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commanding heights book review: The Commanding Heights Daniel Yergin, 1998 |
commanding heights book review: Silent Surrender Kari Levitt, 2002 The Recolonization of Canada -- The Old Mercantilism and the New -- The Rise of the Nation State -- Regression to Dependence -- Who Decides? -- Metropolis and Hinterland -- The Harvest of Lengthening Dependence -- Appendix: The New Mercantilism of U.S. Direct Involvement. |
commanding heights book review: The Quest Daniel Yergin, 2011-09-20 The Quest continues the riveting story Daniel Yergin began twenty years ago with his No.1 International Bestseller The Prize, revealing the on-going quest to meet the world's energy needs - and the power and riches that come with it. A master story teller as well as our most expert analyst, Yergin proves that energy is truly the engine of global political and economic change. From the jammed streets of Beijing, the shores of the Caspian Sea, and the conflicts in the Middle East, to Capitol Hill and Silicon Valley, Yergin tells the inside stories of the oil market, the rise of the 'petrostate', the race to control the resources of the former Soviet empire, and the massive corporate mergers that have transformed the oil landscape. He shows how the drama of oil - the struggle for access to it, the battle for control, the insecurity of supply, its impact on the global economy, and the geopolitics that dominate it - will continue to shape our world. And he takes on the toughest questions: will we run out; are China and the United States destined for conflict; what of climate change? Yergin also reveals the surprising and turbulent histories of nuclear, coal, and natural gas, and investigates the 'rebirth of renewables'- biofuels, wind, and solar energy - showing how understanding this greening landscape and its future role are crucial to the needs of a growing world economy. The Quest presents an extraordinary range of characters and dramatic stories to illustrate the principles that will shape our energy security system for the decades to come. It is essential reading. |
commanding heights book review: The Prize Daniel Yergin, 2012-09-11 The Prize recounts the panoramic history of oil -- and the struggle for wealth power that has always surrounded oil. This struggle has shaken the world economy, dictated the outcome of wars, and transformed the destiny of men and nations. The Prize is as much a history of the twentieth century as of the oil industry itself. The canvas of this history is enormous -- from the drilling of the first well in Pennsylvania through two great world wars to the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait and Operation Desert Storm. The cast extends from wildcatters and rogues to oil tycoons, and from Winston Churchill and Ibn Saud to George Bush and Saddam Hussein. The definitive work on the subject of oil and a major contribution to understanding our century, The Prize is a book of extraordinary breadth, riveting excitement -- and great importance. |
commanding heights book review: Decadent Developmentalism Matthew M. Taylor, 2020-11-12 Complementarities between political and economic institutions have kept Brazil in a low-level economic equilibrium since 1985. |
commanding heights book review: Plenty of Nothing Thomas I. Palley, 2000-07-16 This work offers an alternative to conventional economic wisdom. It aims to provoke debate amongst economists and the general public about the most stubborn problems in the American economy. |
commanding heights book review: Ages of American Capitalism Jonathan Levy, 2022-04-05 A leading economic historian traces the evolution of American capitalism from the colonial era to the present—and argues that we’ve reached a turning point that will define the era ahead. “A monumental achievement, sure to become a classic.”—Zachary D. Carter, author of The Price of Peace In this ambitious single-volume history of the United States, economic historian Jonathan Levy reveals how capitalism in America has evolved through four distinct ages and how the country’s economic evolution is inseparable from the nature of American life itself. The Age of Commerce spans the colonial era through the outbreak of the Civil War, and the Age of Capital traces the lasting impact of the industrial revolution. The volatility of the Age of Capital ultimately led to the Great Depression, which sparked the Age of Control, during which the government took on a more active role in the economy, and finally, in the Age of Chaos, deregulation and the growth of the finance industry created a booming economy for some but also striking inequalities and a lack of oversight that led directly to the crash of 2008. In Ages of American Capitalism, Levy proves that capitalism in the United States has never been just one thing. Instead, it has morphed through the country’s history—and it’s likely changing again right now. “A stunning accomplishment . . . an indispensable guide to understanding American history—and what’s happening in today’s economy.”—Christian Science Monitor “The best one-volume history of American capitalism.”—Sven Beckert, author of Empire of Cotton |
commanding heights book review: Capital and Imperialism Utsa Patnaik, Prabhat Patnaik, 2021-03-02 A comprehensive survey of capitalism's colonialist roots and uncertain future Those who control the world’s commanding economic heights, buttressed by the theories of mainstream economists, presume that capitalism is a self-contained and self-generating system. Nothing could be further from the truth. In this pathbreaking book—winner of the Paul A. Baran-Paul M. Sweezy Memorial Award—radical political economists Utsa Patnaik and Prabhat Patnaik argue that the accumulation of capital has always required the taking of land, raw materials, and bodies from noncapitalist modes of production. They begin with a thorough debunking of mainstream economics. Then, looking at the history of capitalism, from the beginnings of colonialism half a millennium ago to today’s neoliberal regimes, they discover that, over the long haul, capitalism, in order to exist, must metastasize itself in the practice of imperialism and the immiseration of countless people. A few hundred years ago, write the Patnaiks, colonialism began to ensure vast, virtually free, markets for new products in burgeoning cities in the West. But even after slavery was generally abolished, millions of people in the Global South still fell prey to the continuing lethal exigencies of the marketplace. Even after the Second World War, when decolonization led to the end of the so-called “Golden Age of Capitalism,” neoliberal economies stepped in to reclaim the Global South, imposing drastic “austerity” measures on working people. But, say the Patnaiks, this neoliberal economy, which lives from bubble to bubble, is doomed to a protracted crisis. In its demise, we are beginning to see – finally – the transcendence of the capitalist system. |
