Narconomics How to Run a Drug Cartel

Picking his way through Andean cocaine fields, Central American prisons, Colorado pot shops, and the online drug dens of the Dark Web, Tom Wainwright provides a “a lively and engaging book, informed by both dogged reporting and gleanings from academic research” (The Washington Post)

How does a budding cartel boss succeed (and survive) in the $300 billion illegal drug business? By learning from the best, of course. From creating brand value to fine-tuning customer service, the folks running cartels have been attentive students of the strategy and tactics used by corporations such as Walmart, McDonald’s, and Coca-Cola.
 
In Narconomics, Tom Wainwright is an intrepid guide to the most exotic and brutal industry on earth. Picking his way through Andean cocaine fields, Central American prisons, and communities where the cartels rule, Wainwright offers a vivid, fresh, and innovative look into the drug trade and its 250 million customers. More than just an investigation of how drug cartels do business, Narconomics is also a keen and daring blueprint for how to defeat them.

Tom Wainwright is the Britain editor of the Economist. Until 2013 he was the Mexico City bureau chief of the Economist, covering Mexico, Central America and the Caribbean, as well as parts of South America and the United States border region. He has been a commentator on the drugs business on CNN, the BBC and NPR, among others. He has a first-class degree in philosophy, politics, and economics from Oxford University. Wainwright lives in London, England.