The Summit
Bretton Woods, 1944: J. M. Keynes and the Reshaping of the Global Economy

It’s unlikely that a general reader would pick up a book on economic history, and this one — with a bland main title and not one but two off-putting subtitles — would appear to be a work that only an economist could love. It’s not. The dramatic interplay of personalities that Ed Conway brings to lig......more

Conway’s book is a fascinating tale about the 1944 Bretton Woods Conference that transformed the failed international economic order of the 1920s and 30s into the international economic system that was the engine of the post-World War II recovery and prosperity. Two intertwined narrative lines tell......more

It's quite an achievement to write a pageturner on a financial policy conference, covering the human drama roller-coaster while remaining intellectually rigorous when the economics is discussed. It's a masterpiece.......more

This was a fun book to read. The author has the perfect background of English major with a public policy masters which allows him to sketch the details of the 1944 Breton Woods story using a smooth and engaging prose. Many personal accounts of the men are drawn, and most particularly John Maynard Ke......more

I just finished reading Ed Conway's The Summit: Bretton Woods, 1944: J.M. Keynes and the Reshaping of the Global Economy The emergence of the American Dollar as the world's currency was not by accident. Prior to the three-week intense negotiations to set up the IMF and the World Bank to oversee an en......more