Paul Collier is one of our leading economists and commentators on aid and trade. The Bottom Billion had a profound impact on thinking about global poverty. Wars, Guns and Votes argued that nasty and protracted civil wars, military coups and failing economies will plague the bottom billion unless national sovereignty is curtailed and economic disciplines introduced. The Plundered Planet looks at how to reconcile prosperity with nature. Criticising unchecked profiteering and backward-looking environmental romanticism, he shows that economic and environmental interests are not in fact competing: they are mutually dependent and need to be reconciled for survival.