Sir John Redwood has been at the centre of the movement to speed up the growth in wealth and income around the world through the rediscovery of private enterprise. In the United Kingdom, he has argued and written for privatisation, deregulation, and wider ownership-policies he helped to implement as a government adviser and as Head of the Prime Minister's Policy Unit. Elsewhere, in countries as diverse as Jamaica, New Zealand, Singapore, and France, he has advised governments on industrial policies and privatisation and has supervised major share issues.

In Popular Capitalism (first published in 1988 and now with a new preface by the author) Redwood draws on his wide-ranging experience to illustrate major economic changes happening around the world. He shows that privatisation, deregulation, venture capital, wider ownership, debt repayment and the growth of new markets are all scenes in a larger drama: the story of how the world is responding to the failure of public sector led growth and to the overburdening of debt that has so damaged countries, companies, and even banks. Popular capitalism is a worldwide phenomenon, embracing Latin America, Gorbachev's reforms, China's own style of local capitalism, and the large government privatisation programmes of the developed world.