big Tech Betrayed Its Founding Principles And All of Us
- 2019 Best in Business Award, opinion/commentary, Society for Advancing Business Editing and Writing
- 2016 Shortlist, Financial Times McKinsey Book of the Year, Makers and Takers: The Rise of Finance and the Fall of American Business
- 2013 Best Columnist, Newswomen’s Club of New York
Rana Foroohar understands what went wrong with America and how to make it right. Her pioneering books on big tech and big money proved that Rana is one of the leading economic voices in these troubled times.
Rana Foroohar is a beacon of insight in the world of financial journalism.
Foroohar demystifies the decline in America’s economic prominence, showing that the competitive threats came not from the outside—migration or China—but from within our borders. She explains how finance has permeated every aspect of our economic and political life, and how those who caused the financial crisis wound up benefiting from it.
Foroohar is one of the rare journalists with the insider knowledge and contacts, as well as the deft writing touch, to criticize the “financialization” of the US economy in a way that will sound credible to Wall Street, and readable on Main Street.
- WATCH: Gas prices rise amid renewed tensions in Strait of Hormuz, CNN
- LISTEN: Rana Foroohar on the Economic and Social Force of Big Tech, IMF Podcasts
- LISTEN: The Stock Market is Plummeting. Welcome to the End of the ‘Everything Bubble.’, The Ezra Klein Show
- LISTEN: Homecoming: A Conversation with Rana Foroohar, The DSR Network
- LISTEN: Rana Foroohar on taming big tech, Tech Tonic
BOOKS
Sea Change: America's New Great Game in the Arctic Circle
Forthcoming October 2026
Homecoming: The Path to Prosperity in a Post-Global World
Makers and Takers: How Wall Street Destroyed Main Street
Don't Be Evil: The Case Against Big Tech
Videos
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