commanding heights book review: Well-Being and Fair Distribution Matthew Adler, 2012 A comprehensive philosophically grounded argument for the use of social welfare functions as a framework for governmental policy analysis. |
commanding heights book review: Commanding Heights Michael Miklaucic, 2010 |
commanding heights book review: Capitalism in America Alan Greenspan, Adrian Wooldridge, 2018-10-16 From the legendary former Fed Chairman and the acclaimed Economist writer and historian, the full, epic story of America's evolution from a small patchwork of threadbare colonies to the most powerful engine of wealth and innovation the world has ever seen. Shortlisted for the 2018 Financial Times and McKinsey Business Book of the Year Award From even the start of his fabled career, Alan Greenspan was duly famous for his deep understanding of even the most arcane corners of the American economy, and his restless curiosity to know even more. To the extent possible, he has made a science of understanding how the US economy works almost as a living organism--how it grows and changes, surges and stalls. He has made a particular study of the question of productivity growth, at the heart of which is the riddle of innovation. Where does innovation come from, and how does it spread through a society? And why do some eras see the fruits of innovation spread more democratically, and others, including our own, see the opposite? In Capitalism in America, Greenspan distills a lifetime of grappling with these questions into a thrilling and profound master reckoning with the decisive drivers of the US economy over the course of its history. In partnership with the celebrated Economist journalist and historian Adrian Wooldridge, he unfolds a tale involving vast landscapes, titanic figures, triumphant breakthroughs, enlightenment ideals as well as terrible moral failings. Every crucial debate is here--from the role of slavery in the antebellum Southern economy to the real impact of FDR's New Deal to America's violent mood swings in its openness to global trade and its impact. But to read Capitalism in America is above all to be stirred deeply by the extraordinary productive energies unleashed by millions of ordinary Americans that have driven this country to unprecedented heights of power and prosperity. At heart, the authors argue, America's genius has been its unique tolerance for the effects of creative destruction, the ceaseless churn of the old giving way to the new, driven by new people and new ideas. Often messy and painful, creative destruction has also lifted almost all Americans to standards of living unimaginable to even the wealthiest citizens of the world a few generations past. A sense of justice and human decency demands that those who bear the brunt of the pain of change be protected, but America has always accepted more pain for more gain, and its vaunted rise cannot otherwise be understood, or its challenges faced, without recognizing this legacy. For now, in our time, productivity growth has stalled again, stirring up the populist furies. There's no better moment to apply the lessons of history to the most pressing question we face, that of whether the United States will preserve its preeminence, or see its leadership pass to other, inevitably less democratic powers. |
commanding heights book review: Wealth And Poverty Of Nations David S. Landes, 2015-04-20 The history of nations is a history of haves and have-nots, and as we approach the millennium, the gap between rich and poor countries is widening. In this engrossing and important new work, eminent historian David Landes explores the complex, fascinating and often startling causes of the wealth and poverty of nations. The answers are found not only in the large forces at work in economies: geography, religion, the broad swings of politics, but also in the small surprising details. In Europe, the invention of spectacles doubled the working life of skilled craftsmen, and played a prominent role in the creation of articulated machines, and in China, the failure to adopt the clock fundamentally hindered economic development. The relief of poverty is vital to the survival of us all. As David Landes brilliantly shows, the key to future success lies in understanding the lessons the past has to teach us - lessons uniquely imparted in this groundbreaking and vital book which exemplifies narrative history at its best. |
commanding heights book review: Is China Buying the World? Peter Nolan, 2013-04-30 China has become the world's second biggest economy and its largest exporter. It possesses the world's largest foreign exchange reserves and has 29 companies in the FT 500 list of the world's largest companies. ‘China's Rise' preoccupies the global media, which regularly carry articles suggesting that it is using its financial resources to ‘buy the world'. Is there any truth to this idea? Or is this just scaremongering by Western commentators who have little interest in a balanced presentation of China's role in the global political economy? In this short book Peter Nolan - one of the leading international experts on China and the global economy - probes behind the media rhetoric and shows that the idea that China is buying the world is a myth. Since the 1970s the global business revolution has resulted in an unprecedented degree of industrial concentration. Giant firms from high income countries with leading technologies and brands have greatly increased their investments in developing countries, with China at the forefront. Multinational companies account for over two-thirds of China's high technology output and over ninety percent of its high technology exports. Global firms are deep inside the Chinese business system and are pressing China hard to be permitted to increase their presence without restraints. By contrast, Chinese firms have a negligible presence in the high-income countries - in other words, we are ‘inside them' but they are not yet ‘inside us'. China's 70-odd ‘national champion' firms are protected by the government through state ownership and other support measures. They are in industries such as banking, metals, mining, oil, power, construction, transport, and telecommunications, which tend to make use of high technology products rather than produce these products themselves. Their growth has been based on the rapidly growing home market. China has been unsuccessful so far in its efforts to nurture a group of globally competitive firms with leading global technologies and brands. Whether it will be successful in the future is an open question. This balanced analysis replaces rhetoric with evidence and argument. It provides a much-needed perspective on current debates about China's growing power and it will contribute to a constructive dialogue between China and the West. |
