by Peter F. Drucker ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 29, 1981
Diverse essays, 1972-80, looking as usual chiefly to the future—a natural outlook for the nation's top business-management advisor and goad. Drucker, indeed, is seldom boring and seldom wholly wrong just because he's challenging "generally accepted assumptions"—which are, in the nature of things, always partially erroneous. (And almost invariably out-of-date.) The title essay is Drucker's most encompassing refutation/prognostication. Reviewing the successive schools of economic thinking (Mercantilism to Keynesianism), he characterizes the "world view" of each as either macro- or micro-economic, either supply- or demand-focused. This construct not only makes monetarist Milton Friedman a Keynesian (his economics is macro-economics—and demand-focused, contingent on money and credit), it also shifts attention—in Drucker's words—from the failure of "this or that theory" to the failure of the Keynesian assumption that productivity, unattended, would continue to slowly increase. Add the decline in capital-formation (contra to Keynesian theory), and Drucker is ready to stipulate what the Next Economics will be: micro-economic and based on supply. But the new micro-economics will concentrate, not on profit-maximization, but on productivity and capital-formation—making possible the integration, for the first time, of micro-economics and macro-economics, and of "the real economy of commodities and work and the symbol economy of money and credit." Some of the implications may be previewed in the succeeding pieces, which mostly address specific audiences and specific issues: environmentalism (or, how to identify justifiable risks—and non-justifiable risks), technology (or, how to be technologically innovative—and technologically responsible). One interesting piece deals with multinationals and developing countries. "Neglect and indifference," writes Drucker, "rather than 'exploitation,' is the justified grievance of the developing countries"; and he suggests ways to give Third-World affiliates more standing in the corporate structure. Another reassesses—as totally misrepresented—the prophet of "scientific management," Frederick Taylor. Two concluding pieces focus on Japan: one, a corrective that overcompensates, is devoted to demonstrating that Japan is not a monolith (true, but it's a lot more homogeneous than any other major nation); the second attempts, unimpressively, to view Japan through Japanese art. But even the narrowest of the pieces on management- and work-related issues—corporate boards, retirement, public-service programs—have something eye-opening to say.
Pub Date: April 29, 1981
ISBN: 1422131556
Page Count: 229
Publisher: Harper & Row
Review Posted Online: May 16, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 1981
Share your opinion of this book
More by Peter F. Drucker
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
by Abhijit V. Banerjee & Esther Duflo ‧ RELEASE DATE: Nov. 12, 2019
Occasionally wonky but overall a good case for how the dismal science can make the world less—well, dismal.
“Quality of life means more than just consumption”: Two MIT economists urge that a smarter, more politically aware economics be brought to bear on social issues.
It’s no secret, write Banerjee and Duflo (co-authors: Poor Economics: A Radical Rethinking of the Way To Fight Global Poverty, 2011), that “we seem to have fallen on hard times.” Immigration, trade, inequality, and taxation problems present themselves daily, and they seem to be intractable. Economics can be put to use in figuring out these big-issue questions. Data can be adduced, for example, to answer the question of whether immigration tends to suppress wages. The answer: “There is no evidence low-skilled migration to rich countries drives wage and employment down for the natives.” In fact, it opens up opportunities for those natives by freeing them to look for better work. The problem becomes thornier when it comes to the matter of free trade; as the authors observe, “left-behind people live in left-behind places,” which explains why regional poverty descended on Appalachia when so many manufacturing jobs left for China in the age of globalism, leaving behind not just left-behind people but also people ripe for exploitation by nationalist politicians. The authors add, interestingly, that the same thing occurred in parts of Germany, Spain, and Norway that fell victim to the “China shock.” In what they call a “slightly technical aside,” they build a case for addressing trade issues not with trade wars but with consumption taxes: “It makes no sense to ask agricultural workers to lose their jobs just so steelworkers can keep theirs, which is what tariffs accomplish.” Policymakers might want to consider such counsel, especially when it is coupled with the observation that free trade benefits workers in poor countries but punishes workers in rich ones.
Occasionally wonky but overall a good case for how the dismal science can make the world less—well, dismal.Pub Date: Nov. 12, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-61039-950-0
Page Count: 432
Publisher: PublicAffairs
Review Posted Online: Aug. 28, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2019
Share your opinion of this book
More About This Book
SEEN & HEARD
by Rebecca Henderson ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 1, 2020
A readable, persuasive argument that our ways of doing business will have to change if we are to prosper—or even survive.
A well-constructed critique of an economic system that, by the author’s account, is a driver of the world’s destruction.
Harvard Business School professor Henderson vigorously questions the bromide that “management’s only duty is to maximize shareholder value,” a notion advanced by Milton Friedman and accepted uncritically in business schools ever since. By that logic, writes the author, there is no reason why corporations should not fish out the oceans, raise drug prices, militate against public education (since it costs tax money), and otherwise behave ruinously and anti-socially. Many do, even though an alternative theory of business organization argues that corporations and society should enjoy a symbiotic relationship of mutual benefit, which includes corporate investment in what economists call public goods. Given that the history of humankind is “the story of our increasing ability to cooperate at larger and larger scales,” one would hope that in the face of environmental degradation and other threats, we might adopt the symbiotic model rather than the winner-take-all one. Problems abound, of course, including that of the “free rider,” the corporation that takes the benefits from collaborative agreements but does none of the work. Henderson examines case studies such as a large food company that emphasized environmentally responsible production and in turn built “purpose-led, sustainable living brands” and otherwise led the way in increasing shareholder value by reducing risk while building demand. The author argues that the “short-termism” that dominates corporate thinking needs to be adjusted to a longer view even though the larger problem might be better characterized as “failure of information.” Henderson closes with a set of prescriptions for bringing a more equitable economics to the personal level, one that, among other things, asks us to step outside routine—eat less meat, drive less—and become active in forcing corporations (and politicians) to be better citizens.
A readable, persuasive argument that our ways of doing business will have to change if we are to prosper—or even survive.Pub Date: May 1, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-5417-3015-1
Page Count: 336
Publisher: PublicAffairs
Review Posted Online: Feb. 16, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2020
Share your opinion of this book
© Copyright 2024 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Hey there, book lover.
We’re glad you found a book that interests you!
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Don’t fret. We’ll find you.