Never before has so much qualitative and quantitative evidence been brought to bear on so broad a reinterpretation of this story. Previous histories have usually treated capitalism as a European invention, but Beckert, as ambitious as he is erudite, shows how capitalism arose as a global phenomenon, the peculiar behavior of a few merchants in places as far apart as Cairo and Changzhou ... Many histories of capitalism are abstract, structural and narrowly economic, but Beckert enriches his story by recreating for the reader the places where his subjects made their fortunes ... Readers around the world will study and ponder this monumental work of history, agreeing and arguing with it, all the while affirming its generational importance, for decades to come.
Panoramic ... While scholars have illuminated bits and pieces of this immense narrative, Beckert’s massive volume brings it together with impeccable authority and perspicacity ... A high-impact intellectual workout, straining mental muscles rarely (if ever) used. It compels concentration. Occasionally it lapses into a textbook tone, more suitable to the lectern. The final section deluges us with graphs and charts; Beckert’s summaries can feel repetitive as they thread us through a labyrinth of ideas. But these are micro-quibbles compared to the bravura scale and scope of his project.
Colossal ... [The] sales pitch starts to seem a little disingenuous ... Beckert’s shape-shifting capitalism is relentlessly dynamic ... So long as capitalism both draws upon and generates non-capitalist relations, the distinction between capitalist and non-capitalist forms of life collapses; any space of non-accumulation is just growing room for more capitalism ... Beckert seems not unaware of the problem ... Beckert’s basic opposition, between those who are content with what they have and those who are not, floats free of time and history, issuing in a metaphysical vacuum. He can count on his reader to fill it in.