commanding heights book review: Knowledge and the Wealth of Nations: A Story of Economic Discovery David Warsh, 2007-05-17 Chronicling the story of what has come to be called the new growth theory, this text helps to explain dominant first-mover firms like IBM or Microsoft, underscores the value of intellectual property, and provides essential advice to those concerned with the expansion of the economy. |
commanding heights book review: Shattered Peace Daniel Yergin, 1990 Drawing on once-secret archives and private papers, Daniel Yergin documents this transformation of the American viewpoint and analyzes how the Cold War policy came about. |
commanding heights book review: Portfolio Society Ivan Ascher, 2016-09-02 A bold extension of Marx's Capital for the twenty-first century: at once a critique of modern finance and of the societies under its spell. As financial markets expand and continue to refashion the world in their own image, the wealth of capitalist societies no longer presents itself, as it did to Karl Marx in the nineteenth century, as a “monstrous collection of commodities.” Instead, it appears as an equally monstrous collection of financial securities, and the critique of political economy must proceed accordingly. But what would it mean to write Capital in the twenty-first century? Are we really to believe that risk, rather than labor, is now regarded as the true fount of economic value? Can it truly be the case that the credit relation—at least in the global North—has replaced the wage relation as the key site of exploitation and political struggle? And finally, if precarity is indeed the name of today's proletarian condition, what possible future does it actually portend, what analysis does it require? Through a series of creative substitutions, in Portfolio Society Ivan Ascherextends Marx's critical project in bold and unexpected ways. Ascher not only explains some of the often mystifying processes of contemporary finance, he also invites us to consider what becomes of capitalism itself in those places where the relation of capital to its own future is now mediated by financial markets. In the end, we may find that much has changed and much has not; relations of domination endure, and mystifications abound, but the devil is in the details, and that is where Ascher directs our attention. At once a critique of modern finance and of the societies under its spell, Portfolio Society succeeds in revealing the potential limits of Capital, while reveling still in its limitless potential. |
commanding heights book review: A Low, Dishonest Decade Paul N. Hehn, 2005-09-26 Focusing on the rivalries among the Great Powers in the search for markets during the world depression of the 1930s, the author surveys the five Major Powers and all the Eastern European countries from the Baltic to Turkey. But he primarily canvases the economic situations in locations like Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Poland, Romania, and Yugoslavia. |
commanding heights book review: The Last Economic Superpower: The Retreat of Globalization, the End of American Dominance, and What We Can Do About It Joseph P. Quinlan, 2010-11-19 The Risks and Rewards for the West in the Coming Multipolar World A marked shift has occurred in the tone and assumptions surrounding our national fortune. Nowhere is this better seen than in the second generation of books dealing with America’s financial crisis, particularly Joseph P. Quinlan’s The Last Economic Superpower. New York Journal of Books The global economy, designed by Western powers with the United States as lead architect, is in the process of reconfiguration. The 2008 global financial crisis has terminated America’s reign as sole economic superpower and opened up important new spheres of influence to developing nations. Does this signal the retreat of globalization as we know it? Has an economic “cold war” already begun? Will the West ever exert the kind of control and influence it enjoyed just a few short years ago? In The Last Economic Superpower, Joseph P. Quinlan, a Wall Street veteran and expert on global economic affairs, addresses these questions and many others. Presenting his vision with refreshing clarity and objectivity, Quinlan examines: How America went from being a major creditor to the world’s largest debtor nation in only two decades Five critical issues America must face in order to prevent permanent fragmentation of the global economy What the fading appeal of Europe and Japan means for the future of globalization What China, India, and others have that the West doesn’t--and why this gives them unprecedented leverage Decisions made now will shape the course of history. The Last Economic Superpower outlines critical choices that must be made in order to recast, reinvent, and reenergize a new style of globalization. The Last Economic Superpower lays bare the issues and challenges that will decide whether the world builds a new, functional system that serves all or fragments into separate spheres of influence, which benefits no one. |
commanding heights book review: Tearing Down the Walls Monica Langley, 2004-04-27 He is one of the world's most accomplished figures of modern finance. As chairman and chief executive officer of Citigroup, Sanford Sandy Weill has become an American legend, a banking visionary whose innovativeness, opportunism, and even fear drove him from the lowliest jobs on Wall Street to its most commanding heights. In this unprecedented biography, acclaimed Wall Street Journal reporter Monica Langley provides a compelling account of Weill's rise to power. What emerges is a portrait of a man who is as vital and as volatile as the market itself. Tearing Down the Walls tells the riveting inside story of how a Jewish boy from Brooklyn's back alleys overcame incredible odds and deep-seated prejudices to transform the financial-services industry as we know it today. Using nearly five hundred firsthand interviews with key players in Weill's life and career -- including Weill himself -- Langley brilliantly chronicles not only his success and scandals but also the shadows of his hidden self: his father's abandonment and his loving marriage; his tyrannical rages as well as his tearful regrets; his fierce sense of loyalty and his ruthless elimination of potential rivals. By highlighting in new and startling detail one man's life in a narrative as richly textured and compelling as a novel, Tearing Down the Walls provides the historical context of the dramatic changes not only in business but also in American society in the last half century. |
