Want to create an interactive transcript for this episode?
Podcast: New Books in Genocide Studies
Episode: Walter Scheidel, âThe Great Leveler: Violence and the History of Inequalityâ (Princeton UP, 2017)
Description: In 2017 half of the worldâs wealth belongs to the top 1% of the population. In his new book, The Great Leveler Violence and the History of Inequality from the Stone Age to the Twenty-First Century (Princeton University Press, 2017), Walter Scheidel explores economic inequality and sets forth the provocative thesis that only violence and catastrophes have truly reduced it throughout history. Scheidel delves in what he labels as the âFour Horsemenâ of levelingâmass-mobilization warfare, transformative revolutions, state collapse, and catastrophic plaguesâand how they have persisted in history and proved the most efficient ways in reducing what seems to be an inev...