The Why Nations Fail will change the way you see and understand the world. An impressive and fascinating book, it answers the question that has puzzled experts for centuries: Why are some nations rich and others poor, why do prosperity and poverty, health and disease, feeding and famines divide nations?

Is it culture, climate, geography? Or perhaps, ignorance of what the right policies are? The answer is 'no'. None of these factors are decisive or fatal. Otherwise, how can one explain the fact that Botswana is one of the fastest-growing countries in the world, while other African nations, such as Zimbabwe, the Congo, and Sierra Leone, are mired in poverty and violence?

Daron Acemoglu and James Robinson argue that political and economic institutions are the foundation of economic success or failure. Based on fifteen years of original research, Acemoglu and Robinson provide striking historical evidence from the Roman Empire, the city-states of the Maya, medieval Venice, the Soviet Union, Latin America, England, Europe, the United States, and Africa to ground a new theory of political economy.

[Excerpt from the text on the back cover of the edition]