commanding heights book review: Utopia for Realists Rutger Bregman, 2017-03-14 Universal basic income. A 15-hour workweek. Open borders. Does it sound too good to be true? One of Europe's leading young thinkers shows how we can build an ideal world today. A more politically radical Malcolm Gladwell. -- New York Times After working all day at jobs we often dislike, we buy things we don't need. Rutger Bregman, a Dutch historian, reminds us it needn't be this way -- and in some places it isn't. Rutger Bregman's TED Talk about universal basic income seemed impossibly radical when he delivered it in 2014. A quarter of a million views later, the subject of that video is being seriously considered by leading economists and government leaders the world over. It's just one of the many utopian ideas that Bregman proves is possible today. Utopia for Realists is one of those rare books that takes you by surprise and challenges what you think can happen. From a Canadian city that once completely eradicated poverty, to Richard Nixon's near implementation of a basic income for millions of Americans, Bregman takes us on a journey through history, and beyond the traditional left-right divides, as he champions ideas whose time have come. Every progressive milestone of civilization -- from the end of slavery to the beginning of democracy -- was once considered a utopian fantasy. Bregman's book, both challenging and bracing, demonstrates that new utopian ideas, like the elimination of poverty and the creation of the fifteen-hour workweek, can become a reality in our lifetime. Being unrealistic and unreasonable can in fact make the impossible inevitable, and it is the only way to build the ideal world. |
commanding heights book review: Hoover Kenneth Whyte, 2017 An exemplary biography--exhaustively researched, fair-minded and easy to read. It can nestle on the same shelf as David McCullough's Truman, a high compliment indeed. --The Wall Street Journal The definitive biography of Herbert Hoover, one of the most remarkable Americans of the twentieth century--a wholly original account that will forever change the way Americans understand the man, his presidency, his battle against the Great Depression, and their own history. An impoverished orphan who built a fortune. A great humanitarian. A president elected in a landslide and then resoundingly defeated four years later. Arguably the father of both New Deal liberalism and modern conservatism, Herbert Hoover lived one of the most extraordinary American lives of the twentieth century. Yet however astonishing, his accomplishments are often eclipsed by the perception that Hoover was inept and heartless in the face of the Great Depression. Now, Kenneth Whyte vividly recreates Hoover's rich and dramatic life in all its complex glory. He follows Hoover through his Iowa boyhood, his cutthroat business career, his brilliant rescue of millions of lives during World War I and the 1927 Mississippi floods, his misconstrued presidency, his defeat at the hands of a ruthless Franklin Roosevelt, his devastating years in the political wilderness, his return to grace as Truman's emissary to help European refugees after World War II, and his final vindication in the days of Kennedy's New Frontier. Ultimately, Whyte brings to light Hoover's complexities and contradictions--his modesty and ambition, his ruthlessness and extreme generosity--as well as his profound political legacy. Hoover: An Extraordinary Life in Extraordinary Times is the epic, poignant story of the deprived boy who, through force of will, made himself the most accomplished figure in the land, and who experienced a range of achievements and failures unmatched by any American of his, or perhaps any, era. Here, for the first time, is the definitive biography that fully captures the colossal scale of Hoover's momentous life and volatile times. |
commanding heights book review: I, Citizen Tony Woodlief, 2021-12-07 This is a story of hope, but also of peril. It began when our nation’s polarized political class started conscripting everyday citizens into its culture war. From their commanding heights in political parties, media, academia, and government, these partisans have attacked one another for years, but increasingly they’ve convinced everyday Americans to join the fray. Why should we feel such animosity toward our fellow citizens, our neighbors, even our own kin? Because we’ve fallen for the false narrative, eagerly promoted by pundits on the Left and the Right, that citizens who happen to vote Democrat or Republican are enthusiastic supporters of Team Blue or Team Red. Aside from a minority of party activists and partisans, however, most voters are simply trying to choose the lesser of two evils. The real threat to our union isn’t Red vs. Blue America, it’s the quiet collusion within our nation’s political class to take away that most American of freedoms: our right to self-governance. Even as partisans work overtime to divide Americans against one another, they’ve erected a system under which we ordinary citizens don’t have a voice in the decisions that affect our lives. From foreign wars to how local libraries are run, authority no longer resides with We the People, but amongst unaccountable officials. The political class has stolen our birthright and set us at one another’s throats. This is the story of how that happened and what we can do about it. America stands at a precipice, but there’s still time to reclaim authority over our lives and communities. |
