Games Indians Play : Why We are the Way We are

Why are we a nation that is individually so smart and collectively so naive?

Why do we mistake talk for action? Why is our self-worth massaged only if we have the 'authority' to break rules?

Why are we among the world's most corrupt? Why do we jump red lights? Why do we dump our garbage at the neighbour's doorstep?...Can it be our climate, population density, poverty, colonial past or even genetic encoding?

In a rare attempt to understand the Indianness of Indians - perhaps the most intelligent people in the world, but also, to a dispassionate eye, among the most baffling - V.

Raghunathan uses the props of game theory and behavioural economics to provide an insight into this most difficult question: why are we the way we are?

Raghunathan tackles the question by putting under the scanner our attitudes towards rationality and irrationality, egotism and selfishness, our penchant for antagonism and competition, and our aversion to collaboration and cooperation.