He received his B.A. from Columbia in 1990 and his Ph.D. from Yale in 1997. His first book, "A Diplomatic Revolution: Algeria's Fight for Independence and the Origins of the Post-Cold War Era," received the AHA's George Louis Beer Prize for European international history since 1895 and Paul Birdsall Prize for European military and strategic history since 1870. Other publications include articles for the American Historical Review, the International Journal of Middle East Studies, Comparative Studies in Society and History, and The Atlantic Monthly. He is currently working on a history of the international campaign to control population growth to be published by Harvard University Press.