Business Ethics: Case Studies and Selected Readings

Book Description

This text provides real-life examples of ethical dilemmas, poor ethical choices, and wise ethical decisions from newspapers, business journals and the author's experiences as a consultant and board member. This text not only assists in fulfilling the AACSB's curriculum requirement but exposes students to a critical issue---the strong sense of values that is essential to principled and successful leadership in the business world. The cases also apply theory to reality in order to nurture or reinforce a needed sense of values in future business leaders.

Customer Reviews:

Decent, but rather uneven coverage for an intro text........2005-06-23

One benefit of this book is that it contains articles, commentary, and discussion questions all in one text. It also covers a wide variety of issues, which is good since business ethics is a vast subject. On the negative side, I don't think the organization of the sections is the most effective way to approach the topic. The sections are organized based on a 1991 survey of CEOs in which the participants ranked their most important types of ethical dilemmas. As a result, there isn't the logical flow or progression of ideas from chapter to chapter that one might expect from a philosophy book. Unfortunately, the pragmatic interests of CEOs are not the same as the educational needs of students who are new to business ethics. There is also no discussion of ethical theories and no direct interaction between the articles. On the whole, this book may be beneficial if used in conjunction with a survey of ethical theories and ethical decision-making, but taken by itself it makes for a rather uneven introduction to business ethics.

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Readings and Cases in Auditing
Thomas D. Hubbard
Manufacturer: Dame Pubns
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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Readings and Case Studies in Auditing
Michael Harding , William R. Edge , and Barry J. Cooper
Manufacturer: Gaunt Inc.
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Retirement Systems in Japan: Wharton School Pension Research Council Monograph (Pension Research Council Publications Series)
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Retirement Systems in Japan: Wharton School Pension Research Council Monograph (Pension Research Council Publications Series)
Robert Louis Clark
Manufacturer: Univ of Pennsylvania Pr
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0256091412

Retirement Systems in Japan: Wharton School Pension Research Council Monograph (Pension Research Council Publications Series)
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Retirement Systems in Japan: Wharton School Pension Research Council Monograph (Pension Research Council Publications Series)
Robert Louis Clark
Manufacturer: Univ of Pennsylvania Pr
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000OQGD3I

Customer Reviews:

Reef, Rainforest and Red heart - the spirit of Australia.......2001-09-15

I only have one 'coffee table' book, and this is it.

This inspiring and moving book, beautifully captures in words and over 120 full-colour photographs the essence of the isolated continent that is Australia. The author, Darren Jew, was inspired by his father's travels in Antarctica to pursue a career in nature photography, and has photographed much of the world's wildlife and landscapes. However, it is his native Australia, where he grew up and lives, and where he spent 8 years as photographer for the Queensland National Parks and Wildlife Service which is his greatest inspiration.

In this book he takes the reader on a journey from the abundant life of the great barrier reef and tropical rainforests, to the stark beauty of the red centre. Along the way he shares with us his understanding of and love for the unique plants and animals that make this isolated continent their home.

Why do I love this book? I have travelled in Australia many times, and it is a truly magnificent and fascinating place to which I will return again and again. The author has captured this magic with breathtaking images and lyrical yet factual prose. It's clear he knows and understands the land, its plants and animals. The breadth of material is outstanding. You can dive down to the depths of the great barrier reef and swim amongst the beautiful corals and cruising barracuda; sit on a sandy athol watching the sun go down or catch crabs scuttling to their holes; climb the misty ranges of the blue mountains or gaze in awe at the majesty that is Ayers Rock.

Darren's range as a photographer is as wide as his knowledge of the land. His portaits of wildlife are superb - some burstling with action such as courting terns and diving whales, others graphic still lifes -the brilliance of the the colourful cup moth on a palm leaf, the beady eye of the watchful yellow python. They're all here: kookaburras and koalas, possums and platypus, cassowarys and crocodiles. There are over around 60 colour plates of all the well known Australian fauna and a few you won't have even thought of.

And the landscape photographs match the wildlife ones in both quantity and quality. Darren really does 'write with light' and captures the spirit of a place perfectly. You can almost feel the water dripping from the tree ferns in the rainforests, imagine the scent of silver barked eucalypts against the deepest blue sky and feel the parched red desert and sacred rocks.

