The Human Network: How Your Social Position Determines Your Power, Beliefs, and Behaviors

How modern human networks work—and what you need to do to succeed in them.

Human society is a complex system with its own hierarchy—one that is actually built far more intricately than it seems at first glance. Our relationships with one another resemble a huge, sprawling network that follows its own rules and functions according to its own logic. Social networks such as Facebook or Telegram are only a new step in a long and fascinating history of the evolutionary development of human networks. Moreover, networks that existed even before the invention of computers functioned according to virtually the same rules—only the speed of information transfer lagged far behind modern times. Using the example of an enormous amount of materials—from medieval chronicles to the newest research—Matthew Jackson shows how modern human networks function and what you need to do to achieve success within them.