Debt: The First 5,000 Years, Updated and Expanded

Debt: The First 5,000 Years, Updated and Expanded - Paperback

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Debt: The First 5,000 Years, Updated and Expanded
  • Debt: The First 5,000 Years, Updated and Expanded
Debt: The First 5,000 Years, Updated and Expanded - Paperback

Debt: The First 5,000 Years, Updated and Expanded - Paperback

by David Graeber
$26.99
$26.99

Book Overview

Now more relevant than ever, the groundbreaking international best-seller turns everything you think about money, debt, and society on its head--from the "brilliant, deeply original political thinker" David Graeber (Rebecca Solnit, author of Men Explain Things to Me)

Before there was money, there was debt. For more than 5,000 years, since the beginnings of the first agrarian empires, humans have used elaborate credit systems to buy and sell goods--that is, long before the invention of coins or cash. It is in this era that we also first encounter a society divided into debtors and creditors--which lives on in full force to this day.

So says anthropologist David Graeber in a stunning reversal of conventional wisdom. He shows that arguments about debt and debt forgiveness have been at the center of political debates from Renaissance Italy to Imperial China, as well as sparking innumerable insurrections. He also brilliantly demonstrates that the language of the ancient works of law and religion (words like "guilt," "sin," and "redemption") derive in large part from ancient debates about debt, and shape even our most basic ideas of right and wrong.

We are still fighting these battles today.
ISBN9781612194196
Author David Graeber
PublisherMelville House Publishing
GenreHistory and Business
FormatPaperback
PublishedOctober 2014
LanguageENG- English
Pages560
Weight1.0 lb
Target AudienceAdults
Print SizeStandard Print

Related Subjects

Business & Economics History Nonfiction

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About David Graeber

David Graeber (1961-2020) was a Professor of Anthropology at the London School of Economics. His bestselling books include The Dawn of Everything, cowritten with David Wengrow, and DEBT: The First 5,000 Years. He was a contributor to Harper's Magazine, The Guardian, and The Baffler.

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