The Journey of Humanity

The Origins of Wealth and Inequality

By: Oded Galor

Narrated by: Kobna Holdbrook-Smith

A landmark, radically uplifting account of our species’ progress, from one of the world's preeminent thinkers.

“Unparalleled in its scope and ambition…All readers will learn something, and many will find the book fascinating.’—The Washington Post

“Breathtaking. A new Sapiens!” —L'Express

“Completely brilliant and utterly original ... a book for our epoch.”—Jon Snow, former presenter, Channel 4 News (UK)

“A wildly ambitious attempt to do for economics what Newton, Darwin or Einstein did for their fields: develop a theory that explains almost everything.” —The New Statesman

“An inspiring, readable, jargon-free and almost impossibly erudite masterwork.” —The New Statesman

“[A] sweeping overview of cultural, technological and educational forces... Its breadth and ambition are reminiscent of Diamond’s Guns, Germs, and Steel and Harari’s Sapiens.”—Financial Times

“Astounding in scope and insight...provides the keys to the betterment of our species.”—Nouriel Roubini, author of Crisis Economics

“A masterful sweep through the human odyssey.... If you liked Sapiens, you'll love this.” —Lewis Dartnell, author of Origins

“Oded Galor's attempt to unify economic theory is impressive and insightful.” —Will Hutton, The Guardian

“A great historical fresco.” —Le Monde

“It's a page-turner, a suspense-filled thriller full of surprises, mind-bending puzzles and profound insights!”—Glenn C. Loury, author of The Anatomy of Racial Inequality

“Brilliantly weaves the threads of global economic history. A tour de force!”—Dani Rodrik, author of Straight Talk on Trade

In a captivating journey from the dawn of human existence to the present, world-renowned economist and thinker Oded Galor offers an intriguing solution to two of humanity’s great mysteries.

Why are humans the only species to have escaped—only very recently—the subsistence trap, allowing us to enjoy a standard of living that vastly exceeds all others? And why have we progressed so unequally around the world, resulting in the great disparities between nations that exist today? Galor’s gripping narrative explains how technology, population size, and adaptation led to a stunning “phase change” in the human story a mere two hundred years ago. But by tracing that same journey back in time and peeling away the layers of influence—colonialism, political institutions, societal structure, culture—he arrives also at an explanation of inequality’s ultimate causes: those ancestral populations that enjoyed fruitful geographical characteristics and rich diversity were set on the path to prosperity, while those that lacked it were disadvantaged in ways still echo today.

As we face ecological crisis across the globe, The Journey of Humanity is a book of urgent truths and enduring relevance, with lessons that are both hopeful and profound: gender equality, investment in education, and balancing diversity with social cohesion are the keys not only to our species’ thriving but to its survival.

PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying PDF will be available in your Audible Library along with the audio.

©2022 Oded Galor (P)2022 Penguin Audio

Critic reviews

Honors & Awards:
Best Philosophy and Ideas Books 2022 —The Times
Hottest New Books for Great Escape —The Guardian
Berlin's Best Non-Fiction 2022 —Exberliner Magazine
Author of the year 2022 - CITIC Publishers, China
The Yaesu Book Award 2023 (Grand Prize) —Japan
Five Best Economics Books of 2022 —Five Books

“The best book to read on your summer holidays.” —Irish Independent

“Breathtaking. A new Sapiens!” —L'Express

Excellent work, worthy of your time.

Excellent and efficient articulation of how and why certain geographic areas have developed faster that others.

A careful and scholarly, yet accessible, work.

Unified Growth Theory elucidated

This book is organized around ideas that form part of the "unified growth theory" themes that have characterized the author's influential academic work, mostly as a growth theorist, Yet Galor has resisted overemphasizing his own research, focusing too narrowly on theory, or taking undue credit. The chapters provide a wide-ranging tour of modern political economy of development and economic history literatures on the determinants of long-run economic growth. The narration is good. This is a vast literature, of course, but this book succeeds in guiding the reader through it and providing a 'unified' (if multifaceted) account of how the world economy was transformed by agricultural and industrial revolutions, how and why economic regions diverged in terms of incomes per capita.

Another reviewer recommended that, instead of reading this book, one should read Diamond's "Guns, Germs, and Steel" or Acemoglu and Robinson's "Why Nations Fail?" instead. I disagree. I"ve read both those books and many more on grand theories of development and divergence. What I'd say is this is a good book to read AFTER you've read those other books (or perhaps the one book you read first to see how the pieces will fit together) because it provides a well-organized synthesis and review of ideas (including going in depth on Diamand and A&R) and it gives you a sense of where the field has moved since those books appeared, plus a few thought-provoking new ideas..

promoting innovation and industrial disease

Great read on details of this praise of innovation and technology.
try some facts from "To govern the globe" by Alfred McCoy . get real history to add to theory. 1500 to 1850 all material value came from the SEA. SLAVERY AND MERCANTILE EXPLOITATION of the whole earth is where mountains of the treasures of the world that funded innovation and industrial disease .

The second book I couldn't read. The author would do well to brush up, simply having the knowledge of history to frame his stories more realisticly.

Thought-provoking and highly original

Through an abundance of interesting historical and anthropological examples, this book presents a coherent scientific theory on the root causes of human economic prosperity and global inequality. The author exposes key mechanisms that explains global economic development since the origins of humankind, as well as income inequality across countries today. The book is extremely well written and interspersed with interesting information. At the same time, the book does not oversimplify the arguments, and is filled with pointers to the relevant primary literature. This makes the book suitable for both curious members of the general public as well as students of economics or related disciplines.

Read “Why Nation Fail” and “Guns, Germs, and Steel” instead.

I was hoping for an updated version of earlier works in the same vein. This didn’t deliver.

Guns, Germs and Steel was better

Nothing original in this slog of a book. It's hard for me to find the diamond in the dung hill here. I was bored 100% off the time. And the writing was superfluous and needlessly supercilious.