Just as he captures the spirit of the creatures and landscapes, he too captures the moment. One of my favourite pictures is a glassy wave breaking onto the reef, every drop of water frozen at that moment in time - now where's my surf board?

Whilst many of Darren's pictures are spectacular panoramas, he is also adept at capturing the more intimate scenes: a close up of delicate forest fungi dripping with dew; a tiny turtle hatchling making its dangerous trip back to the ocean.

The words which accompany the images are both inspiring and illuminating - simply but engagingly written, with a vast store of first hand knowledge to draw upon. You can tell that the author loves his home and wants to protect and nuture it.

Whenever anyone asks me what Australia is like, I show them this book. Then they book their Qantas ticket. Really, it's that good.

The Greatest Ballpark Ever: Ebbets Field And The Story Of The Brooklyn Dodgers
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Why Bash Walter O'Malley?

Brooklyn As It Once Was-The Greatest Place to Grow Up

Bring back the Dodgers to Ebbets Field

Extraordinary!

Sorry Mr. Kahn, this is my new BIBLE

The Greatest Ballpark Ever: Ebbets Field And The Story Of The Brooklyn Dodgers
Bob McGee
Manufacturer: Rutgers University Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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Brooklyn Remembered: The 1955 Days of the Dodgers

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ASIN: 0813536006

Book Description

"I've been in and around baseball for seventy years now and this undoubtedly is one of the finest books I've ever read. For a moment I thought I was sitting in Ebbets Field and was ready to order a hot dog."—Arthur Richman, senior advisor for the New York Yankees

"For the old time fans of the Dodgers of Brooklyn, [TheGreatestBallparkEver] has much appeal and much to recommend it." -Harvey Frommer, frommersports: the Book Review

"Bob McGee spins a magical tale about the ball park, and readers will come away with an understanding of its mystique for generations of Dodger fans."—Stan Isaacs, weekly columnist at thecolumnists.com

Generations after its demise, iconic Ebbets Field remains the single most colorful and enduring image of a baseball park, with a treasured niche in the game's legacy and the American imagination.

In this lively story of sports, politics, and the talented, hilarious, and charming characters associated with the Brooklyn Dodgers, Bob McGee chronicles the ballpark's vibrant history from the drawing board to the wrecking ball, beginning with Charley Ebbets and the heralded opening in 1913, on through the storied eras that followed. McGee weaves a story about how Ebbets Field's architectural details, notable flaws, and striking facade brought Brooklyn and its team together in ways that allowed each to define the other. The author, who puts Dodgers fans in the driver's seat, illustrates poignant examples of how the people who came to play and those who watched and rooted both managed to inspire, endear, and captivate a nation. Ebbets Field was hallowed ground, a cherished place that continues to resonate in memory, long after the walls came down and the cheers subsided.

Drawing on original interviews and letters, as well as published and archival sources, The Greatest Ballpark Ever explores the individual struggle of Charley Ebbets to build Ebbets Field, the days of Wilbert Robinson's early pennant winners, the era of the Daffiness Boys, Larry MacPhail and the tumultuous field leadership of Leo the Lip, Branch Rickey and the fiery triumph of Jackie Robinson, the golden days of the Boys of Summer, and Walter O'Malley's ignominious departure. Memorable personalities including Casey Stengel, Zach Wheat, Dazzy Vance, Babe Herman, Van Lingle Mungo, Frenchy Bordargaray, Dolf Camilli, Pistol Pete Reiser, Pee Wee Reese, Mickey Owen, Hugh Casey, and Cookie Lavagetto are all here, as well as Oisk, Skoonj, Gil, Campy, Newk, the Duke, and many more.

With humor and passion, The Greatest Ballpark Ever lets readers relive a day in the raucous ballpark with its quirky angles and its bent right-field wall, with the characters and events that have become part of the nation's folklore.

Customer Reviews:

Why Bash Walter O'Malley?.......2007-08-07

This book is a must for Dodger fans, and the best of its kind.

