100 books like The Educator and the Oligarch

By Anthony Cody,

Here are 100 books that The Educator and the Oligarch fans have personally recommended if you like The Educator and the Oligarch. Shepherd is a community of 11,000+ authors and super readers sharing their favorite books with the world.

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Book cover of No Such Thing as a Free Gift: The Gates Foundation and the Price of Philanthropy

Tim Schwab Author Of The Bill Gates Problem: Reckoning with the Myth of the Good Billionaire

From my list on if Bill Gates is our 'good billionaire'.

Why am I passionate about this?

My writing career has been organized around the old-school journalistic mission to ‘afflict the comforted and comfort the afflicted.’ Often, I take on big targets that other journalists have missed—a case in point being Bill Gates. News outlets have published thousands of one-sided stories about Gates’s philanthropic goals and gifts but seldom interrogate the Gates Foundation for what it is: an unaccountable, undemocratic structure of power. My investigation of Bill Gates, of course, stands on the shoulders of giants. The five books I recommend here paved the way for me to break new ground, expand the story, and hopefully spark a bigger public debate.

Tim's book list on if Bill Gates is our 'good billionaire'

Tim Schwab Why did Tim love this book?

Sociologist Linsey McGoey’s sharp critique of ‘philanthrocapitalism’ raises pointed questions about the Gates Foundation’s close work with the private sector, including its charitable practice of donating money to for-profit companies. Is this kind of philanthropic giving actually driving social change? Or, the really big question—is the foundation doing more harm than good?

By asking readers to consider the evidence that it might be, McGoey helped galvanize and expand a public debate about our philanthropist in chief—one that continues today.

By Linsey McGoey,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked No Such Thing as a Free Gift as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

The charitable sector is one of the fastest-growing industries in the global economy. Nearly half of the more than 85,000 private foundations in the United States have come into being since the year 2000. Just under 5,000 more were established in 2011 alone. This deluge of philanthropy has helped create a world where billionaires wield more power over education policy, global agriculture, and global health than ever before.

In No Such Thing as a Free Gift, author and academic Linsey McGoey puts this new golden age of philanthropy under the microscope-paying particular attention to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.…


Book cover of The Gates Foundation's Rise to Power: Private Authority in Global Politics

Tim Schwab Author Of The Bill Gates Problem: Reckoning with the Myth of the Good Billionaire

From my list on if Bill Gates is our 'good billionaire'.

Why am I passionate about this?

My writing career has been organized around the old-school journalistic mission to ‘afflict the comforted and comfort the afflicted.’ Often, I take on big targets that other journalists have missed—a case in point being Bill Gates. News outlets have published thousands of one-sided stories about Gates’s philanthropic goals and gifts but seldom interrogate the Gates Foundation for what it is: an unaccountable, undemocratic structure of power. My investigation of Bill Gates, of course, stands on the shoulders of giants. The five books I recommend here paved the way for me to break new ground, expand the story, and hopefully spark a bigger public debate.

Tim's book list on if Bill Gates is our 'good billionaire'

Tim Schwab Why did Tim love this book?

Danish scholar Adam Fejerskov spent months in Seattle doing field research, trying to get behind the impenetrable and secretive PR fortress the Gates Foundation has built to guard its humanitarian image. Calling the foundation a “chameleon,’ Fejerskov explores how the foundation publicly presents itself as an innocent philanthropy while actually operating, at turns, like a private company or a political actor.

The book will leave readers troubled by the foundation's enormous power in global affairs and questioning why this power is so unregulated.  

By Adam Moe Fejerskov,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Gates Foundation's Rise to Power as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation has established itself as one of the most powerful private forces in global politics, shaping the trajectories of international policy-making. Driven by fierce confidence and immense expectations about its ability to change the world through its normative and material power, the foundation advances an agenda of social and economic change through technological innovation. And it does so while forming part of a movement that refocuses efforts towards private influence on, and delivery of, societal progress.

The Gates Foundation's Rise to Power is an urgent exploration of one of the world's most influential but also…


Book cover of Polio Eradication and Its Discontents: A Historian's Journey Through an International Public Health (UN) Civil War

Tim Schwab Author Of The Bill Gates Problem: Reckoning with the Myth of the Good Billionaire

From my list on if Bill Gates is our 'good billionaire'.

Why am I passionate about this?

My writing career has been organized around the old-school journalistic mission to ‘afflict the comforted and comfort the afflicted.’ Often, I take on big targets that other journalists have missed—a case in point being Bill Gates. News outlets have published thousands of one-sided stories about Gates’s philanthropic goals and gifts but seldom interrogate the Gates Foundation for what it is: an unaccountable, undemocratic structure of power. My investigation of Bill Gates, of course, stands on the shoulders of giants. The five books I recommend here paved the way for me to break new ground, expand the story, and hopefully spark a bigger public debate.