commanding heights book review: Tata Mircea Raianu, 2021-07-06 An eye-opening portrait of global capitalism spanning 150 years, told through the history of the Tata corporation. Nearly a century old, the grand faade of Bombay House is hard to miss in the historic business district of Mumbai. This is the iconic global headquarters of the Tata Group, a multinational corporation that produces everything from salt to software. After getting their start in the cotton and opium trades, the Tatas, a Parsi family from Navsari, Gujarat, ascended to commanding heights in the Indian economy by the time of independence in 1947. Over the course of its 150-year history Tata spun textiles, forged steel, generated hydroelectric power, and took to the skies. It also faced challenges from restive workers fighting for their rights and political leaders who sought to curb its power. In this sweeping history, Mircea Raianu tracks the fortunes of a family-run business that was born during the high noon of the British Empire and went on to capture the worldÕs attention with the headline-making acquisition of luxury car manufacturer Jaguar Land Rover. The growth of Tata was a complex process shaped by world historical forces: the eclipse of imperial free trade, the intertwined rise of nationalism and the developmental state, and finally the return of globalization and market liberalization. Today Tata is the leading light of one of the worldÕs major economies, selling steel, chemicals, food, financial services, and nearly everything else, while operating philanthropic institutions that channel expert knowledge in fields such as engineering and medicine. Based on painstaking research in the companyÕs archive, Tata elucidates how a titan of industry was created and what lessons its story may hold for the future of global capitalism. |
commanding heights book review: Collective Insecurity Ikechi Mgbeoji, 2011-11-01 This book provides both a superb analysis of the historical dysfunction of the post-colonial African state generally and, more specifically, a probing critique of the crisis that resulted in the tragic collapse of Liberia. Ikechi Mgbeoji ultimately shows that blame for this endless cycle of violence must be laid at the feet of both the Western powers and African states themselves. He further posits that a reconstructed regime of African statehood, legitimate governance, and reform of the United Nations Security Council are imperatives for the creation of a stable African polity. |
commanding heights book review: The Third Pillar Raghuram Rajan, 2020-02-25 Revised and updated Shortlisted for the Financial Times/McKinsey Business Book of the Year Award From one of the most important economic thinkers of our time, a brilliant and far-seeing analysis of the current populist backlash against globalization. Raghuram Rajan, distinguished University of Chicago professor, former IMF chief economist, head of India's central bank, and author of the 2010 FT-Goldman-Sachs Book of the Year Fault Lines, has an unparalleled vantage point onto the social and economic consequences of globalization and their ultimate effect on our politics. In The Third Pillar he offers up a magnificent big-picture framework for understanding how these three forces--the state, markets, and our communities--interact, why things begin to break down, and how we can find our way back to a more secure and stable plane. The third pillar of the title is the community we live in. Economists all too often understand their field as the relationship between markets and the state, and they leave squishy social issues for other people. That's not just myopic, Rajan argues; it's dangerous. All economics is actually socioeconomics - all markets are embedded in a web of human relations, values and norms. As he shows, throughout history, technological phase shifts have ripped the market out of those old webs and led to violent backlashes, and to what we now call populism. Eventually, a new equilibrium is reached, but it can be ugly and messy, especially if done wrong. Right now, we're doing it wrong. As markets scale up, the state scales up with it, concentrating economic and political power in flourishing central hubs and leaving the periphery to decompose, figuratively and even literally. Instead, Rajan offers a way to rethink the relationship between the market and civil society and argues for a return to strengthening and empowering local communities as an antidote to growing despair and unrest. Rajan is not a doctrinaire conservative, so his ultimate argument that decision-making has to be devolved to the grass roots or our democracy will continue to wither, is sure to be provocative. But even setting aside its solutions, The Third Pillar is a masterpiece of explication, a book that will be a classic of its kind for its offering of a wise, authoritative and humane explanation of the forces that have wrought such a sea change in our lives. |
commanding heights book review: The Confounding Island Orlando Patterson, 2019-11-12 Orlando Patterson returns to Jamaica, his birthplace, to reckon with its history and culture. Locals claim to be some of the world’s happiest people, and their successes in music and athletics are legendary. Yet the country remains violent and poor. In Jamaica the dilemmas of globalization and postcolonial politics are thrown into stark relief. |
commanding heights book review: Markets Over Mao Nicholas R. Lardy, 2014-09-10 China's transition to a market economy has propelled its remarkable economic growth since the late 1970s. In this book, Nicholas R. Lardy, one of the world's foremost experts on the Chinese economy, traces the increasing role of market forces and refutes the widely advanced argument that Chinese economic progress rests on the government's control of the economy's commanding heights. In another challenge to conventional wisdom, Lardy finds little evidence that the decade of the leadership of former President Hu Jintao and Premier Wen Jiabao (2003–13) dramatically increased the role and importance of state-owned firms, as many people argue. This book offers powerfully persuasive evidence that the major sources of China's growth in the future will be similarly market rather than state-driven, with private firms providing the major source of economic growth, the sole source of job creation, and the major contributor to China's still growing role as a global trader. Lardy does, however, call on China to deregulate and increase competition in those portions of the economy where state firms remain protected, especially in energy and finance. |
commanding heights book review: Superpower: Australia's Low-Carbon Opportunity ROSS. GARNAUT, 2019-08-26 'The fog of Australian politics on climate change has obscured a fateful reality- Australia has the potential to be an economic superpower of the future post-carbon world.'-Ross Garnaut We have unparalleled renewable energy resources. We also have the necessary scientific skills. Australia could be the natural home for an increasing proportion of global industry. But how do we make this happen? In this crisp, compelling book, Australia's leading thinker about climate and energy policy offers a road map for progress, covering energy, transport, agriculture, the international scene and more. Rich in ideas and practical optimism, Superpower is a crucial, timely contribution to this country's future. |