But by 1957, Ebbets Field was no longer a suitable ballpark for a major league team. The park and its neighborhood were deteriorating, there was no public transportation, and attendance had been steadily falling even in their pennant-winning years (the previous review notes that the powerhouse Dodgers were drawing around 10,000 fans per home game). Renovation was not an option because there would be insufficient additional revenue projected to cover the cost. The Dodgers simply could not stay there. But Walter O'Malley did not want to leave Brooklyn.

In reality, he wanted to stay in Brooklyn and build a brand new ballpark at the corner of Atlantic and Flatbush, near public transportation. Walter O'Malley was not the villain of the piece; rather, it was Robert Moses, then the most powerful man in New York City, who refused to let him do so, insisting that he build instead in Flushing Meadows (where Shea Stadium stands today). They would no longer have been in Brooklyn, and O'Malley naturally refused. He left reluctantly, narrowly choosing Los Angeles over Minneapolis. In doing so, he brough Major League Baseball west of the Mississippi, and forever changed the game. He deserves to be in the Hall of Fame (plenty of even tougher businessmen are), but East Coast writers like Roger Kahn and misinformed fans like the one who posted that he "hates O'Malley" to this day have blocked his entry. Shame on them.

Brooklyn As It Once Was-The Greatest Place to Grow Up.......2006-12-04

What differentiated this book from the countless others witten about the Brooklyn Dodgers was the author's attention to small detail. Now being from Brooklyn myself I appreciated this. The references to Steeplechase and the clown with paddles, Jim McElroy bring the Torre brothers to games at Ebbets field, the old Washington Park, Jack Kaiser, etc. For the average baseball fan outside of Brooklyn this is a great way to experience what once was. Even though I was only 6 when the Dodgers left and never saw a game at Ebbets Field the only logo's I display on anything I wear are Brooklyn Dodgers hats or shirts. You can't believe how many compliments I get. McGee in his writing really connects the Dodgers into the everyday life of every Brooklynite. I could only imagine what it must have been like (neither of my parents were sports fans nor did I have brothers or sisters). Growing up on the streets of Brooklyn you never had to worry how much junk food you ate because you would constantly burn it off playing stickball or basketball in the schoolyards. I find it interesting the players lived right in the neighborhoods, todays players live in castles and mansions, how could they ever connect to today's fan. I read this book very slow in order to digest every detail, there are plenty to digest. I highly recoomend this book to anyone baseball fan or not to get a glimpse into what was the "greatest place in the world" to grow up in. I only regret the Dodgers were not there when I could have appreciated them. I had the pleasure of meeting the author at a book signing and if he is ever in your area make it your business to meet him. The only thing better than the book is actually meeting Bob McGee.

Bring back the Dodgers to Ebbets Field.......2006-10-22

Even though I grew up a Senators fan, having lived in Washington, DC., my parents, both of whom are from Brooklyn, instilled in me a love and respect for that grand old city/borough. I was born on October 16, 1956, 8 days after Don Larsen's World Series perfect game, but this book brought me in a time machine, allowing me to sit with Charley Ebbets as he planned to build this park, talked strategy with Uncle Robbie, laughed as the three Dodgers ended up on third, cried as those close chances in the World Series of the 1940s, cheered for Pee Wee, the Duke, Gil, Oisk, Campy and Jackie, booed Walter O'Malley and cried as the wrecking ball wiped out a landmark. Read this book today, immerse yourself in an era that was simpler, more neighborly, more alive. Take those memories and share them with all people, your kids, grandkids and their kids. Keep the memory of Ebbets Field and the Brooklyn Dodgers alive forever.

Extraordinary!.......2006-02-25

I had the privilege of meeting bob McGee at a commemoration of the Brooklyn Dodgers' only winning World Series and was amazed to learn he was a bit too young to have ever gone to Ebbets Field in person.
However, he somehow did manage to get there in spirit as he has done an exceptional job in capturing the flavor of a wonderful bygone era.
Until someone invents a time machine, McGee's book is the best means of transporting a reader back to a time when an extrordinary baseball team made those of us lucky enough to have lived in Brooklyn feel a little special outselves.
The well-known words of fellow Brooklynite Jackie Gleason describe this book to a "T."
"HOW SWEET IT IS!"

