Humankind (EXTRACT)

'Humankind challenged me and made me see humanity from a fresh perspective' Yuval Noah Harari

From 'the folk hero of Davos', Fox News antagonist and author of the international bestseller Utopia for Realists comes a radical history of our innate capacity for kindness.

It's a belief that unites the left and right, psychologists and philosophers, writers and historians. It drives the headlines that surround us and the laws that touch our lives. From Machiavelli to Hobbes, Freud to Pinker, the roots of this belief have sunk deep into Western thought. Human beings, we're taught, are by nature selfish and governed primarily by self-interest.

Providing a new historical perspective on the last 200,000 years of human history, Humankind makes a new argument: that it is realistic, as well as revolutionary, to assume that people are good. When we think the worst of others, it brings out the worst in our politics and economics too.

In this major book, internationally bestselling author Rutger Bregman shows how believing in human kindness and altruism can be a new way to think – and act as the foundation for achieving true change in our society.

It is time for a new view of human nature.

'An author bristling with hope, optimism and answers . . . Listen out for Rutger Bregman. He has a big future shaping the future' Observer

'One of Europe's pre-eminent young thinkers' New Statesman

Bregman is out on his own, thinking for himself, using history to give the rest of us a chance to build a much better future than we can presently imagine' Timothy Snyder , author of On Tyranny

'The positive and uplifiting message in Humankind is essential if we are ever going to create a better form of capitalism where the many, not the few, can flourish' Mariana Mazzucato

'This beautifully written, well documented, myth-busting work is now number one on my list of what everyone should read. Read it and buy copies for all of your most cynical friends' Peter Gray

'Put aside your newspaper for a little while and read this book' Barry Schwartz

'Bregman argues that it is only by dreaming about what seems unachievable that society can make good things possible' New York Times 

'Part of the new zeitgeist . . . One for today's dreamers and tomorrow's realists' Danny Dorling 

'Rutger Bregman is part of a new generation of thinkers who are suggesting exciting alternatives to the orthodoxies of the last forty years'  Brian Eno

'Bregman shows us we've been looking at the world inside out. Turned right way out we suddenly see fundamentally new ways forward' Richard Wilkinson, author of The Spirit Level