Summary of Paul Collier's The Future of Capitalism

By IRB Media

Please note: This is a companion version & not the original book. Book Preview:

#1 The divide between the well-educated and less-educated has become a new source of anxiety and anger in our societies. The less-educated, both in the metropolis and nationally, are in crisis, while the well-educated are forging themselves into a new ruling class.

#2 The lack of a purposeful life is evident in the falling life expectancy of whites who have not been to college in America. The syndrome is also widespread and in the most broken cities, such as Blackpool, life expectancy is falling.

#3 The last time capitalism derailed, in the 1930s, the same thing happened. The emerging dangers were crystallized by Aldous Huxley in Brave New World (1932) and George Orwell in Nineteen Eighty-Four (1949).

#4 There are three awful rifts that have opened in our societies, and they are not just problems that I study: they are the tragedies that have defined my life purpose. I want to change this situation.

• Language: English
• Publisher: IRB Media
• Release date: Jun 4, 2022
• ISBN: 9798822503069

IRB Media

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Insights on Paul Collier's The Future of Capitalism

Contents

Insights from Chapter 1

Insights from Chapter 2

Insights from Chapter 3

Insights from Chapter 4

Insights from Chapter 1

#1

The divide between the well-educated and less-educated has become a new source of anxiety and anger in our societies. The less-educated, both in the metropolis and nationally, are in crisis, while the well-educated are forging themselves into a new ruling class.

#2

The lack of a purposeful life is evident in the falling life expectancy of whites who have not been to college in America. The syndrome is also widespread and in the most broken cities, such as Blackpool, life expectancy is falling.

#3

The last time capitalism derailed, in the 1930s, the same thing happened. The emerging dangers were crystallized by Aldous Huxley in Brave New World (1932) and George Orwell in Nineteen Eighty-Four (1949).

#4

There are three awful rifts that have opened in our societies, and they are not just problems that I study: they are the tragedies that have defined my life purpose. I want to change this situation.

#5

The co-operative movement, which was the foundation of the political parties of the centre-left, was able to address the new anxieties that arose as a result of the industrial revolution. However, social democracy has been largely destroyed by middle-class intellectuals who have drifted away from their origins in practical reciprocity.

#6

The intellectuals of the left were attracted to the ideas of a nineteenth-century philosopher, Jeremy Bentham, who detached morality from our instinctive values and deduced it from a single principle of reason: an action is moral if it promotes the greatest happiness of the greatest number.

#7

The Utilitarian approach to public policy quickly became toxic. It assumed that people were psychopaths, and that the purpose of the state was to maximize utility, which meant redistributing consumption to those who needed it the most.

#8

The backlash against paternalism grew during the 1970s. It could have attacked the disdain for loyalty and fairness and restored communitarianism, but instead, it attacked the disdain for liberty and demanded that individuals be protected from the infringements of the state by reclaiming their natural rights.

#9

The Utilitarian cause was promoted by economists, and the rights cause was promoted by