Bodley Head to publish Minouche Shafik

The Bodley Head will publish What Do We Owe Each Other?: A New Social Contract for the 21st Century by Minouche Shafik, director of the London School of Economics and Political Science.

Will Hammond, deputy publishing director, acquired UK & Commonwealth rights from James Pullen at the Wylie Agency. The Bodley Head will publish in hardback in 2021.

"In this short, accessible book, Shafik will offer a transformative way of understanding and tackling the current divisions and future challenges that societies the world over now face," said the publisher. "Shafik argues that our current period of political turbulence stems from outdated social contracts, which have failed to accommodate massive changes in demography, work and the expectations of women. They are also woefully ill-equipped to tackle the major challenges of the 21st century: ageing populations, the impact of technology and the climate crisis."

Shafik was appointed director of the London School of Economics and Political Science in September 2017. That same year, in honour of the 75th anniversary of the Beveridge Report, she launched a programme of research at LSE called “Beveridge 2.0” to rethink the welfare state for the 21st century. 

Hammond said: "Minouche Shafik is a superbly lucid explicator of ideas and, as successor to Beveridge, is uniquely well placed to provide answers to perhaps the most pressing question any society now faces. This book will be urgently relevant the world over."