Sorry Mr. Kahn, this is my new BIBLE.......2005-08-30

As a 58 year old Brooklyn Dodger fanatic who still and always will hate O'Malley, Mr. McGee's book is my new bible. He gives you the entire history of Baseball in Brooklyn without being boring, without preaching facts and making me feel that I was still living on Eastern Parkway. This is one book that I read very slowly as I didn't want it to end. He brought back many great memories and also brought back the tears I shed when they left and even more when on that cold February day they tore down the Hallowd Walls of that place called Ebbets. He brought me back to the times when I snuck in to watch games, layed on my stomach on Bedford Avenue to sneak a peak at the only spot to look under the Center Field fense to watch a game,saved our Borden's Elsie Dixie Cup tops to get Bleacher Seats and to turn in a Bedford Blast for a free admision to the bleachers. He even spelled Gladys Goodding's name correctly, something not done in some of the other Brookly Dodger books.

A job well done, Mr. McGee. My only disappointment in your book is that I finally ran out of pages. But, It is a book I will read over and over and over again and to all who miss Ebbets Field,the Brooklyn Dodgers and still hate O'Malley, DO NOT miss this book

Steve Grossman, Mount Laurel, NJ

Book Description

Daniel has lived his whole life within the walls of an orphanage called Jeremiah, on Jupiter Island. He is a profoundly gifted, strong-willed and isolated 12 year old, with a powerful urge to explore. He has a plan to escape Jeremiah and experience the great adventure he has always dreamed of. But his journey hurls him into the clutches of a whirling black vortex, 10 miles below the ocean's surface, and a world yet unknown to human kind… the world of Prehistoria. Through a process of self-discovery and a very unusual friendship, Daniel experiences an important rite of passage, and leaves that world with a secret he will have to keep for the rest of his life.

Customer Reviews:

This book is a scam.......2007-03-18

It's a vanity press special. The book is horrible and only serves as a bullet point on the child author's resume. The writing displays a complete lack of emotional maturity. The whole piece is an exercise in narcissism. Don't waste a cent on this piece of trash.

Hate This Book.......2006-03-28

First, Im sorry if I spel anythig wrong, my keybords kind of damaged, and some letters don't always come out. Anyway, I hate this book. A lot. It's about a kid who gets suked into a black hole hidden under the Bermuda Triangl, and is traped there with a bunch of Hydras, but its badly ritten and the pictures make it wors. This is dul, dum, and really just awful.

Bleh!.......2006-03-07

After reading the reviews, I bought this as a joke. But the level of badly-written parts is no joking matter. And the author has stuffed the Bermuda Triangle into this. It's odd. It's about an orphan who falls into a black hole under (you guessed it) the Bermuda Triangle. Under it he meets an alien who thinks everyone is dying because of meat. The kid saves them (with no interest in it whatsoever) and then they use a cannon to shoot him to the surface in a coffin.
I just wish he died in the coffin. I hate this book.

Dull.......2006-02-23

This is the worst book ever, and is about a kid who lives in an orphanage, runs away, gets sucked into an underwater black hole, and meets an alien from a species that eats too much meat. They turn all the aliens into vegitariens and then the kid goes back home. Point-none. If it were allowed, I would give this zero stars. Pity it isn't

This sucks!.......2006-02-19

I hated this book, and I usually love sci-fi. It's a dumb thing about a boy in an orpahnage who gets sucked into an underwater black hole and meets dumb characters, and befriends a vegitarien alien who is royalty and heir to the throne. At the end they stick the kid in a metal box and shoot him to the surface, after a page of copied and pasted calculations and the kid saying "Yo!". Soemthing is wrong with this book.

Book Description

Buying travel can look very easy to the uninitiated, but road blocks can be raised every step of the way as you plan your dream vacation. This invaluable book is by the editors of Consumer Reports Travel Letter and includes expert tips and strategies on using the Web to find travel bargains, choosing the perfect trip, whether it's a tour or a cruise, getting the most out of your frequent flyer miles, finding great accodomations for less, and more.

