Book description
From historian David Priestland, Merchant, Soldier, Sage is a
remarkable book that proposes a radical new approach to how we see our
world, and who runs it, in the vein of Francis Fukuyama's The End
of History
We live in an age ruled by merchants. Competition, flexibility and
profit are still the common currency, even at a time when Western
countries have been driven off a cliff by these very values. But will
it always be this way?
David Priestland argues for the predominance in any society of one
of three broad value systems - that of the merchant (commercial and
competitive); the soldier (aristocratic and militaristic); and the
sage (bureaucratic or creative). These 'castes' struggle alongside the
worker (egalitarian and artisanal) for power, and when they achieve
supremacy, they can have such a strong hold over us that it is almost
impossible to imagine life outside their grip. And yet there
does come a point of drastic change, usually because one caste
becomes too dominant. The result is economic crisis, war or
revolution, and eventually a new caste takes over.
Priestland argues, we are now in the midst of a period with all the
classic signs of imminent change. As the history of the last century
shows, there is good reason to be fearful of the forces that this
failure may unleash. Merchant, Soldier, Sage is both a
masterful dissection of our current predicament and a brilliant piece
of history. The world will not look the same again.
Reviews:
'We have here a gripping, argument-led history, efforlessly moving
between New York, Tokyo and Berlin, from the Reformation to the 2008
economic crisis ... dazzling ... here, at last, is a work that places
the current crisis in a longer history of seismic shifts in the
balance of social power' Frank Trentman, BBC History Magazine
'Concise but extremely ambitious ... well worth pondering and
reflecting on ... among the many contributions to the dissection of
our current predicament, this is surely one of the most
thought-provoking' Sir Richard J Evans, Guardian
'Stimulating ... In illustrating these larger processes of caste
conflict and caste collaboration, the author offers crisp portraits of
entrepreneurs, economists and warriors ... Sparkling prose and ...
arresting comparisons' Ramachandra Guha, Financial Times
About the author:
David Priestland has studied Communism in all its forms for many
years, in both Oxford and Moscow State Universities. He is University
Lecturer in Modern History at Oxford and a Fellow of St. Edmund Hall,
and the author of Stalinism and the Politics of Mobilization. The
Red Flag was shortlisted for the Longman/History Today prize.
David Priestland has studied Communism in all its forms for many
years, in both Oxford and Moscow State Universities. He is University
Lecturer in Modern History at Oxford and a Fellow of St. Edmund Hall,
and the author of Stalinism and the Politics of Mobilization.
The Red Flag
was shortlisted for the Longman/History Today prize.