commanding heights book review: World War 3.0 Ken Auletta, 2002 When the U.S. Justice Department took Microsoft to court in October 1998, the company had the highest market capitalization in the world. From day one of the trial, Ken Auletta was there, not merely covering the tense proceedings but conducting his own excavation for the truth. Drawn from his range of interviews with Bill Gates, David Boies, Judge Thomas Penfield Jackson, Steve Case, and other sources, World War 3.0 unveils two stories simultaneously: the war inside the courtroom that found Microsoft guilty of monopolistic behavior and the war outside the courtroom for corporate supremacy. Determined to create the fairest and most human portrait of Microsoft to date, Auletta shows how the company's culture seeded both its current legal misery and its business success. He paints a portrait of Bill Gates, half genius and half child, and the drama of characters and corporations whose fates are linked to Microsoft's. World War 3.0 peeks into the future of the Information Age and takes readers on an entertaining ride that offers astonishing views of hubris, vanity, and greed - and of gifted and flawed giants.--BOOK JACKET.Title Summary field provided by Blackwell North America, Inc. All Rights Reserved |
commanding heights book review: Sustaining China's Economic Growth After the Global Financial Crisis Nicholas R. Lardy, 2011-12-15 The global financial crisis and ensuing economic downturn has raised many questions concerning the future of global economic growth. Prior to the financial crisis, global growth was characterized by growing imbalances, reflected primarily in large trade surpluses in China, Japan, Germany, and the oil exporting countries and rapidly growing deficits, primarily in the United States. The global crisis raises the question of whether the previous growth model of low consumption, high saving countries such as China is obsolete. Although a strong and rapid policy response beginning in the early fall of 2008 made China the first globally significant economy to come off the bottom and begin to grow more rapidly, critics charged that China's recovery was based on the old growth model, relying primarily on burgeoning investment in the short run and the expectation of a revival of expanding net exports once global recovery gained traction. Critics, however, argued that as government-financed investment inevitably tapered off, the likelihood was that global recovery would not be sufficiently strong for China's exports to resume their former role as a major contributor to China's economic expansion. The prospect, in the eyes of these critics, is that China's growth will inevitably falter. This study examines China's response to the global crisis, the prospects for altering the model of economic growth that dominated the first decade of this century, and the implications for the United States and the global economy of successful Chinese rebalancing. On the first it analyzes the strengths and weaknesses of China's stimulus program. On the second it analyzes the nature of origins of the imbalances in China's economy and the array of policy options that the government has to transition to more consumption-driven growth. On the third successful rebalancing would mean that more rapid growth of consumption would offset the drag on growth from a shrinkage of China's external surplus. Successful rebalancing would mean China would no longer be a source of financing for any ongoing US external deficit. From a global perspective China would no longer be a source of the global economic imbalances that contributed to the recent global financial crisis and great recession. |
commanding heights book review: Red Plenty Francis Spufford, 2012-02-14 Spufford cunningly maps out a literary genre of his own . . . Freewheeling and fabulous. —The Times (London) Strange as it may seem, the gray, oppressive USSR was founded on a fairy tale. It was built on the twentieth-century magic called the planned economy, which was going to gush forth an abundance of good things that the lands of capitalism could never match. And just for a little while, in the heady years of the late 1950s, the magic seemed to be working. Red Plenty is about that moment in history, and how it came, and how it went away; about the brief era when, under the rash leadership of Khrushchev, the Soviet Union looked forward to a future of rich communists and envious capitalists, when Moscow would out-glitter Manhattan and every Lada would be better engineered than a Porsche. It's about the scientists who did their genuinely brilliant best to make the dream come true, to give the tyranny its happy ending. Red Plenty is history, it's fiction, it's as ambitious as Sputnik, as uncompromising as an Aeroflot flight attendant, and as different from what you were expecting as a glass of Soviet champagne. |
commanding heights book review: I'm Not Crazy, I'm Just Not You Roger Pearman, Sarah C. Albritton, 2010-12-15 Tracing the growth of the study of personality type from its roots in the work of Carl Jung to today’s subtly nuanced type theory, I’m Not Crazy, I’m Just Not You shows how greatly our individual personality preferences affect our interactions with others. By shedding light on individual characteristics and tendencies, psychologists Roger R. Pearman and Sarah C. Albritton teach us how to overcome our natural inclination to judge difference in order to recognize and celebrate it. This new edition includes current research into psychological type, information about the benefits of using type to enhance health and manage stress, discussion of the link between type and emotional intelligence and analysis of how personality preferences translate across generational and cultural divides. |
commanding heights book review: The Corona Crash Grace Blakeley, 2020-10-27 Free market, competitive capitalism is dead. The separation between politics and economics can no longer be sustained. In The Corona Crash, leading economics commentator Grace Blakeley theorises about the epoch-making changes that the coronavirus brings in its wake. We are living through a unique moment in history. The pandemic has caused the deepest global recession since the Second World War. Meanwhile the human cost is reflected in a still-rising death toll, as many states find themselves unable—and some unwilling—to grapple with the effects of the virus. Whatever happens, we can never go back to business as usual. This crisis will tip us into a new era of monopoly capitalism, argues Blakeley, as the corporate economy collapses into the arms of the state, and the tech giants grow to unprecedented proportions. We need a radical response. The recovery could see the transformation of our political, economic, and social systems based on the principles of the Green New Deal. If not, the alternatives, as Blakeley warns, may be even worse than we feared. |