Tim's book list on if Bill Gates is our 'good billionaire'

Tim Schwab Why did Tim love this book?

For Bill Gates, there is no bigger philanthropic goal than eradicating polio, the focus of historian William Muraskin’s book. The author puts a critical lens on the polio eradication campaign not because he is a critic of vaccines but because he’s a critic of colonialism. Why do powerful Western actors—like Bill Gates—get to decide the public health priorities of poor nations? 

And who, really, is the primary beneficiary of the Gates Foundation? The answer I came up with when writing my book is Bill Gates. Between the political influence, public applause, reputational enhancements, and tax benefits, Gates himself is the single biggest beneficiary of the foundation.

By William Muraskin,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Polio Eradication and Its Discontents as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

There are many infectious diseases which kill millions of children every year the world over, but polio is not one of them. So why did the World Health Assembly in 1988 choose the eradication of polio as a global goal? This is the key question that William Muraskin asks and it inexorably leads to the unravelling of the official heroic story of the fight against polio. The author finds that the public health agenda of every single nation of the world was effectively hijacked by a small group of people working at the global level. They were out to show…


Book cover of Hard Drive: Bill Gates and the Making of the Microsoft Empire

Tim Schwab Author Of The Bill Gates Problem: Reckoning with the Myth of the Good Billionaire

From my list on if Bill Gates is our 'good billionaire'.

Why am I passionate about this?

My writing career has been organized around the old-school journalistic mission to ‘afflict the comforted and comfort the afflicted.’ Often, I take on big targets that other journalists have missed—a case in point being Bill Gates. News outlets have published thousands of one-sided stories about Gates’s philanthropic goals and gifts but seldom interrogate the Gates Foundation for what it is: an unaccountable, undemocratic structure of power. My investigation of Bill Gates, of course, stands on the shoulders of giants. The five books I recommend here paved the way for me to break new ground, expand the story, and hopefully spark a bigger public debate.

Tim's book list on if Bill Gates is our 'good billionaire'

Tim Schwab Why did Tim love this book?

If you want to understand the man who runs the Gates Foundation, you must understand the man who ran Microsoft. For this, there is no better text than Hard Drive, the highly readable, magisterial biography of Gates published in 1993.

Reading the book today, the throughlines between Gates’s two careers, as a businessman and philanthropist, are unmistakable: the desire to win at any cost, the questions surrounding his treatment of women, the explosive temper tantrums, and the incredible hubris that drives Gates—that makes him believe he is right and righteous in everything he does, whether he is trying to dominate software markets or malaria research.

By James Wallace, Jim Erickson,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Hard Drive as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

The true story behind the rise of a tyrannical genius, how he
transformed an industry, and why everyone is out to get him.In this fascinating exposé, two investigative reporters trace the hugely successful career of Microsoft founder Bill Gates. Part entrepreneur, part enfant terrible, Gates has become the most powerful -- and feared -- player in the computer industry, and arguably the richest man in America. In Hard Drive, investigative reporters Wallace and Erickson follow Gates from his days as an unkempt thirteen-year-old computer hacker to his present-day status as a ruthless billionaire CEO. More than simply a "revenge of…


Book cover of Little Soldiers: An American Boy, a Chinese School, and the Global Race to Achieve

Anna Wang Author Of Inconvenient Memories: A Personal Account of the Tiananmen Square Incident and the China Before and After

From my list on Westerners’ experience in China.

Why am I passionate about this?

Anna Wang was born and raised in Beijing, China, and immigrated to Canada in her 40s. She received her BA from Beijing University and is a full-time bilingual writer. She has published ten books in Chinese. These include two short story collections, two essay collections, four novels, and two translations. Her first book in English, a 2019 memoir, Inconvenient Memories, recounts her experience and observation of the Tiananmen Square Protest in 1989 from the perspective of a member of the emerging middle-class. The book won an Independent Press Award in the "Cultural and Social Issues" category in 2020. She writes extensively about China. Her articles appeared in Newsweek, Vancouver Sun, Ms. Magazine, LA Review of Books China Channel, Ricepaper Magazine, whatsonweibo.com, etc.

Anna's book list on Westerners’ experience in China

Anna Wang Why did Anna love this book?

This book deals with the new challenge brought by the Chinese education system. As an American journalist dispatched to Shanghai, Chu chose an unconventional way of educating her son by enrolling him in an elite state-run public school instead of an international school. This memoir delineates her navigating inside China's high-achieving yet somewhat insular education system. When the Chinese use military-like high-pressured techniques to educate their students and "out-educate" the Americans, people couldn’t help but wonder if the Chinese educational philosophy could teach the world a lesson or two. Chu discovered that the Chinese system was designed to weed out the incompetent, and as a result, every student who successfully entered higher education was a fighter and survivor. Educational practices reveal the core value of a society. Chu raises an important question in an increasingly flattened world as to how to raise American kids to compete globally. 

