Extreme Economies

Breathtaking. An entertaining, fascinating, important reminder of the power of economics to shape all of our lives.

Ed Conway, Economics Editor of Sky News

Exciting to see economics strike out into the real world showing how trauma and chaos can yield raw truths about markets, monopolies and the state.

Simon Jenkins

Richard Davies balances economics with art, exposing the trade-offs made by people living today and forcing us to question the outcomes of our decisions.

Will Page, Chief Economist at Spotify

We learn most about ourselves at times of extreme stress and challenge. Using nine compelling country case studies, Richard Davies brilliantly demonstrates that the same is true of our economic systems. In its approach and insights, Extreme Economies is a revelation - and a must-read.

Andy Haldane, Chief Economist at the Bank of England

Richard Davies obviously made the kind of road trip many of us only dream of to write Extreme Economies. I tore through it. An economist who can write so well while at the same time explaining the economic principles so clearly is always a joy.

Diane Coyle, Bennett Professor of Public Policy at the University of Cambridge

A must read for anyone feeling desperate about the state of world affairs today, Extreme Economies demonstrates with vivid clarity and humanity how those in the most challenging situations can prosper. Many economists are quite narrow in their thinking about life’s challenges, this book beautifully demonstrates why the world’s most interesting places force us to think more openly.

Lord Jim O'Neill, Chair, Chatham House

A highly original approach to understanding what really makes economies tick. Both insightful and accessible to non-economists.

Mervyn King, former Governor of the Bank of England

Extreme Economies makes sense of the forces shaping the future. Taken together, the books nine deep dives are a much needed reminder that an economy is not what happens when equations interact with data. An economy is what happens when people -- real people, people with names -- interact with people. Anyone who wants to learn economics, is learning economics, or pretends to know some economics should read this book.

Paul Romer, winner of the 2018 Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences

We can't forecast the coming decades, but it is enlightening to look at extreme economies for clues what we may be in store for. Davies book is fascinating.

Professor Robert J. Shiller, winner of the 2013 Nobel Prize for Economic Sciences

Accessible and original. The author draws on sociology and anthropology and the simple power of observation and conversation to bring economics alive.

Vince Cable, New Statesman Books of the Year

Davies visits economies pushed to the limit and examines what their response teaches us about resilience in the face of climate change, demographic shifts and state failure.

Financial Times

A fascinating book on economics in extremes. What happens when things go really wrong or are really different.

Martin Wolf, Financial Times

An exploration of the lessons to be drawn from disaster-stricken economies and imperilled (but innovative) people, which ranges from the jungles of Panama to post-tsunami Indonesia to the prison system of Louisiana and Syrian refugee camps.

The Economist - Books of the Year 2019

Crisp and sensitive reporting from an extraordinary range of inaccessible places. As a discussion of the strengths and weaknesses of markets versus planned economies, Extreme Economies is one of the most subtle and surprising I have read.

Tim Harford, Financial Times

Engagingly written and genuinely interesting… fascinating reportage. Davies dives into corners of the world you don’t hear much about and conveys, briefly and clearly, how they work. Simultaneously entertaining, informative and balanced.

Matthew Yglesias, New York Times

Financial Times Best Books of 2019: Extreme Economies is a reflection on human resilience. The author takes you from a prison to a refugee camp to Kinshasa and Santiago to explain how economies work in extreme circumstances and why markets succeed or fail. Weaving economic theory and individual life stories, this is an important and enjoyable read.

Roula Khalaf, FT deputy editor

A gimlet-eyed look at developments in the global economy, in which interesting and sometimes ominous things are happening. Highly recommended, sobering reading for anyone interested in the economic future, for good and bad.

Kirkus Review

Extreme Economies makes sense of the forces shaping the future by describing what people do when pushed to their limits. This strategy of going to extremes pays off spectacularly. Taken together, the book's nine deep dives are a much needed reminder that an economy is not what happens when equations interact with data. An economy is what is what happens when people -- real people, people with names -- interact. Anyone who wants to learn economics, is learning economics, or pretends to know some economics should read this book.

Paul Romer, winner of the 2018 Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences

In each location, Davies keeps his perspective on broad, and often disturbing, historical trends while celebrating the resourcefulness of the individuals and communities he profiles. . . This ambitious and thought-provoking guide helps to make sense of the economic future.

Publishers Weekly

[A] worthwhile lesson, today more than ever. Much of the evidence from Davies’s book, a bottom-up look at what happens when disaster strikes, is encouraging: before long, individuals rebuild themselves and their livelihoods. Fashionable as it is to do it down, capitalism is remarkably resilient.

Ed Conway, The Times

Markets, Mr. Davies engagingly shows, can make an extreme situation less extreme . . . a compelling portrait of markets functioning?and sometimes malfunctioning?in all sorts of conditions and cultures

William Easterly, The Wall Street Journal

Davies’s visit to Zaatari, a massive, hastily built camp for Syrian refugees in Jordan, is fascinating reportage on its own terms and also a brilliant illustration of Adam Smith’s observations about the power of the natural human tendency to 'truck, barter and exchange one thing for another.'

Matthew Iglasius, The New York Times Book Review