WORK
The Mystery of Capital
De Soto's 2000 landmark — subtitled <em>Why Capitalism Triumphs in the West and Fails Everywhere Else</em> — that reframed global poverty as a problem of representational infrastructure rather than resource deficit.
The Mystery of Capital consolidated de Soto's fieldwork across four continents into a single theoretical framework. The book's core argument inverted orthodox development economics: the developing world does not lack assets. It possesses trillions of dollars in untitled real estate, unregistered businesses, and informal savings. What it lacks is the institutional infrastructure — property registries, contract law, business registration systems, credit mechanisms — that converts assets into capital. The book identified six specific functions that formal property systems perform and traced the centuries-long process by which Western economies built these systems incrementally. It has influenced property rights reform in dozens of countries and now provides the analytical framework for understanding institutional exclusion in the AI economy.
In The You On AI Field Guide
Published in 2000 by Basic Books, the volume emerged from nearly two decades of empirical research conducted through de Soto's Institute for Liberty and Democracy. The book's methodology was distinctive: rather than beginning with economic theory, de Soto's team counted things.
Keep reading with YOU ON AI
Unlock the full book, 10,000+ field-guide entries, and a 1000+ thinker library. If you have a book code, register now — it takes a minute.