Book Description

`This book highlights Don Lavoie's multidisciplinary approach to the study of economics. In his view, economics is closer to the humanities than to the hard sciences, notwithstanding the claim often made in the literature that economics is indeed "a hard science". True to Lavoie's vision, the book contains theoretical articles and case studies which link economics to several fields of study. It is a delight to see emphasis placed on the "hows and whys" underlying market processes.' - Alan A. Rabin, University of Tennessee, Chattanooga, US

`The authors do well-merited honor to Don Lavoie with carefully written contributions that not only are excellent for a memorial volume but could constitute a selection of outstanding journal articles. They tie together Lavoie's many superficially different interests in, among others, comparative economic systems, market processes, computer programming, and epistemology. In particular, they emphasize how markets and prices enhance and coordinate inevitably dispersed knowledge. So doing, they further develop the contributions of Ludwig von Mises and especially of F.A. Hayek to the debate over socialist calculation.' - Leland Yeager, Auburn University and University of Virginia, US

Don Lavoie's published work encompasses a wide range of subjects - socialism, hermeneutics, information technology, and culture. The subjects appear unrelated, but a close examination of his research reveals an underlying unity of thought and an economics at sharp variance with the post World War II mainstream. The contributors to this volume explore the legacy of his scholarship and its implications for economics.

Three themes run throughout Don Lavoie's work and are explored in these chapters, the overarching one being the importance of social intelligence to economics. Second, and related to this, was his belief that certain institutions or practices are better at creating social intelligence than others - what might be termed the primacy of liberty or voluntaryism. Thirdly, he asserted that economics is more closely aligned with the humane disciplines than with the physical. As these essays make clear, if the next generation of economists does integrate economics with the humanities, some of the credit must go to Don Lavoie.

Students and scholars of economics, methodology, and the humanities more broadly will find this a provocative and enriching collection.

A Humane Economy: The Social Framework of the Free Market
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The Humane Economy: Economics as if the Individual Matters..

The market is not everything

The Price of Everything and the Value of Nothing

Wilhelm Röpke, un economista ante la crisis de la cultura

A Truly Extraordinary Book

A Humane Economy: The Social Framework of the Free Market
Wilhelm Ropke
Manufacturer: ISI Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 1882926242

Book Description

An introduction to economic thinking which holds that the vital things in life are those beyond supply and demand, written by the chief architect of Germany's post-war social market economy. A Humane Economy offers an understandable and compelling explanation of how economies operate. A sweeping and brilliant exposition of market mechanics and moral philosophy, Rpke's masterwork cuts through the jargon and statistics that make most economic writing so obscure and confusing. Over and over, the great Swiss economist stresses one simple point: You cannot separate economic principles from human behavior.

Customer Reviews:

The Humane Economy: Economics as if the Individual Matters.........2003-06-29

~A Humane Economy~ is an astute treatise and insightful look at the social and political framework of the market economy. Wilhelm Röpke is a brilliant German-born economic, social and political thinker, and perhaps my favorite amongst the so called "Austrian school." He stands apart from his colleagues in that he thinks on a more humane level rejecting crude utilitarian calculations in favor of sound and prudent empirical reasoning. This brilliant German economist of the "Austrian school" stood up to the centralising and dehumanising policies of the Nazis. Röpke recognised that collectivist ideologies lay waste to civil society-destroying the intermediary institutions between individual and state. When the State acts to supplant the natural civil associations with state institutions to empower and enhance the state, it destroys the moral fabric of communities, saps the nation's economic vitality and usually leads to twin perils of centralisation and atomisation. Röpke recognized that allocating resources by the free play of supply and demand is the most humane system and as such he was champion of the market economy. He was influential over German economist Ludwig Erhard, who architected the Federal Republic of Germany's postwar economic plan, which emphasized free enterprise while effectively curtailing state controls (i.e. price fixing, rationing, and state enterprises.)

