Screen LibraryThe company of strangers : a natural history of economic life /
The Company of Strangers shows us the remarkable strangeness, and fragility, of our everyday lives. This completely revised and updated edition includes a new chapter analyzing how the rise and fall of social trust explain the unsustainable boom in the global economy over the past decade and the fin...
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| Main Authors: | |
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| Corporate Authors: | |
| Published: |
Princeton University Press,
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| Publisher Address: | Princeton, N.J. : |
| Publication Dates: |
[2010] ©2010 |
| Literature type: | eBook |
| Language: | English |
| Edition: | Revised edition with a New foreword by Daniel C. Dennett. |
| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: |
http://dx.doi.org/10.1515/9781400834785 http://www.degruyter.com/doc/cover/9781400834785.jpg |
| Summary: |
The Company of Strangers shows us the remarkable strangeness, and fragility, of our everyday lives. This completely revised and updated edition includes a new chapter analyzing how the rise and fall of social trust explain the unsustainable boom in the global economy over the past decade and the financial crisis that succeeded it. Drawing on insights from biology, anthropology, history, psychology, and literature, Paul Seabright explores how our evolved ability of abstract reasoning has allowed institutions like money, markets, cities, and the banking system to provide the foundations of social trust that we need in our everyday lives. Even the simple acts of buying food and clothing depend on an astonishing web of interaction that spans the globe. How did humans develop the ability to trust total strangers with providing our most basic needs. |
| Carrier Form: | 1 online resource (400 pages) : illustrations |
| ISBN: | 9781400834785 |
| Index Number: | HM708 |
| CLC: | C91 |
| Contents: |
Frontmatter -- Contents -- Foreword / Acknowledgments -- Trust and Panic: Introduction to the Revised Edition -- CHAPTER 1. Who s in Charge? -- Prologue to Part II -- CHAPTER 2. Man and the Risks of Nature -- CHAPTER 3. Our Violent Past -- CHAPTER 4. How Have We Tamed Our Violent Instincts? -- CHAPTER 5. How Did the Social Emotions Evolve? -- CHAPTER 6. Money and Human Relationships -- CHAPTER 7. Honor among Thieves: Hoarding and Stealing -- CHAPTER 8. Honor among Bankers? What Caused the Financial Crisis? -- CHAPTER 9. Professionalism and Fulfillment in Work and War -- Epilogue to Parts I and II -- Prologue to Part III -- CHAPTER 10. The City, from Ancient Athens to Modern Manhattan -- CHAPTER 11. Water: Commodity or Social Institution? -- CHAPTER 12. Prices for Everything? -- CHAPTER 13. Families and Firms -- CHAPTER 14. Knowledge and Symbolism -- CHAPTER 15. Exclusion: Unemployment, Poverty, and Illness -- Epilogue to Part III -- Prologue to Part IV -- CHAPTER 16. States and Empires -- CHAPTER 17. Globalization and Political Action -- CHAPTER 18. Conclusion: How Fragile Is the Great Experiment? -- Notes -- References -- Index. |