'a hopeful book about the potential for human progress when we work off facts rather than our inherent biases'. BARACK OBAMA 'One of the most important books I've ever read - an indispensable guide to thinking clearly about the world.' BILL GATES 'Hans Rosling tells the story of "the secret silent miracle of human progress" as only he can. But Factfulness does much more than that. It also explains why progress is so often secret and silent and teaches readers how to see it clearly.' MELINDA GATES Factfulnes s: The stress-reducing habit of only carrying opinions for which you have strong supporting facts. When asked simple questions about global trends - why the world's population is increasing; how many young women go to school; how many of us live in poverty - we systematically get the answers wrong. So wrong that a chimpanzee choosing answers at random will consistently outguess journalists, Nobel laureates, and investment bankers. In Factfulness , Professor of International Health and a man who can make data sing, Hans Rosling, together with his two long-time collaborators Anna and Ola, offers a radical new explanation of why this happens, and reveals the ten instincts that distort our perspective. It turns out that the world, for all its imperfections, is in a much better state than we might think. But when we worry about everything all the time instead of embracing a worldview based on facts, we can lose our ability to focus on the things that threaten us most. Inspiring and revelatory, filled with lively anecdotes and moving stories, Factfulness is an urgent and essential book that will change the way you see the world.
Why are some nations more prosperous than others? This book sets out to answer this question, with a compelling and elegantly argued new theory: that it is not down to climate, geography or culture, but because of institutions. It explains why the world is divided into nations with wildly differing levels of prosperity.
Yanis Varoufakis is an economist, political leader and the author of numerous bestselling books: Talking to My Daughter: A Brief History of Capitalism; Adults in the Room, a memoir of his time as finance minister of Greece; an economic history of Europe, And The Weak Suffer What They Must?; and Another Now: Dispatches from An Alternative Present. Born in Athens in 1961, he was for many years a professor of economics in Britain, Australia and the USA before he entered politics. He is co-founder of the international grassroots movement DiEM25 and a Professor of Economics at the University of Athens.>
What is economics?br>What can - and can''t - it explain about the world? br>Why does it matter?br>br>Ha-Joon Chang teaches economics at Cambridge University, and writes a column for the Guardian. The Observer called his book 23 Things They Don''t Tell You About Capitalism, which was a no.1 bestseller, ''a witty and timely debunking of some of the biggest myths surrounding the global economy.'' He won the Wassily Leontief Prize for advancing the frontiers of economic thought, and is a vocal critic of the failures of our current economic system.>
How can your name affect how well you do in life? What do estate agents and the Ku Klux Klan have in common? Why do drug dealers live with their mothers?The answer: Freakonomics. Its at the heart of everything we do and the things that affect us daily: from sex to crime, parenting to politics, fat to cheating, fear to traffic jams. And we can use it to get to the heart of whats really happening under the surface of everyday life. This cult bestseller will show you how, by unravelling your lifes secret codes, you can discover a totally new way of seeing the world.>
What have the invention of the wheel, Pompeii, the Wall Street Crash, Harry Potter and the internet got in common? Why are all forecasters con-artists? And, what can Catherine the Great's lovers tell us about probability? This book shows us how to stop trying to predict everything and take advantage of uncertainty.
THE TOP TEN BESTSELLER From the bestselling author of The Black Swan , a bold book that challenges many of our long-held beliefs about risk and reward, politics and religion, finance and personal responsibility Why should we never listen to people who explain rather than do? Why do companies go bust? How is it that we have more slaves today than in Roman times? Why does imposing democracy on other countries never work? The answer: too many people running the world don't have skin in the game. In his inimitable, pugnacious style, Nassim Nicholas Taleb shows that skin in the game applies to all aspects of our lives. It's about having something to lose and taking a risk. Citizens, lab experimenters, artisans, political activists and hedge fund traders all have skin in the game. Policy wonks, corporate executives, theoreticians, bankers and most journalists don't. As Taleb says, "The symmetry of skin in the game is a simple rule that's necessary for fairness and justice, and the ultimate BS-buster," and "Never trust anyone who doesn't have skin in the game. Without it, fools and crooks will benefit, and their mistakes will never come back to haunt them".