Röpke would attest that mammon is not the measure of all things. In Röpke's eyes, the intangibles-that is to say faith, family and tradition-are the things that animate life and give it meaning. Röpke recognised the limitations of the market economy. Röpke possessed a remarkable sense of prudence and conservative sobriety in his thinking as it relates to the political economy. He rejected the idea of making economists into social engineers whether in the interests of "efficiency" or "social justice." And amongst his "Austrian" colleagues like F.A. Hayek and Ludwig von Mises, he brought economics to a more humane level, rejecting crude utilitarian logic in favor of more sound empirical reasoning to defend the market economy. Furthermore, he refrains from the market idolatry that is so common to libertarian apologists for the free-market these days. Libertarians frequently espouse an ideology that can be summed up as "everything in the market, nothing outside the market." (This, of course, turns Mussolini's statist mantra on its nose.) Röpke recognised something that libertarians miss with their penchant for crude utilitarian calculations and their amoral neutrality that often makes being an avowed "libertarian" indistinguishable from being a "libertine." Many libertarians content themselves writing diatribes defending the "robber barrons" of the yesteryears while praising the colossal (i.e. Wal-Mart and oil cartels.) In their efforts to defend any and everything related to "the private sector," these reductionists forget that the apparently sporadic interventions of the state often come at the behest of big business. Many capitalists" content themselves with cozy public-private partnerships that translate to steady, predictable profits and a regulated environment that drowns small business competition. Big business typically possesses a considerable advantage over their smaller competitors, because they can absorb the regulatory costs much easier and they can influence the regulators and regulations. Röpke, however, scorns the "cult of the colossal" not in demagogic rhetoric, but in the rhetoric of an economist. He likewise sees "big business" as a concomitant pillar of "big government" and its regulatory state. Röpke possessed some peculiarities in his lexicon that set in him apart from his colleagues, but his motive for such peculiarities was principled. Röpke rejected characterising socialism as a "planned economy" and he recognised that the market economy facilitated economic activity "planned" by entrepreneurs as opposed to state planners. He preferred the delineation of "market economy" to "capitalism" since what often passed for capitalism in the early twentieth century was a large interventionist welfare state in a cozy lockstep relationship with big business monopolists. This was state corporatism not capitalism. Moreover, "capitalism" was, of course, coined by its chief critic Karl Marx and while the term captures the importance of capital to the market economy, it remains rather sterile and ideological. What is more, "capitalism" typically delineates a materialistic consumerist ideology or images of big business rather than a social framework based on the market economy.

Unlike libertarians and some classical economists who too often dwell in the realm of abstract theory, Röpke possessed a gritty realism: first, he recognised that there is interplay between between political and economic processes; and he recognised the value of state intervention in prosecuting acts of force and fraud, enforcing contracts and upholding private property rights. As an economist, he could offer prescriptive wisdom on the proper and limited role of the state in the economy while elaborating upon the causes and consequences imprudent state interventions (i.e. price-fixing, inflation, production quotas, monopolies, cartels, overtaxation and overregulation.) Röpke essentially favored economic laissez-faire overseen by a night-watchmen state that exercised profound restraint in its interventionism least it hinder or even cripple a nation's potential for prosperity. Underlying Röpke's humane economy is the idea that a market economy needs a prudent civil framework, widespread distribution of property, a strong entrepreneurial middle class and emphasis on parochial traditionalism. Anyway, Röpke itinerates the need for sound monetary and fiscal policy on the part of the state. He holds that the gold standard is the only real safeguard against the vicious boom-and-bust cycles of modern capitalist society. Röpke recognised that a market economy flourishes when tradition and community guard against the centralising depredations of both the state and big business. Röpke further emphasised the principle of subsidiarity, which in Europe today seems to survive only in that beautiful alpine island of parochialism, namely Switzerland. Though, Switzerland may be losing its vitality as it is straddled by the colossal and cosmopolitan EU super-state as if it is ready to be cansumed.

In the Humane Economy, Röpke surmised that: "The market economy, and with social and political freedom, can thrive only as part and under the protection of a bourgeois system. This implies the existence of a society in which certain fundamentals are respected and color the whole network of social relationships: individual effort and responsibility, absolute norms and values, independence based on ownership, prudence and daring, calculating and saving, responsibility for planning one's own life, proper coherence with the community, family feeling, a sense of tradition and the succession of generations combined with an open-minded view of the present and the future, proper tension between individual and community, firm moral discipline, respect for the value of money, the courage to grapple on one's own with life and its uncertainties, a sense of the natural order of things, and a firm scale of values." To answer those who might sneer at this, Röpke nimbly replies, "Whoever turns his nose up at these things... suspects them of being 'reactionary'... may in all seriousness be asked what ideals he intends to defend against Communism without having to borrow from it."

