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The Technological Republic

Hard Power, Soft Belief, and the Future of the West

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The Technological Republic

By: Alexander C. Karp, Nicholas W.Zamiska
Narrated by: Nicholas W.Zamiska
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Brought to you by Penguin.

**THE INSTANT SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER**

**THE #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER**

From the Palantir co-founder and The Economist’s ‘best CEO of 2024,’ and his deputy, a sweeping indictment of the West’s culture of complacency and a passionate call for the West to wake up to our new reality.

Our most brilliant engineering minds once collaborated with government to advance world-changing technologies. Their efforts secured the West’s dominant place in the geopolitical order. But that relationship has now eroded, with perilous repercussions.

In this groundbreaking treatise, one of tech’s boldest thinkers and his longtime deputy offer a searing critique of our collective abandonment of ambition. Palantir co-founder and CEO Alexander C. Karp and Nicholas W. Zamiska argue that in order for the West to retain its global edge—and preserve the freedoms we take for granted—the software industry must renew its commitment to addressing our most urgent challenges, including the new arms race of artificial intelligence. Government, in turn, must embrace the most effective features of the engineering mindset that have propelled Silicon Valley’s success.

Above all, leaders must reject intellectual fragility and preserve space for ideological confrontation. A willingness to risk the disapproval of the crowd, Karp and Zamiska contend, has everything to do with technological and economic out-performance.

At once iconoclastic and rigorous, this book will also lift the veil on Palantir and its broader political project from the inside, offering a passionate call for the West to wake up to our new reality.

“Equal parts company lore, jeremiad, and homily . . . The primary target of The Technological Republic is not a nation that has failed Silicon Valley. It is more cogent and original as a story about how Silicon Valley has failed the nation.”
—The New Yorker

“The Technological Republic provides a fascinating, if at times disturbing, insight into the reassertion of US hard power.”
—The Financial Times, “Best Books of the Week”

“"A scathing indictment of today’s complacent Silicon Valley . . . [A] big-idea book that’s getting a lot of buzz.”
—Toronto Star

©2025 Alexander C. Karp, Nicholas W. Zamiska (P)2025 Penguin Audio

 Computer Science Economics Freedom & Security History & Culture International Machine Theory & Artificial Intelligence Politics & Government Programming & Software Development Software Development & Engineering Technology & Society Technology Socialism Capitalism Software

Critic Reviews

The wizards of America’s digital revolution have produced many shiny consumer products and apps. But they have often remained aloof from engaging in a sense of national purpose or common good. This book is a rallying cry, as we enter the age of artificial intelligence, for a return to the World War II era of cooperation between the technology industry and government in order to pursue innovation that will advance our national welfare and democratic goals. A fascinating and important work (Walter Isaacson)
[The Technological Republic] help[s] explain the sudden and extraordinary change of worldview that has seized much of the US tech elite… a fascinating, if at times disturbing, insight into the reassertion of US hard power
A cri de coeur that takes aim at the tech industry for abandoning its history of helping America and its allies... Likely the only book by a business executive to feature three epigrams (one in German), citations from the Bible, Richard Linklater's Before Sunset, and an outright attack on a market leader
Not since Allan Bloom’s astonishingly successful 1987 book The Closing of the American Mind — more than 1 million copies sold — has there been a cultural critique as sweeping as Karp’s
Equal parts company lore, jeremiad, and homily... The primary target of The Technological Republic is not a nation that has failed Silicon Valley. It is more cogent and original as a story about how Silicon Valley has failed the nation
As clear and bracing as reveille... with engaging storytelling... Whether or not Americans can agree on how and why to defend the country, Karp and Zamiska make a stirring call for the tech industry to follow Palantir's path and get involved with the effort
A bold and ambitious work, The Technological Republic reminds us of a time when technological progress answered a national calling. It is essential reading in the age of AI, as the direction of Silicon Valley will help define the future of American leadership in the world
In today's complicated geopolitical, technological, and economic environment, the author's ability to be both well spoken and outspoken in The Technological Republic can help us understand important issues about the future prosperity of the United States and its allies. The book is by turns provocative and insightful, and Alex Karp's resilience, patriotism, and depth of experience in our rapidly changing world provide instructive lessons and intellectual arguments for all of us to consider
All stars
Most relevant
This book is so insightful for its analysis of the digital technology industry and why it has been focused on the market and not nation building. The authors provide a new manifesto to get industry to align itself not just to the market but to stakeholders (the state, fellow countrymen).

A moral manifesto for industry and nations

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