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Shortlist announced for FT Goldman Sachs Business Book of the Year

The Financial Times and Goldman Sachs have announced the shortlist for the seventh annual Financial Times and Goldman Sachs Business Book of the Year Award, which aims to identify the book providing the most compelling and enjoyable insight into modern business issues.

The shortlist is:

Poor Economics: A Radical Rethinking of the Way to Fight Global Poverty, Abhijit V. Banerjee and Esther Duflo (Perseus Books, Public Affairs, USA)

ExorbitantPrivilege: The Rise and Fall of the Dollar, Barry Eichengreen (Oxford University Press, UK)

Triumph of the City: How Our Greatest Invention Makes Us Richer, Smarter, Greener, Healthier and Happier, Edward L. Glaeser (The Penguin Press, USA; Macmillan, UK)

Willful Blindness: Why We Ignore the Obvious at Our Peril, Margaret Heffernan (Walker & Co, USA; Simon & Schuster, UK)

Good Strategy, Bad Strategy: The Difference and Why It Matters, Richard Rumelt (Crown Business, USA; Profile, UK)

The Quest: Energy, Security, and the Remaking of theModern World, Daniel Yergin (The Penguin Press, USA; Allen Lane, UK)

The distinguished panel of judges, chaired by Lionel Barber, Editor, Financial Times, this year comprises:

• Vindi Banga, Partner, Clayton, Dubilier & Rice

• Lynda Gratton, Professor of Management Practice, London Business School

• Arthur Levitt, former Chairman of the United States Securities and Exchange Commission

• Mario Monti, President of Bocconi University, Milan, European chairman of the Trilateral Commission, honorary president of Bruegel

• Jorma Ollila, Chairman of Nokia and Royal Dutch Shell

• Shriti Vadera, Director of Shriti Vadera Ltd, Non-Executive Director of BHP Billiton and AstraZeneca

Lionel Barber, Editor, Financial Times, said: “I am delighted with the breadth and depth of this year’s shortlist.  The books are intellectually stimulating, offer something provocative and different and open up new vistas on the business world.  Themes range from tackling poverty, to the future of the dollar, and energy security in the modern age. I would like to thank the judges for reading an outstanding long list.”

The overall winner will be announced at the Awards Dinner co-hosted by Lionel Barber, Editor, Financial Times and Lloyd C. Blankfein, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, The Goldman Sachs Group, Inc at The Wallace Collection in London on 3rd November 2011.  Lord Patten will be presenting the keynote speech at the event.

The winner of the Business Book of the Year Award 2011 will be awarded £30,000, and each of the remaining shortlisted authors will receive £10,000 each.

Previous winners of the Award are Raghuram Rajan for Fault Lines (2010); Liaquat Ahamed for The Lords of Finance (2009); Mohamed El-Erian for When Markets Collide (2008); William D. Cohan for The Last Tycoons (2007); James Kynge for China Shakes the World (2006); and Thomas Friedman, as the inaugural Award winner in 2005, for The World is Flat.