Rules for a Flat World

In the paperback edition of Rules for a Flat World, economist and legal scholar Gillian Hadfield provides an updated prologue to her sweeping historical overview and reimagining of the relationship between law and economic and social prosperity. Hadfield argues for a return to first principles in building the new systems of rules we need to ensure that powerful new technologies like machine learning and globally-integrated digital societies make us all better off.

Technology and globalization are uprooting and reshaping daily life. Global supply chains are now deeply embedded, and digital platforms connect almost everyone in complex networks of data and exchange. This "flat world" is one of tremendous possibility, but it also poses challenges to stability and shared prosperity. In Rules for a Flat World, Gillian Hadfield argues that the legal rules that currently guide global integration are no longer working. They are too slow, costly, and localized for increasingly complex advanced economies, and fail to address issues such as poverty, instability, and oppression for the billions living in the developing world. Hadfield proposes a new set of rules that enhance complex societies and economic interdependence and makes the case for building a more agile infrastructure. In this paperback edition, she presents a new prologue to her sweeping historical overview and vision of the relationship between law and economic and social prosperity.