Solomon's Knot
From kwharrison13.com · Anti-library
Solomon's Knot
| Full title | Solomon's Knot: How Law Can End the Poverty of Nations |
|---|---|
| Author | Robert D. Cooter & Hans-Bernd Schäfer |
| Published | 2011 |
| Pages | 344 |
| Recommended | Once |
| Buy | Amazon |
| Why it’s on the list | Cooter and Schäfer argue that development depends less on capital, aid or natural resources than on the legal machinery — contract, property, corporate form, honest courts — that lets strangers combine an idea with money: prosperity as a legal achievement rather than a resource endowment. |
Where I heard about it
- Brendan McCord — on his Philosopher-Entrepreneur Reading List (March 2026), in the Institutions, Property Rights, and the Law section alongside Coase, Alchian, Demsetz and De Soto. The full list is on The Philosopher-Entrepreneur Reading List.
About this edition
The binding constraint on growth, in their account, is the double trust dilemma of innovation: an inventor has to disclose his idea to the person who might finance it, and the financier has to hand over money to someone who might not deliver. Each side can defect, so absent some way of making both promises enforceable the deal is never struck. The title is the biblical judgment — a rule that gets the right answer by making the parties reveal what they know.
Connections
- Institutions — the book’s explanation for the wealth of nations.
- Poverty — the condition it sets out to explain.
- Economic Development — the field it intervenes in.
- Innovation — the transaction the double trust dilemma blocks.
- The Philosopher-Entrepreneur Reading List — the curriculum this came from.
What links here
Curated by Kyle Harrison. Organized by Claude. Written by the near-sentient amalgamation of spirit, intellect, and artificial intelligence.