Kuratore
The Company of Strangers
Book

The Company of Strangers

A Natural History of Economic Life

Paul Seabright
Princeton UP, 2004
Buy book or audiobook

Read offline

  • 0.5×
  • 0.75×
  • 1×
  • 1.25×
  • 1.5×
  • 1.75×
1×

Editorial Rating

9

Qualities

  • Innovative
  • Eye Opening
  • Engaging

Recommendation

Credit author Paul Seabright's achievement on several scores. First, he is an economist who thinks outside the supply-and-demand box, and whose thoughts actually are comprehensible to the average reader. Second, his ideas are original, blending evolution, economics and sociology. In his view, the daily trusting interaction of complete strangers is a marvel that is unprecedented in the animal kingdom. Moreover, this high degree of non-familial social cooperation has only arisen in the past 10,000 years or so, despite the six to seven-million-year existence of Homo sapiens. Although the average businessperson probably has no direct application for Seabright's book, it's interesting, worthwhile reading anyway. In a world where the need for global cooperation is greater, and its existence more fragile, getAbstract.com recommends this book for its unique, valuable perspective.

Summary

Strangers in a Strange Land

Would you dare to trust your life to someone you've never met? You wouldn't? In modern life, you trust your life to strangers daily. When you board a plane, train, motor coach, cab or limo, you put your life in the hands of people you believe or hope have learned to perform their jobs well enough to preserve your safety. That is trust.

When you visit a doctor, a dentist or even a hairdresser, you are acting on the assumption that their professional acumen insulates you from danger. You trust them. You even trust the fast food chef to cook your burger properly, although every once in a while your expectation may be defeated. If you suddenly became seriously ill or got injured, your first thought would be to call an ambulance staffed by complete strangers, who would transport you to a hospital where other strangers would take your fate in their hands.

In modern society, this division of labor is perfectly normal. Yet only 10,000 years ago, a wink of time in history's gaze, this was not the case. Prior to the development of agriculture, tribes or clans are thought to have viewed any individual they didn't know with intense suspicion or...

About the Author

Paul Seabright is a contributor to the London Review of Books and a professor of economics at the University of Toulouse, France. Previously, he served as a fellow of All Souls College in Oxford and of Churchill College in Cambridge.

Comment on this summary or 开始讨论