THE WEALTH AND POVERTY OF NATIONS - LANDES,DS

Why do some countries have highly developed economies while other coun tries remain poor! David S. Landes's book, The Wealth and Poverty of N ations, probes this phenomenon by surveying the economic development o f the modern would. Reviewer David Warsh, economics columnist at the B oston Globe, positions the book in the context of other explanations o f national development. Unlike economists, who ask only those question s that can be answered with a high degree of certainty, historians see k to see matters whole. They synthesize details from a wealth of sourc es to create a narrative that satisfies our sense of a full explanatio n. Warsh finds that Landes has remained true to the historian's missio n, generating an expansive and gripping account of world economic hist ory. Europe became rich, says Landes, because of its temperate climate and its political and religious fragmentation. He stands his ground a gainst ''multiculturalist'' historians, insisting that other lands fel l short economically because of their own internal problems of central ized power and spiritual orthodoxy. Along with the book's ambitious sc ope, highly readable prose, and passionate arguments, Warsh finds that Landes still manages to address questions that interest economists. J ust as Landes's previous book helped raise economists' interest in the centrality of knowledge and entrepreneurship, the rich cultural analy sis of Landes's historical account anticipates much of what may transp ire in the next to years of technical economic theory. Readers might s ave themselves the trouble of keeping abreast of these developments by reading The Wealth and Poverty of Nations now.