John Zmirak does a wonderful job profiling the life and work of a very brilliant man. Bravo! Röpke's ideas are remarkably original, but even so are analogous to that of conservative sociologist Robert Nisbet, Anglo-Catholic distributists like Chesterton and Belloc, and the Southern agrarians. You might check out their works as well if Wilhelm Röpke interests you.

The market is not everything.......2001-05-04

One of the great errors prevalent in economics is the assumption that an economy is a kind of endogenous entity which can be understood entirely on its own terms, without reference to social, political, and psychological factors. This error is especially prevalent among those ideologues who believe that, while politics affects economics, economics never affects politics. But this is clearly not how things stand in social reality. Politics and economics exist within a complex web of causal interdependence. No attempt to impose through politics a specific brand of economics can ever hope to be successful, since waves of causation from the economic realm will ricochet back into the political realm, thus altering the original economic program.

The political right, especially in its libertarian and pro-market incarnations, has never properly understood this insight into social reality. In their polemic economic tracts, they implicitly assume that "society" or the "government" could choose at any time to adopt any economic principle it liked, regardless of the likely social or political consequences of that principle. Libertarians tend to support any economy policy which they believe will bring about greater freedom and efficiency, ignoring all the while the disastrous consequences the policy might have in the political and social realms. The great merit of Wilhelm Roepke's "Humane Economy" is that he sedulously avoids this error. Roepke is one of the few pro-market who understands that the free market does not exist in vacuo and that the market cannot be defended as a good-in-itself. In the "Humane Economy," Roepke points out that free enterprise depends on sociological, moral, and cultural factors for its maintenance and survival. The "sphere of the market, of competition, of the system where supply and demand move prices and thereby govern production, may be regarded and defended only as part of a wider general order encompassing ethics, law, the natural conditions of life and happiness, the state, politics, and power," writes Roepke. "Individuals who compete on the market and there pursue their own advantage stand all the more in need of the social and moral bonds of community, without which competition degenerates most grievously." Roepke's defense of the market rests firmly on time-tested conservative principles. He dissects the corrosive effects of mass society and social rationalism and warns against those two "slowly spreading cancers of our Western economy," "the irresistible advance of the welfare state and the erosion of the value of money, which is called creeping inflation." There are few books which detail the crisis of modern civilization in the West better than this one; and none which offer a more convincing vision of a genuinely "humane" economy.

The Price of Everything and the Value of Nothing.......2001-03-13

Russell Kirk tended to take the view of Edmund Burke that the age of Sophists, Economists, and Calculators was upon us and that the unbought graces of life were gone. Kirk found the priests of the dismal science to be a blinkered breed who worshipped the god Efficiency, but from that judgment he excluded Wilhelm Ropke, whose work was aimed at returning economics to the human scale.

Ropke opposed the rise of the National Socialists in his native Germany. When Hitler came to power, Ropke was forced to leave, having lectured against the centralizing economics of that regime. But after the Second World War he returned to play a large role in Germany's postwar recovery, which was based on market solutions. From experience he had no confidence in systems of centralized authority -- socialism, communism, or collectivized decision-making of any kind. Against these he believed in local institutions, such as the small town of his birth, family, church, local community, neighborhood, and what Burke called the little platoons in which we travel.

Further, he had no faith in an abstract capitalism that excluded moral considerations. The essence of A Humane Economy is that the most important facets of life transcend the economic sphere. Ropke builds his argument by looking at the moral foundations and ethical conditions necessary for a market economy to function, and by locating the market economy within necessary limits and spheres of activity. He also examines the destructive effects of mass society: crowded cities, bureaucratic hospitals, ubiquitous industry, egalitarian democracy, the absurd pace and busy-ness of modern life, and the myth of the sovereign people over the individual person. The remaining chapters look at the welfare state, chronic inflation, and the importance of ownership and private property.

