LEADER 00000cam 122007577a 4500 
001    19981044 
003    LIBRIS 
008    170109s2017    xxua     b    000 0 eng c 
020    9780691165028 
020    0691165025 
041    eng 
082 04 305.512|223/swe 
084    Kv|2kssb/8 
084    Ocl|2kssb/8 
084    Qada|2kssb/8 
092 0  305.5|bengelska 
100 1  Scheidel, Walter,|d1966-|4aut 
245 14 The great leveler :|bviolence and the history of 
       inequality from the Stone Age to the twenty-first century 
       /|cWalter Scheidel 
246 3  Violence and the history of inequality from the Stone Age 
       to the 21st century 
264    Princeton, New Jersey :|bPrinceton University Press,|c2017
300    xvii, 504 s. :|bill 
490 1  The Princeton economic history of the Western world 
500    Are mass violence and catastrophes the only forces that 
       can seriously decrease economic inequality? To judge by 
       thousands of years of history, the answer is yes. Tracing 
       the global history of inequality from the Stone Age to 
       today, Walter Scheidel shows that inequality never dies 
       peacefully. Inequality declines when carnage and disaster 
       strike and increases when peace and stability return. The 
       Great Leveler is the first book to chart the crucial role 
       of violent shocks in reducing inequality over the full 
       sweep of human history around the world. Ever since humans
       began to farm, herd livestock, and pass on their assets to
       future generations, economic inequality has been a 
       defining feature of civilization. Over thousands of years,
       only violent events have significantly lessened 
       inequality. The "Four Horsemen" of leveling--mass-
       mobilization warfare, transformative revolutions, state 
       collapse, and catastrophic plagues--have repeatedly 
       destroyed the fortunes of the rich. Scheidel identifies 
       and examines these processes, from the crises of the 
       earliest civilizations to the cataclysmic world wars and 
       communist revolutions of the twentieth century. Today, the
       violence that reduced inequality in the past seems to have
       diminished, and that is a good thing. But it casts serious
       doubt on the prospects for a more equal future. An 
       essential contribution to the debate about inequality, The
       Great Leveler provides important new insights about why 
       inequality is so persistent--and why it is unlikely to 
       decline anytime soon.   (Bookdata) 
504    Includes bibliographical references (pages 457-493) and 
       index 
505 8  Introduction: The Challenge of Inequality -- A Brief 
       History Of Inequality. The Rise of Inequality -- Empires 
       of Inequality -- Up and Down -- War. Total War -- The 
       Great Compression -- Preindustrial Warfare and Civil War -
       - Revolution. Communism -- Before Lenin -- Collapse. State
       Failure and Systems Collapse -- Plague. The Black Death --
       Pandemics, Famine, and War -- Alternatives. Reform, 
       Recession, and Representation -- Economic Development and 
       Education -- What If ? From History to Counterfactuals -- 
       Inequality Redux And The Future Of Leveling. -- In Our 
       Time -- What Does the Future Hold? -- Appendix: The Limits
       of Inequality 
650  0 Equality|xHistory 
650  0 Violence|xHistory 
650  7 Jämlikhet|xekonomiska aspekter|xhistoria|2sao 
650  7 Våld|xekonomiska aspekter|xhistoria|2sao 
651  4 Västerlandet 
830  0 The Princeton economic history of the Western world 
907 00 170801