FROM THE WINNERS OF THE 2019 NOBEL PRIZE IN ECONOMICS 'Wonderfully refreshing . . . A must read' Thomas Piketty In this revolutionary book, prize-winning economists Abhijit V. Banerjee and Esther Duflo show how economics, when done right, can help us solve the thorniest social and political problems of our day. From immigration to inequality, slowing growth to accelerating climate change, we have the resources to address the challenges we face but we are so often blinded by ideology. Original, provocative and urgent, Good Economics for Hard Times offers the new thinking that we need. It builds on cutting-edge research in economics - and years of exploring the most effective solutions to alleviate extreme poverty - to make a persuasive case for an intelligent interventionism and a society built on compassion and respect. A much-needed antidote to polarized discourse, this book shines a light to help us appreciate and understand our precariously balanced world.
**Shortlisted for the Financial Times and Schroders Business Book of the Year Award**
Picked as a Book of the Year by THE TIMES, FINANCIAL TIMES, ECONOMIST and NEW STATESMAN
A BBC RADIO 4 Book of the Week
''A compelling narrative of the human story'' TIM MARSHALL, author of Prisoners of Geography
''Lively, rich and exciting... full of surprises'' PETER FRANKOPAN, author of The Silk Roads
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Sand, salt, iron, copper, oil and lithium. They built our world, and they will transform our future.
These are the six most crucial substances in human history. They took us from the Dark Ages to the present day. They power our computers and phones, build our homes and offices, and create life-saving medicines. But most of us take them completely for granted.
In Material World, Ed Conway travels the globe - from the sweltering depths of the deepest mine in Europe, to spotless silicon chip factories in Taiwan, to the eerie green pools where lithium originates - to uncover a secret world we rarely see. Revealing the true marvel of these substances, he follows the mind-boggling journeys, miraculous processes and little-known companies that turn the raw materials we all need into products of astonishing complexity.
As we wrestle with climate change, energy crises and the threat of new global conflict, Conway shows why these substances matter more than ever before, and how the hidden battle to control them will shape our geopolitical future. This is the story of civilisation - our ambitions and glory, innovations and appetites - from a new perspective: literally from the ground up.
A guide to the economy in graphic novel format traces the history of Western economic thought from its beginnings to the world economy in the twenty-first century.
This landmark study of the transatlantic slave trade by pioneering economic historian Eric Williams offers a boldly revisionist view of racism, imperialism and emancipation.br>br>Tracing the rise and fall of slavery through the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, Williams examines how the trade laid the foundations of global capitalism and fuelled Europe''s industrial development. He reveals how racism arose as a result, providing a means of rationalising a profoundly immoral but lucrative practice. And he lays bare the economic self-interest that drove the early abolitionists, exploding the myth of emancipation as a mark of Britain''s moral progress.br>br>''If one criterion of a classic is its ability to reorient our most basic way of viewing an object or a concept, Eric Williams''s study supremely passes that test'' Seymour Drescher>
Ha-Joon Chang teaches economics at SOAS University of London, and is one of the world's leading economists. His books include Economics: The User's Guide, Bad Samaritans and 23 Things They Don't Tell You About Capitalism, which was a no.1 b
Martin Wolf is Chief Economics Commentator at the Financial Times. He was a member of the UK's Vickers Commission on Banking, which reported in 2011. He holds an honorary doctorate at the London School of Economics and is an h
This is an excellent book, developing a clear argument and not afraid to look really big questions squarely in the eye... Susskind believes in the innovative powers of humankind to develop ways to tackle successfully the trade-offs we face; arguing that we should treasure the future and strike out into it with confidence.>
An accessible account of the history of economics through the ideas of great thinkers
"A whistle-stop introduction to the great works and thinkers of each age, this is a clear and accessible primer."-Laura Garmeson, Financial Times
Economics explains the world. For example, the fact that you're holding this book in your hands puts you in a special position. To many people around the globe, spending money on a book and being able to read it would seem as likely as a trip to the moon. But why can some countries afford the buildings, books and teachers they need to educate their children - and others can't? The word 'economics' might sound a bit dry, but it's really about getting to the bottom of questions like these.
