The long reign (1848-1916) of Francis Joseph began with the 1848 Revolutions and ended in the conflagration of the First World War. It saw, or prefigured, almost unimaginable changes, and the Habsburg monarchy itself survived the old man by less than two years. At the end of his life (he died at 86) Francis Joseph already seemed to his younger contemporaries a figure from a vanished age. Yet, as Steven Beller shows in this impressive contribution to Profiles in Power, his story is full of resonances for our own time. Many of the key issues which faced him have returned to haunt us ⁠— most notably multi-ethnic strife in the Balkans, and the conflicting claims of nationalism and federalism in Europe's patchwork of nations. As a result, we are better placed today than before to assess his career with objectivity, yet with understanding.