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Surrounded by Crisis
Practical guide to prevent any crisis anytime
Every crisis sends signals. This book is the instrument for reading them and acting before the storm arrives.
English · Español
Now available for pre-order — be among the first readers in the world
Does this sound familiar?
The call arrives. In seconds you must respond to something you never planned for. Most of us survive those moments. Surviving is not the same as navigating them well.
The difference is an instrument.
Before the Storm
Read the signals others miss. Prevent the crisis from forming.
During the Storm
Pause. Think. Decide. Act. Without panic. Without paralysis.
After the Storm
Reckon honestly. Rebuild structurally. Prevent recurrence.
What a 30-year crisis professional says
“I encourage you to keep it handy, just as I do.”
Larry A. Wansley
Decorated FBI Undercover Pioneer · Head of Global Security, American Airlines · Award-Winning Author
The record behind the method
30
Years working inside crises
20+
Countries, five continents
14
Years as a senior OSCE official
1
Method, tested case by case
Inside the book
Written by a practitioner, not an observer. Three decades of crises across more than twenty countries.
Every principle in these pages was tested before it was written.
- Chapter 1
- Why crises catch us by surprise, even when the signals were there.
- Chapter 2
- How to build what seems impossible, without precedent or guarantees.
- Chapter 3
- Preventing the storm before it forms. The signals nobody reads.
- Chapter 4
- Inside the storm. Eleven imperatives that separate survival from collapse.
- Chapter 5
- Why the aftermath always costs more than the crisis itself.
- Chapters 6 & 7
- The complete operational toolkit, in theory and practice.
- Conclusion
- The choice that was always yours.
“The pause is not a luxury. It is a biological necessity: the one act that transfers control from the brain that will make things worse to the brain that can make things better.”
Andrei Muntean, Surrounded by Crisis
The author
Andrei Muntean
Andrei Muntean spent fourteen years as a senior OSCE official, working across more than twenty countries on five continents. He built national anti-corruption institutions from scratch, negotiated through institutional collapse, and learned that most crises look obvious in retrospect and invisible in the moment.
His education was not classroom theory. It was the room where the cost of a wrong read was immediate: post-conflict field missions, election crises, hostage situations, failing states. What emerged from those years was a method — not a checklist, but a way of seeing — that held up every time it was tested.
He grew up in the wings of an opera house, watching performers become something larger than themselves the moment the lights went up. That early schooling in the gap between the person and the performance still runs through everything he writes.
He has served in the U.S. Senate and at Drexel University, and now serves in an international capacity at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.
Where the method was forged
Thirty years in the room
Not a theory assembled from case studies. A method built where the cost of being wrong was immediate.
Field missions
Post-conflict deployments where the plan lasts until the first radio call.
The multilateral table
Briefing governments and delegations when the room disagrees on the facts.
Heads of government
Advising national leadership through political and institutional crises.
Building institutions
Anti-corruption bodies built from scratch, without precedent or guarantees.
Negotiation rooms
Where a single sentence decides whether an agreement survives the week.
Under the lights
Speaking on the record while the situation is still moving.
This book is for you if…
- You are a leader who has wondered, afterward, whether you handled it as well as you could have.
- You are a diplomat or public servant, where a wrong decision outlasts your career.
- You are an executive who knows the next crisis is a matter of when, not whether.
- You work in healthcare, law enforcement, aviation, or security.
- You are a parent, teacher, or community leader who wants to think clearly when life goes off plan.
- You want to understand why the world feels like permanent crisis.
Pre-order
The next crisis will not wait. Neither should you.
Reserve your edition today and be among the first readers in the world.
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