William Collins buys 'visionary critique' of capitalism failures

William Collins is to publish The Third Pillar: The Revival of Community in a Polarized World, about how capitalism is “failing our democracies”, by finance academic Raghuram Rajan.

UK Commonwealth rights including India were bought by Arabella Pike, publishing director at William Collins, in a co-publication with Harper Collins India, from Brockman Inc. Penguin Press will publish the book in the US. The book is set for publication on 7th March 2019 with Rajan set to visit London and give a series of high-profile lectures around publication.

“The ’third pillar’ of the title is society,” the synopsis reads. “Economists all too often understand their field as the relationship between the market and government, and leave social issues for other people, which isn’t just myopic, Rajan argues; it's dangerous. All economics is actually socioeconomics – all markets are embedded in a web of human relations, values and norms.”

Rajan, a finance professor at the University of Chicago. discusses how throughout history, technological innovations have ripped the market out of old webs and led to violent backlashes, and to what we now call populism, William Collins said. Rajan offers a way to rethink the relationship between the market and civil society and argues for a return to strengthening and empowering local communities as an antidote to growing despair and unrest. 

He was also previously Governor of the Reserve Bank of India with previously published books including Fault Lines: How Hidden Fractures Still Threaten the World Economy (Princeton University Press) and winner of the 2010 FT and Goldman-Sachs Book of the Year Fault Lines.

Pike said: “In these profoundly uncertain times, Rajan offers a blueprint for why so much has gone wrong. In this landmark work of analysis and insight, Rajan sets out a bold, visionary critique of what can and should be done to help alleviate the many problems faced by societies across the world. It is a book with profound implications for the global economy and future of democracy.”

Rajan said: “It is fair to say that capitalism is failing our democracies today. I explain in this book why this is happening at a time of record low unemployment, and what we should do about it. Reinvigorating the third pillar, the community, is critical to rebuilding a system that works for all, so that democracy does not fail capitalism.”