Why Nations Fail: The Origins of Power, Prosperity, and Poverty

that share power, and you begin to see the contribution of this brilliant and engagingly written book.”
    —Scott E. Page, University of Michigan and Santa Fe Institute
    “In this stunningly wide-ranging book, Acemoglu and Robinson ask a simple but vital question, why do some nations become rich and others remain poor? Their answer is also simple—because some polities develop more inclusive political institutions. What is remarkable about the book is the crispness and clarity of the writing, the elegance of the argument, and the remarkable richness of historical detail. This book is a must-read at a moment when governments across the Western world must come up with the political will to deal with a debt crisis of unusual proportions.”
    —Steven Pincus, Bradford Durfee Professor of History and International and Area Studies, Yale University
    “It’s the politics, stupid! That is Acemoglu and Robinson’s simple yet compelling explanation for why so many countries fail to develop. From the absolutism of the Stuarts to the antebellum South, from Sierra Leone to Colombia, this magisterial work shows how powerful elites rig the rules to benefit themselves at the expense of the many. Charting a careful course between the pessimists and optimists, the authors demonstrate history and geography need not be destiny. But they also document how sensible economic ideas and policies often achieve little in the absence of fundamental political change.”
    —Dani Rodrik, Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University
    “This is not only a fascinating and interesting book: it is a really important one. The highly original research that Professors Acemoglu and Robinson have done, and continue to do, on how economic forces, politics, and policy choices evolve together and constrain each other, and how institutions affect that evolution, is essential to understanding the successes and failures of societies and nations. And here, in this book, these insights come in a highly accessible, indeed riveting form. Those who pick this book up and start reading will have trouble putting it down.”
    —Michael Spence, Nobel laureate in economics, 2001
    “This fascinating and readable book centers on the complex joint evolution of political and economic institutions, in good directions and bad. It strikes a delicate balance between the logic of political and economic behavior and the shifts in direction created by contingent historical events, large and small, at ‘critical junctures.’ Acemoglu and Robinson provide an enormous range of historical examples to show how such shifts can tilt toward favorable institutions, progressive innovation, and economic success or toward repressive institutions and eventual decay or stagnation. Somehow they can generate both excitement and reflection.”
    —Robert Solow, Nobel laureate in economics, 1987



Copyright © 2012 by Daron Acemoglu and James A. Robinson
    All rights reserved.
    Published in the United States by Crown Publishers, an imprint of the Crown Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., New York.
    www.crownpublishing.com
    CROWN and the CROWN colophon are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.
    Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Acemoglu, Daron.
Why nations fail : the origins of power, prosperity, and poverty / Daron Acemoglu, James A. Robinson.—1st ed.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references.
1. Economics—Political aspects. 2. Economic history—Political aspects. 3. Poverty—Developing countries. 4. Economic development—Developing countries.
5. Revolutions—Economic aspects. 6. Developing countries—Economic policy.
7. Developing countries—Social policy. I. Robinson, James A., 1960–. II. Title.
HB74.P65A28 2012
330—dc23
2011023538
    eISBN: 978-0-307-71923-2
    Maps by Melissa Dell
Jacket design by David Tran
Jacket photograph by Kirk Mastin/Getty Images
    v3.1

For Arda and Asu
—DA
    Para María Angélica, mi vida y mi alma
—JR

P REFACE
    T HIS BOOK IS about the huge differences in incomes and standards of living that separate the rich countries of the world, such as the United States, Great Britain, and Germany, from the poor, such as those in sub-Saharan Africa, Central America, and South Asia.
    As we write this preface, North Africa and the Middle East have been shaken by the “Arab Spring” started by the so-called Jasmine Revolution, which was initially ignited by public outrage over the self-immolation of a street vendor,