commanding heights book review: The Conservative Enemy Anthony Crosland, 1962 Labor member of Parliament outlines a program of radical Left-wing reform. |
commanding heights book review: Orchestration James Reilly, 2021 Orchestration explores the origins, operations, and effectiveness of China's distinctive 'orchestration' approach to economic statecraft. It describes how China engages in economic statecraft, explains why China uses this approach, and identifies when Beijing's efforts are most effective. The first two chapters trace how China's unique historical experiences and complex political-economic structures led to Beijing's orchestration approach. Today, Chinese leaders deploy incentives and innovative policies to mobilize a vast array of companies, banks, and local officials to rapidly expand trade and investment with targeted countries around the world. China's economic statecraft thus requires only a light touch. Four chapters comparing China's economic statecraft across Europe, and in Myanmar and North Korea, reveal Beijing's orchestration in action. Policymakers combined delegation with incentives, encouraged participation by regional authorities and enterprises, and facilitated interest alignment among implementing actors to successfully mobilize domestic actors. When problems with enterprise malfeasance, policy stretching, and moral hazards emerged, central leaders adroitly reversed course. Despite successful implementation, Beijing's economic statecraft exacerbated populist anxieties, undermining China's foreign policy goals. The policy implications for countries targeted by China's economic statecraft are thus broadly reassuring. Orchestration concludes by laying a foundation for future studies in comparative economic statecraft--Provided by publisher. |
commanding heights book review: An Army Like No Other Haim Bresheeth-Zabner, 2020-08-25 A history of the IDF that argues that Israel is a nation formed by its army. The Israeli army, officially named the Israel Defence Forces (IDF), was established in 1948 by David Ben-Gurion, Israel's first prime minister, who believed that 'the whole nation is the army'. In his mind, the IDF was to be an army like no other. It was the instrument that might transform a diverse population into a new people. Since the foundation of Israel, therefore, the IDF has been the largest, richest and most influential institution in Israel's Jewish society and is the nursery of its social, economic and political ruling class. In this fascinating history, Bresheeth charts the evolution of the IDF from the Nakba to the continued assaults upon Gaza, and shows that the state of Israel has been formed out of its wars. He also gives an account of his own experiences as a young conscript during the 1967 war. He argues that the army is embedded in all aspects of daily life and identity. And that we should not merely see it as a fighting force enjoying an international reputation, but as the central ideological, political and financial institution of Israeli society. As a consequence, we have to reconsider our assumptions on what any kind of peace might look like. |
commanding heights book review: The Zero Marginal Cost Society Jeremy Rifkin, 2014-04-01 The New York Times–bestselling author describes how current trends will create an era when anything and everything is available for almost nothing. In The Zero Marginal Cost Society, New York Times–bestselling author Jeremy Rifkin uncovers a paradox at the heart of capitalism that has propelled it to greatness but is now taking it to its death—the inherent entrepreneurial dynamism of competitive markets that drives productivity up and marginal costs down, enabling businesses to reduce the price of their goods and services in order to win over consumers and market share. (Marginal cost is the cost of producing additional units of a good or service, if fixed costs are not counted.) While economists have always welcomed a reduction in marginal cost, they never anticipated the possibility of a technological revolution that might bring marginal costs to near zero, making goods and services priceless, nearly free, and abundant, and no longer subject to market forces. Now, a formidable new technology infrastructure—the Internet of things (IoT)—is emerging with the potential of pushing large segments of economic life to near zero marginal cost in the years ahead. Rifkin describes how the Communication Internet is converging with an Energy Internet and Logistics Internet to create a new technology platform that connects all. There are billions of sensors feeding Big Data into an IoT global neural network. Prosumers can connect to the network and use Big Data, analytics, and algorithms to accelerate efficiency, dramatically increase productivity, and lower the marginal cost of producing and sharing a wide range of products and services to near zero, just like they now do with information goods. The plummeting of marginal costs is spawning a hybrid economy—part capitalist market and part Collaborative Commons—with far reaching implications for society, according to Rifkin. Hundreds of millions of people are already transferring parts of their economic lives to the global Collaborative Commons. Prosumers are plugging into the IoT and making and sharing their own information, entertainment, green energy, and 3D-printed products at near zero marginal cost. Students are enrolling in free massive open online courses (MOOCs) that operate at near zero marginal cost. Social entrepreneurs are even bypassing the banking establishment and using crowdfunding to finance startup businesses as well as creating alternative currencies in the fledgling sharing economy. In this new world, social capital is as important as financial capital, access trumps ownership, sustainability supersedes consumerism, cooperation ousts competition, and “exchange value” in the capitalist marketplace is increasingly replaced by “sharable value” on the Collaborative Commons. Rifkin concludes that capitalism will remain with us, albeit in an increasingly streamlined role, primarily as an aggregator of network services and solutions, allowing it to flourish as a powerful niche player in the coming era. We are, however, says Rifkin, entering a world beyond markets where we are learning how to live together in an increasingly interdependent global Collaborative Commons. |
