There are a lot of great books about natural resources and climate change. Natural Capitalism by Paul Hawken is the grandfather of the industry and connection between capitalism and the environment. It is also important to me as I met Paul whilst at Cambridge University and did some research for this book. Paul made me realise that it was not enough to be an environmentalist - you needed to create profitable companies that were self sustaining to make real change.

There are a some really fantastic books in this list, so many in fact that it is hard to know which ones to recommend over the others. But if I had to recommend just a few of the list I would start with the greatest and oldest histories ever written, Herodotus and Thucydides.

Unlike some of the sublime writing by historians in the Global Balance of Power reading list, the standard of writing from economists and business writers is more prosaic. What they lack in style, however, is more than made up for by some of their ideas, which have had a lasting impact.

Sociologists can write well. So the choices from this reading list are pretty good. First up are two books which really make you think about our place in history: The Horse, the Wheel, and Language: How Bronze-Age Riders from the Eurasian Steppes Shaped the Modern World by David Anthony and Empires of the Word: A Language History of the World by Nicholas Ostler. Anthony’s book is one of several that combines linguistics and paleo DNA analysis to reach back in time to a world before written histories.