Can the U.S. and other coronavirus-ravaged countries take a cue from individuals in crisis and follow their own 12-step path to recovery?

Jared Diamond, one of America’s most celebrated scholars, says the answer is yes. In a discussion drawing from his book Upheaval: Turning Points for Nations in Crisis, the Pulitzer Prize and National Medal of Science winner from UCLA looks at how and why some nations through history have recuperated from trauma and others haven’t. As with people, success lies in taking responsibility for problems, seeking and accepting help, and being open to change.

In his book, released last May, Diamond weighs the impact of a geopolitical 12-step response to such contemporary global challenges as climate change and political polarization. In his presentation, he extends his focus to the pandemic now gripping the world.

Diamond is a professor of geography at UCLA who is equally renowned for his work in the fields of ecology and evolutionary biology and for his groundbreaking studies of the birds of Papua New Guinea. In addition to the National Medal of Science, he is the recipient of a MacArthur “Genius” grant and a nonfiction Pulitzer for his bestselling book Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies.