WHY NATIONS FAIL: THE ORIGINS OF POWER, PROSPERITY AND POVERTY

Prosperity, on the argument advanced here, is explained not by climate, geography or culture but by the institutions a society builds and the incentives they create. Daron Acemoglu and James Robinson test that claim against an unusually wide range of cases, from ancient Rome and Tudor England to present-day China, and distinguish institutions that spread opportunity from those that concentrate it. Built over fifteen years of research, their case is that people invest and innovate when they can keep what they earn, and that politics decides whether such arrangements last. Rival explanations, from Max Weber through Jeffrey Sachs and Jared Diamond, are addressed head on. Angles the book takes: • Institutions treated as the decisive factor in national wealth • Historical cases ranging across continents and centuries • Economics, politics and history handled within one argument • Direct engagement with rival theories of development Recommended for students of economics and politics and for general readers of big-picture history, this title is available at Boipoka.