What Is Capitalism?

The book reveals the 'problem of twelve,' where roughly a dozen key figures in major index funds (Vanguard, State Street, Fidelity, BlackRock) and private equity funds control significant voting power in S&P 500 companies and a growing share of the economy. Coates explains the rise of these funds due to economies of scale and their unprecedented influence, which poses political risks despite benefits like efficiency. He offers guidance on managing this power while preserving the advantages these institutions provide to investors and the economy.

This book tells the epic story of the rise and fall of the empire of cotton, its centrality to the world economy, and its making and remaking of global capitalism. Beckert explores how European entrepreneurs and powerful statesmen combined imperial expansion, slave labor, and new machines to transform the world's most significant manufacturing industry. The book spans five thousand years of cotton's history, with a focus on the seventeenth to twentieth centuries, highlighting the international nature of the cotton industry and its impact on modern global capitalism. It also delves into the concepts of 'war capitalism' and 'industrial capitalism' to explain how Europeans dominated global cotton networks through violent and diplomatic means.