With this fascinating book, New Yorker business columnist James Surowiecki explores a deceptively simple idea: Large sets of people are smarter than an elite few, no matter how brilliant-better at solving problems, fostering innovation, coming to wise decisions, also predicting the future.

With boundless erudition and in delightfully very clear prose, Surowiecki runs across areas as diverse as popular culture, mindset, ant biology, behavioral economics, artificial intelligence, military history, and politics to show how this simple idea offers essential lessons for how we live our lives, select our leaders, operate our companies, and think about our world.