Columbia Global Reports, the new publishing venture based out of Columbia University headed up by Nicholas Lemann, has signed five authors for its first list, which launches fall 2015.

The first group of authors and projects include Bethany McLean, contributing editor at Vanity Fair and co-author of The Smartest Guys in the Room, for an untitled work that examines the remaining risk factors in the global financial system. In his book, Economist correspondent Nicolas Pelham will pen a "fresh analysis" of the Middle East, under the working title From Israel to ISIS: The Transition from Multi-Cultural to Sectarian States in the New Middle East.

Clay Shirky, NYU professor and author of Here Comes Everybody will write a book, working title iChina, which explores the "implications for China as it develops its own smartphone." The Victory Lab author Sasha Issenberg will investigate medical tourism, and Atossa Abrahamian, journalist and opinion editor at Al Jazeera America, will write a book with the working title The Cosmopolites, which explores the "phenomenon of statelessness and global citizenship."

“This list expresses our goal of publishing books by both established authors and journalists as well as up-and-coming ones, and our desire to address a wide range of topics,” said Lemann. “We think these works have the potential to change the conversation, through new information, new analysis, memorable expression, or, in the best cases, all three.”