Prior to writing The Givers, Callahan wrote seven nonfiction books, including his 2010 publication, Fortunes of Change: The Rise of the Liberal Rich and the Remaking of America, in which he described the emerging upper class of "cosmopolitan elite", "super-educated" "professionals and entrepreneurs" who adopt "key liberal ideas as multiculturalism and active government" and who work in "knowledge" industries.[1][3] In The Givers, which is based on extensive research and interviews, Callahan described a "secret world" of a new wave of philanthropists, people like Mark Zuckerberg, who are elite philanthropists involved in what he calls "big philanthropy." He calls them "grandmasters", "super-citizens", "disrupters", the "new Medicis", and "agents of wealth".