By Lenora Chu,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Little Soldiers as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

'I couldn't put this book down. Whip smart, hilariously funny and shocking. A must-read'
Amy Chua, Yale Law Professor and author of Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother

In 2009, Lenora Chu, her husband Rob, and toddler Rainey, moved from LA to the Chinese megacity Shanghai. The US economy was spinning circles, while China seemed to be eating the planet's economic lunch. What's more, Shanghai teenagers were top in the world at maths, reading and science. China was not only muscling the rest of the world onto the sidelines, but it was also out-educating the West.

So when Rainey was…


Book cover of Finnish Lessons 3.0: What Can the World Learn from Educational Change in Finland?

Howard Gardner Author Of The Essential Howard Gardner on Education

From my list on educating for the future.

Why am I passionate about this?

I always assumed that one day I would become a teacher. Yet, it was only by a circuitous route that I ended up focusing on education, taught at a Graduate School of Education, and was a founding member of Project Zero, a major education research center. In my book, I present the major ideas and programs with which I’ve been involved. (In a companion volume I present my “essential writings” on the Mind). While I am best known for developing the “theory of multiple intelligences,” I believe that this book provides a full portrait of my contributions.

Howard's book list on educating for the future

Howard Gardner Why did Howard love this book?

A small group of scholars and educators have taken the ideas of progressive education seriously and made them available to ambitious and adventurous educators worldwide.

In his explanations of why Finland has become among the most admired systems in the world, with three editions of this “instant classic,” Sahlberg has provided an important and timely model for progressive educators worldwide.

By Pasi Sahlberg,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Finnish Lessons 3.0 as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

The first two editions of Finnish Lessons described how a small Nordic nation built a school system that provided access to a world-class education for all of its young people. Now available in 30 languages, this Grawemeyer Award-winning book continues to influence education policies and school practices around the globe. In this Third Edition, Pasi Sahlberg updates the story of how Finland sustains its exemplary educational performance, including how it responds to turbulent changes at home and throughout the world. Finnish Lessons 3.0 includes important new material about: teachers and teacher education teaching children with special needs the role of…


Book cover of Schools Out! The Hidden History of Britain's School Student Strikes

Laura Tisdall Author Of A Progressive Education?: How Childhood Changed in Mid-Twentieth-Century English and Welsh Schools

From my list on making you question why schools exist.

Why am I passionate about this?

I attended school for fourteen years, experiencing a wide range of different school types, from an experimental child-centred school in Washington DC to a Steiner school in rural Wiltshire to an all-girls’ comprehensive school in Bath. I hated school and my teachers and peers frequently hated me. In revenge, I became a historian of childhood and education in modern Britain so I could try and work out why school was so bad, and why children and teenagers are not listened to in British society. I did my PhD in History at the University of Cambridge and am now an Academic Track Fellow in History at Newcastle University. 

Laura's book list on making you question why schools exist

Laura Tisdall Why did Laura love this book?

As Cunningham and Lavalette argue, there have been school strikes in Britain for as long as there have been schools.

This fascinating popular history is the only book I know of that tells the story of these strikes from the ‘children’s rebellion’ that kicked off in Scotland in the 1880s to the mass walkouts in 2003 to protest against war in Iraq. (I, too, marched against this war as a sixteen-year-old.)

It shows that the same arguments have always been used against student strikers: they are just ‘bunking off’, copying adults, or controlled by more powerful forces. But young people have led their own movements over and over again, recognising that schools are their workplaces, and refusing to go to them is an effective way to protest.

By Steve Cunningham, Michael Lavalette,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Schools Out! The Hidden History of Britain's School Student Strikes as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Young people, we are told, are totally disengaged from political debate. True, distrust of the Westminster political game has alienated many. But as soon as an opportunity arises to effect real change - whether that's the independence referendum in Scotland or Jeremy Corbyn's election as Labour Party leader - young people have engaged, enthusiastically and in numbers.In late 2010 young students left their schools and sixth form colleges to join mass demonstrations against cuts and student fees. In much of the press they were dismissed as truants, easily led and unthinking. But, whenever they were given a chance, young students…


Book cover of Education for Extinction: American Indians and the Boarding School Experience, 1875-1928

Farina King Author Of The Earth Memory Compass: Diné Landscapes and Education in the Twentieth Century

From my list on U.S. Indian boarding school experiences.

Why am I passionate about this?

