Niall Ferguson is considered one of the most influential of economic historians. In his latest book The ascent of money: a financial history of the world he boldly argues that finance is behind every major event in history. But if financial history is one of the key elements in interpreting history, then surely it deserves more attention than 350 pages. The proper subtitle of his book might as well be A very concise financial history of the world. The reason why this book is relatively short, especially when the title is so ambitious, is that it was written as a script for a TV show of the same name, and I guess Ferguson failed to obtain funding for more than four episodes. The fact that this book is also a TV show is important in understanding its structure of arguments. The book is full of historical examples, biographies of people who have shaped finance in their times, which makes this book very enjoyable to read (and watch), but which does not necessary contribute to rigorous analysis or strengthen its arguments. In fact, the target group of this book seems to be "ordinary" people and not economic historians or finance experts.
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