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An introduction to Thomas Piketty´s monumental work

US Nobel Prize-winner Paul Krugman described Thomas Piketty´s Capital in the Twenty-First Century as "perhaps the most important book of the last decade." It has sparked major international debates, dominated bestseller lists and generated a level of enthusiasm-as well as intense criticism-in a way no other economic or sociological work has in a long time. Piketty has been described as a new Karl Marx and placed in the same league as the economist John Maynard Keynes.

The "rock star economist´s" underlying thesis is that inequality under capitalism has reached dramatic levels in the last few decades and continues to grow-and that this is not by chance. A small elite is making itself richer and richer and acquiring everincreasing levels of power.

Given the sensational reception of Piketty´s not-so-easily digested 800-page study, the question as to where the hype around the book comes from deserves to be asked. What does it get right? And what should we make of it-both of the book itself and of the criticism it has received? This introduction lays out the argument of Piketty´s monumental work in a compact and understandable format, while also investigating the controversies Piketty has stirred up. In addition, the two authors demonstrate the limits, contradictions and errors of the so-called Piketty revolution.

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Stephan Kaufmann was born in 1965 and has worked for nearly twenty years as the business editor of various newspapers including the Berliner Zeitung and the Frankfurter Rundschau .

Ingo Stützle is a political scientist and sits on the editorial board of the monthly newspaper ak-analyse and kritik as well as the PROKLA-Zeitschrift für kritische Sozialwissenschaft .

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