The Commanding Heights

The Battle Between Government and the Marketplace That Is Remaking the Modern World

Daniel Yergin/Joseph Stanislaw

Simon & Schuster, 2002, 457pp

This fascinating book is about the world's economic history in the last half century (since WWII), with occasional glimpses before that time. Its thesis is that world markets have captured (or at least are in the process of capturing) the high ground, the commanding heights, in their struggle with governments for control. The book tries (and succeeds very well) to explain how and why this happened and who the people were who made it happen. It is encouraging to think this battle of ideas is over, but I'm not so sure. It seems to me like this battle continues to rage on as antimarket forces seek to hold onto their power.

...to be continued