A valuable adjunct to the small but growing literature surrounding the current economic crisis.
Avarice, incompetence, feuding, lying, revenge-seeking: The financial collapse of Iceland in October 2008, writes Financial Times correspondent Boyes, has all the makings of a Viking saga.
Iceland had been riding high, having deregulated its banking industry in a moment of Thatcherite/Reaganite free marketeering. Though a nation with a population approximately the size of a small Midwestern city, Iceland had almost nothing else but commodities speculation going for it. But that speculation brought vast sums to the newly privatized banks, far more than the country’s gross domestic product. As usually happens, bust followed boom. Some 30 players, “the core of the country’s decision-making elite,” made very bad decisions in a time when the rest of the world was falling into an economic tailspin. The sudden bankruptcy of Iceland, Boyes notes, had a radicalizing effect in an otherwise quiet political scene, with demonstrations that would have been the equivalent, in the United States, of a few million angry people taking to the streets. First the islanders threw eggs at the guilty party. When eggs became too expensive, they switched to shoes, bringing the specter of George W. Bush into the mess. In time, the anger transformed into denial, acceptance and the other stages of reckoning with death, in this case the death of a small but independent economy. Boyes includes plenty of human-interest stories, but the narrative will be most interesting to students of globalism, who will find object lessons in the spectacle of a nation’s being forced into bankruptcy thanks to the greed and malfeasance of a few well-placed, well-connected individuals. As to whether Iceland be brought back from the economic grave, Boyes ventures that it is possible—but with more, rather than less, regulation of the sort that will increasingly be required to save capitalism from itself in other economies well beyond the island.
A valuable adjunct to the small but growing literature surrounding the current economic crisis.Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2009
ISBN: 978-1-60819-018-8
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Bloomsbury
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2009
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
A timely, vividly realized reminder to slow down and harness the restorative wonders of serenity.
An exploration of the importance of clarity through calmness in an increasingly fast-paced world.
Austin-based speaker and strategist Holiday (Conspiracy: Peter Thiel, Hulk Hogan, Gawker, and the Anatomy of Intrigue, 2018, etc.) believes in downshifting one’s life and activities in order to fully grasp the wonder of stillness. He bolsters this theory with a wide array of perspectives—some based on ancient wisdom (one of the author’s specialties), others more modern—all with the intent to direct readers toward the essential importance of stillness and its “attainable path to enlightenment and excellence, greatness and happiness, performance as well as presence.” Readers will be encouraged by Holiday’s insistence that his methods are within anyone’s grasp. He acknowledges that this rare and coveted calm is already inside each of us, but it’s been worn down by the hustle of busy lives and distractions. Recognizing that this goal requires immense personal discipline, the author draws on the representational histories of John F. Kennedy, Buddha, Tiger Woods, Fred Rogers, Leonardo da Vinci, and many other creative thinkers and scholarly, scientific texts. These examples demonstrate how others have evolved past the noise of modern life and into the solitude of productive thought and cleansing tranquility. Holiday splits his accessible, empowering, and sporadically meandering narrative into a three-part “timeless trinity of mind, body, soul—the head, the heart, the human body.” He juxtaposes Stoic philosopher Seneca’s internal reflection and wisdom against Donald Trump’s egocentric existence, with much of his time spent “in his bathrobe, ranting about the news.” Holiday stresses that while contemporary life is filled with a dizzying variety of “competing priorities and beliefs,” the frenzy can be quelled and serenity maintained through a deliberative calming of the mind and body. The author shows how “stillness is what aims the arrow,” fostering focus, internal harmony, and the kind of holistic self-examination necessary for optimal contentment and mind-body centeredness. Throughout the narrative, he promotes that concept mindfully and convincingly.
A timely, vividly realized reminder to slow down and harness the restorative wonders of serenity.Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2019
ISBN: 978-0-525-53858-5
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Portfolio
Review Posted Online: July 20, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2019
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