There's a fabulous book by Daniel Yergin entitled, The Commanding Heights: The Battle for the World Economy. A multi-part PBS Frontline documentary was created from the book as well. If you want to get a thoroughly engaging history lesson in 19th, 20th, and even 21st century Capitalism, Communism, Keynesian economics vs Chicago School economics, third-world economics and politics, and the conflicts among the superpowers for political and economic supremacy in the 21st century, then the DVD of the Frontline series will be a real learning experience. It's available for sale at Amazon
, or as a rental via places like NetFlix.
The Commanding Heights was a phrased used by Lenin as a reference to controlling the means of production--agriculture, utility power, transportation and transportation fuels, mining, heavy industry, banking, etc. If you'd like a well-written synopsis of the book and DVD, check out the Wikipedia article here.













