Kleptopia: How Dirty Money is Conquering the World cover art

Kleptopia: How Dirty Money is Conquering the World

How Dirty Money is Conquering the World

Preview
Try Standard free
Select 1 audiobook a month from our entire collection.
Listen to your selected audiobooks as long as you're a member.
Auto-renews at $8.99/mo after 30 days. Cancel anytime.

Kleptopia: How Dirty Money is Conquering the World

By: Tom Burgis
Try Standard free

Auto-renews at $8.99/mo after 30 days. Cancel anytime.

Buy Now for $26.99

Buy Now for $26.99

About this listen

SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER ‘If you think the UK isn't corrupt, you haven't looked hard enough … This terrifying book follows a global current of dirty money, and the murders and kidnappings required to sustain it’ GEORGE MONBIOT, GUARDIAN AN ECONOMIST AND WASHINGTON POST BOOK OF THE YEAR 2020

‘When you pick this book up, you won’t be able to put it down’ MISHA GLENNY, author of MCMAFIA

‘Gripping, disturbing and deeply reported’ BEN RHODES, bestselling author of THE WORLD AS IT IS

In this real-life thriller packed with jaw-dropping revelations, award-winning investigative journalist Tom Burgis reveals a terrifying global web of kleptocracy and corruption.

Kleptopia follows the dirty money that is flooding the global economy, emboldening dictators, enriching oligarchs and poisoning democracies. From the Kremlin to Beijing, Harare to Riyadh, London to the Trump White House, it shows how the thieves are uniting – and the terrible human cost.

A body in a burned-out Audi. Workers riddled with bullets in the Kazakh desert. A rigged election in Zimbabwe. A British banker silenced and humiliated for trying to expose the truth about the City of London – the world’s piggy bank for blood money.

Riveting, horrifying and written like fiction, this book shows that while we are looking the other way, all that we hold most dear is being stolen.

Corruption & Misconduct International Organised Crime Politics & Government True Crime Russia Africa Exciting Imperialism Banking China

Critic Reviews

‘A ghastly and very important story’
Guardian

‘A meticulously reported piece of investigative journalism written in the style of a fast-paced thriller … Gripping … Kleptopia is not a far away republic in central Asia; it is all around us’
The Times

‘I don’t do book reviews. But I am reading Kleptopia very slowly as I have to keep picking my jaw up off the floor … Fascinating. Terrifying’
Paul Lewis

‘I might not have read, or even heard of Tom Burgis if ENRC hadn’t sued. Now I’m in. #Kleptopia’ Hugh Laurie

‘A must-read… A magisterial account of the money and violence behind the world’s most powerful dictatorships … Meticulously reported’
Washington Post

‘The architects of our national security would do well to bring to their meetings a well-thumbed copy … It unpicks the filthy flipside of globalisation … Incendiary’
Edward Lucas, The Times

‘Does the job brilliantly … with a hero straight out of a John le Carré novel … Wonderfully if grimly entertaining’
Economist

‘His landmark book he lays bare what we need to know, and act upon … Burgis provides us with the terrifying evidence. Read it and act’
Jon Snow

‘Read Kleptopia now. There is no time to lose … Tom Burgis demonstrates that money does indeed stink — and shows how to follow its scent’
Roberto Saviano

‘A powerful, appalling, and stunningly reported exposé … It reads like fiction, but unfortunately is all too true: Burgis names names, and follows the money, right into the Trump White House … Shows how dark money has grown from a national problem into an international scourge’
Jane Mayer

‘Reveals exactly why in the last thirty years organised crime and financial capitalism have fused to create a force of such power that no government or leader is free from the pressure it is able to apply … When you pick this book up, you won't be able to put it down’
Misha Glenny

All stars
Most relevant
Interesting book, could not get the last chapter to play. ? Otherwise a well told story

Chapter 41 did not play

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

A fascinating rabbit warren story that shines a bright light on just how much high level corruption surrounds us, dressed up as ‘OK’ by powerful people. Tony Blair surprised me, Trump didn’t - using their networks and knowledge to turn a blind eye to murderous regimes washing billions of stolen money - getting rich themselves in the process. Great read.

How morally corrupt powerful people can become

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

It has for a long time been evident that there is a lot of corruption in the world but this is eye watering. A lots of moving parts and hard to follow all the threads but there was clearly a lot to cover. I should have got out pen and paper to make a spider graph. Well done Tom

What to say

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

It's a truly incredible story that is mostly hard to follow but the gist of which is clear from the outset.

We live in a world ruled by Kleptocrats and they've discovered a self-enforcing model to keep themselves in power.

Fascinating but depressing.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

In the spirit of reconciliation, Audible acknowledges the Traditional Custodians of country throughout Australia and their connections to land, sea and community. We pay our respect to their elders past and present and extend that respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples today.