In an era of “philanthrocapitalism” and “dark money” (Jane Mayer, Dark Money: The Hidden History of the Billionaires behind the Rise of the Radical Right, 2016) in which billionaires appear to play an outsized role in global policy, this timely book explores their impact. Peter Hägel provides case studies of seven billionaires as transnational actors; importantly, he links agency with power and intention (pp. 42–45). Hägel has taken on a difficult analytic challenge examining the agency of actors who are not directly accessible. This raises methodological challenges that he addresses through a counterfactual analysis. Hägel largely succeeds in this effort and has produced an interesting analysis of the agency of billionaires, as well as the limits of their impact.

Hägel situates his analysis in the structure–agency debate through the lens of critical realist Margaret Archer (Being Human: The Problem of Agency, 2000). He argues that transnational relations scholarship has rarely explored the agency of individuals in world politics and makes the case that it is important to do so. He begins by outlining the features of the contemporary economic structure that have facilitated the accumulation of extreme wealth. The globalization of trade and finance, neoliberal ideology, widespread opportunities for tax evasion, the proliferation of “winner take all” markets, the commodification of intangibles via intellectual property protection, and relative peace have all combined to concentrate extraordinary wealth in fewer hands. Institutional dynamics that have shifted welfare states to competition states (Philip Cerny, “Paradoxes of the Competition State,” Government and Opposition, 32, 1997) have led many governments to cut taxes on corporate wealth, relax antitrust (competition) policy and prudential regulation, and valorize the financial services sector. As Hägel points out, this institutional context “is so conducive to getting and staying very rich” (p. 85). He is careful to separate out individual agency from class dynamics as he seeks to investigate the impact that individual billionaires, who are “trying to make a difference,” may or may not have.

Hägel’s six paired case studies cover security (casino mogul Sheldon Adelson and hedge fund manager Raj Rajaratnam), economy (fossil fuel magnates Charles and David Koch and media mogul Rupert Murdoch), and esteem (Microsoft founder Bill Gates and hedge fund billionaire George Soros). Security lies at the center of the study of international relations, and providing security is seen as the primary goal of states. So, can individual billionaires make a difference in this realm? Hägel finds that Adelson has had an outsized impact on Israeli politics, but that Rajaratnam’s contributions to outcomes in his home country Sri Lanka have not been noteworthy. Adelson was a major donor to Republican candidates in the United States with mixed results. His huge donations did not prevent Obama from becoming president, but Adelson was a prominent and generous Trump supporter. Adelson’s main security interest was Israel, and he was a major force in Jewish diaspora politics. A committed Zionist, he favored an “entrenchment-annexation” approach to expand Israel and the territories it controls (p. 120). He supported Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s hardline stance against Iran. Adelson had a significant impact on Israeli politics by financing a free daily newspaper, Israel Hayom, as a “pro-Netanyahu propaganda vehicle” since 2007 (p. 119); it has enjoyed a wide readership. Since 2007, he also donated more than $410 million to the Birthright Israel Foundation that sends young American Jewish adults on all-expense-paid tours of Israel to forge strong bonds (p. 129). Hägel concludes that Adelson helped Netanyahu stay in power from 2009 until very recently (p. 145).

The case of Raj Rajaratnam and his funding of the insurgent Tamil Tigers is less striking. Hägel was able to access a great deal of information about Rajaratnam’s activities that came out in the course of his trial and conviction for insider trading in October 2009 and charges that he had been funding “terrorism” in Sri Lanka (p. 146). As in the case of Adelson, this is a story of a billionaire’s role in a diaspora supporting a political cause. Although Rajaratnam was a generous donor to the Tamil Rehabilitation Organization, a fundraising conduit for the Tamil Tigers (p. 148), the proportion of his annual donations relative to his wealth was small (1.25–2.5%) in comparison to the 10% that the Tigers expected the Sri Lankan diaspora to donate. After 9/11, when US counterterrorism policies made donations to the Tamil Tigers illegal, Rajaratnam stopped giving (p. 152). Hägel concludes that he exercised very little political agency beyond “following the rules of the game” (p. 153).

No one is surprised when billionaires exercise agency to preserve and expand their wealth. The Koch brothers and Rupert Murdoch’s political activities reflect this economic motive. The Koch brothers have donated generously to economic freedom initiatives, libertarian causes, deregulation, tax cuts for the rich, and protecting fossil fuel industries. Two Koch-funded think tanks, the Cato Institute and the Mercatus Center, promote libertarian ideas. In the early 2000s the Kochs began to invest heavily in Republican candidates and politicians through the political advocacy organization Americans for Prosperity. The Koch brothers are committed to climate denialism, donating nearly $150 million to the cause from 1997 to 2017 (p. 167). Rupert Murdoch’s conservative media empire has shaped public opinion and promotes free-market capitalism. His shadow looms large over politicians in the United States, United Kingdom, and Australia who seek favorable media coverage and take steps to avoid his wrath (p. 178).

Hägel classifies Bill Gates’s and George Soros’s social entrepreneurship as the quest for public esteem, although both billionaires claim to be motivated to make the world a better place. Gates is devoted to public health, and Soros to open societies. The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation’s endowment was about $50 billion in 2019 (p. 188). From 2008 to 2018 the Gates Foundation was the second-largest donor to the WHO (after the United States), and its funding is mostly earmarked for specific purposes (p. 202). The Gates Foundation favors biomedical vertical approaches, focusing on drugs and vaccines for infectious diseases. It led an initiative, the “decade of vaccines,” that the WHO adopted and endorsed. The foundation outspends the WHO annually and has played a prominent role in shaping global health governance.

George Soros’s contributions have been less clear-cut, and his Open Society Foundation’s goals are more difficult to measure. Open societies, human rights, independent media, education, and freedom of thought are all priorities. Unlike metrics that Gates embraces, such as the number of vaccinated children, Soros does not believe in quantitative metrics to evaluate his programs (p. 220). His impact is hard to assess, because his activities aim at wide-ranging structural change (p. 224), with one clear exception. Employing a counterfactual analysis, Hägel convincingly argues that Soros’s funding interventions in Georgia’s 2003 “Rose Revolution” had decisive impact.

Overall, Hägel makes a compelling case that the seven actors he scrutinizes have not behaved in ways consistent with expectations of a “transnational capitalist class” analysis. The security actors seemed more concerned with “enthnonationalist” projects that clash with the “logic of capitalist peace” (p. 240). Gates appears to be addressing market failures in health, and Soros is critical of laissez-faire capitalism (p. 241). Hägel effectively argues that the billionaires examined here are “super actors,” rather than creatures of institutional logics: they act with an autonomy and flexibility enabled by great wealth. As long as they are at the helm of their philanthropic efforts, their personal preferences prevail. The democratic legitimacy of these actors raises deeper questions. Transparency and accountability are in short supply.

Hägel’s book invites scholars to investigate the role of super wealthy individuals in international affairs and offers some creative methods to examine these largely inaccessible individuals. This book is a good contribution to an important research agenda going forward—politicizing the role of influential billionaires in an era of apparently weakening commitment to democratic norms. As Hägel reminds us, “The greatest danger may be that it becomes socially acceptable for the rich to rule” (p. 269).