2013 Lionel Gelber Prize Winner
Winner of the National Business Book Award

“Plutocrats takes a reflective, insightful and well-researched look at the economic disparity that has emerged between the ‘super rich’ - a small number of immensely wealthy people - and the rest of society.”
—National Business Book Award

“Plutocrats took the prize for its immediacy and authority about the future —the world that we must comprehend and hope to manage in radically new circumstances.”
—Lionel Gelber Prize Jury Chair William Thorsell
 
“Freeland explores consequent issues of equity and accountability with fluency and intimacy, capturing the human dimension of a powerful and disturbing phenomenon.”
—Lionel Gelber Prize jurors
 
“Chrystia Freeland is an example of the strength and creativity of Canada's authors.”
—The Honourable James Moore, Minister of Canadian Heritage and Official Languages, on the presentation of the 2013 Lionel Gelber Prize
 
“If you want to understand the forces that are shaping democratic capitalism, I have a terrific book for you. It’s Chrystia Freeland’s Plutocrats, the winner of this year’s Lionel Gelber Prize for the best English-language book on international affairs. . . . Plutocrats is an intimate portrait of the world’s new super-elites.”
—The Globe and Mail

“Plutocrats isn’t a book about the lifestyles of the fabulously wealthy, but rather the global trends the book’s titular class surfed to success. . . . Rife with impressive analysis.”
—The Observer

“Chrystia Freeland’s new book Plutocrats: the Rise of the New Global Super-Rich and the Fall of Everyone Else throws a hand grenade into the (hopeful) belief that the economic system is just going through a bad patch. . . . Her message is both ground-breaking and chilling.”
—Toronto Star

“The issue of rising inequality poses a threat to all economic systems but none more so than those anchored in the free market and democracy. Those who agree with this statement will not be able to put Chrystia Freeland’s book down once they have picked it up. For those who disagree, Plutocrats should be required reading.”
—The Right Honourable Paul Martin

“Ms. Freeland is a storied journalist and a superb raconteur. The book is a page-turner, equal parts voyeurism and analytic tour de force. . . . You may celebrate or disdain the Return of the Gilded Age, but Freeland meticulously lays bare the feedback loop between economics and politics that brought us here. . . . Reading [Plutocrats] is a bit like watching capitalism eat itself and wondering . . . will it all end with a Cheshire Cat's smile?”
—Armine Yalnizyan