commanding heights book review: The Dependence Dilemma Daniel Yergin, 1984-08-01 Why should the gas lines of the 1970s become a permanent part of American life in the 1980s? The international energy system is now so precariously balanced that a critical supply interruption can occur at any time. Gasoline rationing could be the immediate response in a new crisis. But is the United States ready? This volume analyzes these urgent issues. It is the result of a special symposium of the nation's leading experts convened by the International Energy Seminar at Harvard's Center for International Affairs to explore the various options for reshaping gasoline demand. There is no easy answer, but the worst course is to do nothing. If we are to solve the dependence dilemma, we must do it ourselves. Originally published by the Harvard University Center for International Affairs in 1980. |
commanding heights book review: Zero-Sum World Gideon Rachman, 2014-07-03 The economic crisis that struck the world in 2008 has drastically altered the logic of international relations. Globalisation no longer benefits all the world's superpowers and they face an array of global problems that are causing division between nations. A win-win world is giving way to a zero-sum world. Zero-sum logic, in which one country's gain looks like another's loss, has prevented the world from reaching an agreement to fight climate change and threatens to create a global economic stalemate. These new tensions are intensified by the emergence of dangerous political and economic problems that risk provoking wars, environmental catastrophe and ever-deeper debilitating economic crises. This timely and important book argues that international politics is about become much more volatile - and sets out what can be done to break away from the crippling logic of a zero-sum world. |
commanding heights book review: A Contemporary Historiography of Economics Till Düppe, E. Roy Weintraub, 2018-09-13 In recent years, the focus of historians of economic thought has changed to also include the ideas and practices of contemporary economists. This has opened up new questions regarding the utilization of sources, choice of method, narrative styles, and ethical issues, as well as a new awareness of the historian’s place, role, and task. This book brings together leading contributors to provide, for the first time, a methodological overview of the historiography of economics. Emphasising the quality of the scholarship of recent decades, the book seeks to provide research tools for future historians of economic thought, as well as to any historians of social science with an interest in historiographic issues. |
COMMANDING Definition & Meaning - Merriam-Webster
The meaning of COMMANDING is drawing attention or priority. How to use commanding in a sentence.
393 Synonyms & Antonyms for COMMANDING - Thesaurus.com
Find 393 different ways to say COMMANDING, along with antonyms, related words, and example sentences at Thesaurus.com.
Commanding - definition of commanding by The Free Dictionary
Define commanding. commanding synonyms, commanding pronunciation, commanding translation, English dictionary definition of commanding. adj. 1. Having command; controlling. …
COMMANDING | English meaning - Cambridge Dictionary
COMMANDING definition: 1. having the authority to give orders: 2. A commanding voice or manner seems to have authority…. Learn more.
COMMANDING definition in American English - Collins Online …
If you describe someone as commanding, you mean that they are powerful and confident. [ approval ] Lovett was a tall, commanding man with a waxed gray mustache.
commanding adjective - Definition, pictures, pronunciation and …
Definition of commanding adjective in Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary. Meaning, pronunciation, picture, example sentences, grammar, usage notes, synonyms and more.
commanding - Wiktionary, the free dictionary
Jan 18, 2025 · Impressively dominant; very good and impressive. Her colleagues say that [Dalia] Stasevska is eager to challenge the status quo both in the artistic realm and in life. Claire …
Commanding - Definition, Meaning & Synonyms
Something that's commanding is lofty, high, or impressive. Your thirtieth-floor apartment gives you a commanding view of the city.
COMMANDING Synonyms: 319 Similar and Opposite Words - Merriam-Webster
Synonyms for COMMANDING: presiding, chief, leading, supreme, lead, top, foremost, primary; Antonyms of COMMANDING: second, less, subordinate, lower, last, secondary, lesser, ancillary
What does commanding mean? - Definitions.net
Commanding refers to the act of exercising authority or control over others. It also implies exhibiting a strong presence that demands respect or attention. In a leadership role, …
COMMANDING Definition & Meaning - Merriam-Webster
The meaning of COMMANDING is drawing attention or priority. How to use commanding in a sentence.
393 Synonyms & Antonyms for COMMANDING - Thesaurus.com
Find 393 different ways to say COMMANDING, along with antonyms, related words, and example sentences at Thesaurus.com.
Commanding - definition of commanding by The Free Dictionary
Define commanding. commanding synonyms, commanding pronunciation, commanding translation, English dictionary definition of commanding. adj. 1. Having command; controlling. …
COMMANDING | English meaning - Cambridge Dictionary
COMMANDING definition: 1. having the authority to give orders: 2. A commanding voice or manner seems to have authority…. Learn more.
COMMANDING definition in American English - Collins Online …
If you describe someone as commanding, you mean that they are powerful and confident. [ approval ] Lovett was a tall, commanding man with a waxed gray mustache.
commanding adjective - Definition, pictures, pronunciation and …
Definition of commanding adjective in Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary. Meaning, pronunciation, picture, example sentences, grammar, usage notes, synonyms and more.
commanding - Wiktionary, the free dictionary
Jan 18, 2025 · Impressively dominant; very good and impressive. Her colleagues say that [Dalia] Stasevska is eager to challenge the status quo both in the artistic realm and in life. Claire …
Commanding - Definition, Meaning & Synonyms
Something that's commanding is lofty, high, or impressive. Your thirtieth-floor apartment gives you a commanding view of the city.
COMMANDING Synonyms: 319 Similar and Opposite Words - Merriam-Webster
Synonyms for COMMANDING: presiding, chief, leading, supreme, lead, top, foremost, primary; Antonyms of COMMANDING: second, less, subordinate, lower, last, secondary, lesser, ancillary
What does commanding mean? - Definitions.net
Commanding refers to the act of exercising authority or control over others. It also implies exhibiting a strong presence that demands respect or attention. In a leadership role, …