The Wealth and Poverty of Nations: Why Some Are So Rich and Some So Poor - Hardcover

Landes, David S.

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0393040178 ISBN 13: 9780393040173

Publisher: W W Norton & Co Inc, 1998

Synopsis

A study of the world's growing gulf between rich and poor explains why Western European nations have been the wealthiest, prospering through open societies, new technologies, and the pursuit of change

About this title

Review:

Professor David S. Landes takes a historic approach to the analysis of the distribution of wealth in this landmark study of world economics. Landes argues that the key to today's disparity between the rich and poor nations of the world stems directly from the industrial revolution, in which some countries made the leap to industrialization and became fabulously rich, while other countries failed to adapt and remained poor. Why some countries were able to industrialize and others weren't has been the subject of much heated debate over the decades; climate, natural resources, and geography have all been put forward as explanations--and are all brushed aside by Landes in favor of his own controversial theory: that the ability to effect an industrial revolution is dependent on certain cultural traits, without which industrialization is impossible to sustain. Landes contrasts the characteristics of successfully industrialized nations--work, thrift, honesty, patience, and tenacity--with those of nonindustrial countries, arguing that until these values are internalized by all nations, the gulf between the rich and poor will continue to grow.

About the Author:

David Landes is professor emeritus of history and economics at Harvard University. He is the author of Revolution in Time and Prometheus Unbound. He lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

About this edition

• Publisher: W W Norton & Co Inc
• Publication date: 1998
• ISBN 10: 0393040178
• ISBN 13: 9780393040173
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 650