Power and Progress

Every day we hear that thanks to unprecedented achievements in science and technology, we’re racing at full speed toward a new, better world. Here’s a new phone. Here’s a latest-model electric car. One more little step—and scientists will find a way to cure cancer, solve the problem of global warming, and maybe even eliminate poverty!
Innovations have become our self-purpose. New technologies have to be introduced to everyone, always, everywhere—and the more, the better.
But with humanity, that has happened already more than once. Yet universal prosperity and flourishing never came. On the contrary, too many inventions brought people only troubles and hardship.
So what is progress? Is it always justified? Who receives the main dividends? And above all, how does it coexist with power?
In his new book “Power and Progress,” Daron Acemoglu—co-author with Simon Johnson—answers these and many other questions.