Commanding Heights (Video)

In my last post, I discussed a book, The Commanding Heights.  In 2002, PBS (WGBH) produced and aired a 6 hour documentary based on the book called, "Commanding Heights: The Battle for the World Economy" (Available on DVD).

If you don't have the time for the book, the documentary is an excellent summary of the ideas and materials covered in the book.  Plus it covers some additional materials (since the book was completed in 1998, 4 years before the documentary).

In addition, PBS has a website devoted to the documentary, which contains a treasure trove of materials related to the documentary, a virtual small encyclopedia on economics in the 20th Century.

If you don't want to purchase the DVD, you can likely borrow it at your local library (though some have it in a VHS format).  You can also watch it online at the PBS website which has the entire documentary available for viewing online.  The website also has the entire transcript available.

The documentary is divided into 3 - 2 hour parts.

• Part 1: The Battle of Ideas
• Part 2: The Agony of Reform
• Part 3: The New Rules of the Game

I highly recommend viewing this documentary.  Much like the book, it gives a vast oversight to economics in the 20th Century on a global scale, and is fairly easy to follow and understand.