My Diné (Navajo) family stories drew me into history including studies of Indigenous experiences in boarding schools. Two of my uncles were Navajo Code Talkers, and I loved asking them about their life stories. My uncle Albert Smith often spoke about his memories of the war. I was struck by the irony that he was sent to a boarding school as a child where the Navajo language was forbidden, and then he later relied on the language to protect his homelands. I then became interested in all my relatives' boarding school stories, including those of my father, which led me to write my first book The Earth Memory Compass about Diné school experiences. 

Farina's book list on U.S. Indian boarding school experiences

Farina King Why did Farina love this book?

Adams’s book exposed the Indian boarding school agenda and system as genocide for many readers. His book was one of the first publications that I read about Indian boarding schools as it represents a significant historiographical shift and approach to Indigenous experiences in boarding schools since the first writings of Native American boarding school students such as Zitkála-Šá, Charles Eastman, and Luther Standing Bear. The revised edition of his book could not have come at a better time with the announcement of the Federal Indian Boarding School Truth Initiative that followed about a year later in June 2021.

By David Wallace Adams,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Education for Extinction as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

The last 'Indian War' was fought against Native American children in the dormitories and classrooms of government boarding schools. Only by removing Indian children from their homes for extended periods of time, policymakers reasoned, could white "civilization" take root while childhood memories of 'savagism' gradually faded to the point of extinction. In the words of one official: 'Kill the Indian and save the man.'

This fully revised edition of Education for Extinction offers the only comprehensive account of this dispiriting effort, and incorporates the last twenty-five years of scholarship. Much more than a study of federal Indian policy, this book…


Book cover of How the Other Half Learns: Equality, Excellence, and the Battle Over School Choice

Efrem Sigel Author Of Juror Number 2: The Story of a Murder, the Agony of a Neighborhood

From my list on how to make cities safer and help poor children.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’m the author of two published novels and dozens of short stories, essays, and memoirs. I write about education, crime, and public safety, and I work to improve educational and career opportunities for young people in New York and other cities.

Efrem's book list on how to make cities safer and help poor children

Efrem Sigel Why did Efrem love this book?

Pondiscio spent an entire school year embedded in Success Academy Bronx 1, an elementary charter school in one of the city’s poorest neighborhoods. Success Academy, a leading charter network, is often criticized for its obsessive focus on structure, discipline, and test prep but in this book, Pondiscio brings to life the incredible dedication and humanity of its teachers and principals as they struggle day by day to change the course of young lives.

By Robert Pondiscio,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked How the Other Half Learns as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

An inside look at America's most controversial charter schools, and the moral and political questions around public education and school choice.

The promise of public education is excellence for all. But that promise has seldom been kept for low-income children of color in America. In How the Other Half Learns, teacher and education journalist Robert Pondiscio focuses on Success Academy, the network of controversial charter schools in New York City founded by Eva Moskowitz, who has created something unprecedented in American education: a way for large numbers of engaged and ambitious low-income families of color to get an education for…


Book cover of An Elusive Science: The Troubling History of Education Research

Sanjay Sarma Author Of Grasp: The Science Transforming How We Learn

From my list on helping us reimagine what education could be.

Why am I passionate about this?

I'm passionate about understanding and fixing how we teach and learn for a simple reason: My own journey as a learner was very nearly cut short. While attending one of the most competitive universities in India, I witnessed firsthand what can happen when a once-promising student runs into learning roadblocks. I nearly gave up on my academic career, only to be saved by—of all things—a hands-on, corporate training program. As I moved back into academia, it became my goal, first as an educator and later as MIT’s Vice President for Open Learning, to empower how we teach and learn with findings from cutting-edge research. And to avail these possibilities to as many learners as possible. 

Sanjay's book list on helping us reimagine what education could be

Sanjay Sarma Why did Sanjay love this book?

There is a cottage industry of historical and analytical books attempting to explain where, exactly, our educational norms, structures, and strictures came from. Many of these are terrific, but Lagemann’s An Elusive Science is the best of the bunch for exploring how nineteenth and twentieth-century scientific research influenced modern educational practice. The author is the source of a line oft-quoted in ed circles: “I have often argued to students, only in part to be perverse, that one cannot understand the history of education in the United States during the twentieth century unless one realizes that Edward L. Thorndike won and John Dewey lost.” This is the book that explicates and explores this almost primordial dichotomy, and how different philosophies of science became aligned with complementary philosophies of educational practice. A piercing, impeccably researched, enjoyable read. 

By Ellen Condliffe Lagemann,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked An Elusive Science as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Since its beginnings at the start of the 20th century, educational scholarship has been a marginal field, criticized by public policy makers and relegated to the fringes of academe. An Elusive Science explains why, providing a critical history of the traditions, conflicts, and institutions that have shaped the study of education over the past century.


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