This is a lively, bestselling account of the history of economics, told through events from ancient to modern times and through the ideas of great thinkers in the field. From Adam Smith to Karl Marx and the invention of money to the Great Depression, this Little History illuminates the economic forces that shape our world.
Little Histories - Inspiring Guides for Curious Minds
Now in paperback, the updated and expanded edition : David Graebers fresh ... fascinating ... thought-provoking ... and exceedingly timely ( Financial Times ) history of debt Here anthropologist David Graeber presents a stunning reversal of conventional wisdom: he shows that before there was money, there was debt. For more than 5,000 years, since the beginnings of the first agrarian empires, humans have used elaborate credit systems to buy and sell goods--that is, long before the invention of coins or cash. It is in this era, Graeber argues, that we also first encounter a society divided into debtors and creditors. Graeber shows that arguments about debt and debt forgiveness have been at the center of political debates from Italy to China, as well as sparking innumerable insurrections. He also brilliantly demonstrates that the language of the ancient works of law and religion (words like guilt, sin, and redemption) derive in large part from ancient debates about debt, and shape even our most basic ideas of right and wrong. We are still fighting these battles today without knowing it.
''One of the most important feminist voices of the 21st century. Emma Holten is going to change the world and you better get on board now . . . This book will make everything make sense. It''s the book about capitalism we didn''t know we needed'' - Sofie Hagen
''Why is it that we are so rich, yet feel so terrible? How have we reached a moment where we are at the very pinnacle of wealth and technological progress, but our care systems are crumbling and people are dying on the streets?''
In Deficit, Emma Holten traces (via witch trials, midwives and the treatment of Britney Spears) how economists - from the Enlightenment onwards - created a value framework that looked down on women and care work. Unable to assign value to acts of care, these acts have, by default, been assigned a value of zero. And this has horrible consequences for all of us, trapped in a world where our perceived value is linked - at political and societal levels - to our economic productivity, above all else.
The bestselling title in the Oxford Quick Reference series, A Dictionary of Law is an essential reference work, described by leading university lecturers as 'the best law dictionary' and favoured by law students and legal professionals alike. The tenth edition features over 4,900 clear and concise definitions on major terms, concepts, and processes within the English legal system, and is a useful source of information for any of the many countries that base their legal system on English law. It includes more than 120 new entries, including acid attacks, lasers, Nightingale Courts, Northern Ireland Protocol, and retained EU Law. Many of the new and revised entries reflect changes brought about by Brexit and the Divorce, Dissolution and Separation Act 2020. There have also been significant increases of coverage in the areas of constitutional law, medical law, and employment law and professional regulation. Updated web links complement the text and lead to a dedicated companion website for further reading materials. The dictionary also contains a guide to legal writing, and a citation guide drawn from the Oxford Standard for Citation of Legal Authorities (OSCOLA).
A Guardian book to look out for in 2024
An insightful exploration of the nature of inequality by the internationally bestselling author of Capital in the Twenty-First Century.
In his newest work, Thomas Piketty explores how social inequality manifests itself very differently depending on the society and epoch in which it arises. History and culture play a central role, inequality being strongly linked to various socio-economic, political, civilisational, and religious developments. So it is culture in the broadest sense that makes it possible to explain the diversity, extent, and structure of the social inequality that we observe every day.
Piketty briefly and concisely presents a lively synthesis of his work, taking up such diverse topics as education, inheritance, taxes, and the climate crisis, and provides exciting food for thought for a highly topical debate: Does natural inequality exist?
