Andrés Solimano is Founder and Chairman of the International Center for Globalization and Development (CIGLOB). His most recent books include Global Capitalism in Disarray: Inequality, Debt, and Austerity (2017); Pensiones a la Chilena (2017); Economic Elites, Crises, and Democracy (2014); and International Migration in the Age of Crisis and Globalization (Cambridge, 2010).

• 1. Introduction; 2. Recessions and depressions: an overview of theories and empirics; 3. World War I, hyperinflation in the 1920s and World War II; 4. The Great Depression of the 1930s; 5. Stagflation in the 1970s, globalization and the financial crisis of 2008–9; 6. Two depressions in the early twenty-first century: the cases of Latvia and Greece; 7. Soviet-type of socialism and the post-socialist transition; 8. Economic crises in Latin America and East Asia; 9. Synthesis and interpretation.

'The twentieth century saw plenty of booms and busts, and the early twenty-first century saw a financial crash - threatening a repeat of the 1930s depression. Andrés Solimano provides the reader with an authoritative guide to these busts, crashes and depressions. This book is not only a history of capitalism, but also a warning that the next calamity is just around the corner.' Tony Addison, United Nations University World Institute for Development Economics Research