The line that Ropke draws is between centrism and decentrism. With centrism comes the gradual erosion of the human element. Just as Ortega y Gassett showed how modernity had excluded man from art, so Ropke is arguing that economics has gradually excluded man from economics. While art had become preoccupied with abstract ideas, economics was being treated as a science, surrounded by theory, charts, and graphs. What economists should have been doing, argues Ropke, is adapting economic policy to man, not trying to adapt man to economics.

Readers should have no trouble recognizing this dehumanization at work in today's world. Contra Ropke, the centralizing impulse is on the rise in both government and the workplace. Books about economics have earned their reputation for dullness, but Ropke transcends the genre. His book is readable and re-readable, with a wider view than the blinkered breed usually gives us. Perhaps in time A Humane Economy will receive a proper hearing.

Wilhelm Röpke, un economista ante la crisis de la cultura.......2000-07-21

Guillermo Röpke, que nace casi con el siglo XX, es uno de los representantes más acreditados del verdadero pensamiento económico, reconciliado con la reflexión ética y política. Lejos de él la tajante separación entre la economía y la política instituida por los representantes del neoliberalismo economicista. Röpke, amigo de Alexander Rüstow, cuya obra también conocía en profundidad, constituye en ejemplo superior de la manera de pensar en órdenes concretos ("Ordnungsdenken"). Ello explica, justamente, la importancia del libro cuya traducción al inglés registra el título "A Humane Economy", y cuya traducción al español, mucho más fiel al título alemán, se rotuló "Más allá de la oferta y la demanda". En efecto, ese título resume perfectamente la intención del autor, pues Röpke consideraba que la economía de mercado no lo es todo. En su opinión, esta necesita ser sostenida por un recio entramado de creencias y valores. En este sentido, resulta insólito descubrir la preocupación social de Röpke en una profesión, la de economista, demasiado preocupada por las grandes categorías científicas.

A Truly Extraordinary Book.......1999-12-21

If you want a bracing look at how society should run, pick up this book. Ropke, a German who resisted Hitler during WWII and was an architect of Germany's post-war economic resurgance, writes beautifully about the value of the market economy, and about the need to undergird this economy with strong social and political institutions.

A chief value of the book is that it was first written back in 1960, and is therefore outside of the current, rather small, debate. Although some of his topics seem a little dated (communism chief among them), the underlying battle is timeless and this book is well-worth the read.

Economic personalism: A new paradigm for a humane economy (Occasional papers / Acton Institute)
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Humane Economy
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A Humane Economy
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A Humane Economy
Wilhelm Ropke
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A Humane Economy
Wilhelm Ropke
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A Humane Economy - The Social Framework of the Free Market
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Wilhelm Ropke
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The Humane Economy. Populism, Capitalism, and Democracy
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The Humane Economy. Populism, Capitalism, and Democracy
Norman Pollack
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The Humane Economy: Populism, Capitalism, and Democracy
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A Humane Economy: The Social Framework of the Free Market
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Wilhelm Ropke
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Book Description

`Globalization has jarred the traditional role and competitiveness of small- and medium-sized enterprises. This masterful volume comprises leading scholars, policy makers and business leaders who have new insights and strategies for SMEs creating opportunities rather than being victims of globalization. The result is a breakthrough in our understanding of entrepreneurship in the global context.'
- David Audretsch, Indiana University, US

Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) often have difficulty competing in the global economy unless they collaborate with domestic or foreign partners or with public sector organizations. This book addresses the resource leverage and innovation challenges that increased global trade represents for SMEs. In doing so, it explores how SMEs can become more competitive at home and in foreign markets as stand-alone firms or as members of supplier and customer networks.

SMEs are turning increasingly to innovation as a source of competitive advantage in order to protect their home markets and participate in expanding foreign markets. The contributors to this volume - leading experts in entrepreneurship, innovation, and international business - provide in-depth coverage of the most compelling issues facing SMEs. These include: innovation as a competitive strategy, network dynamics, ways to leverage technology, internationalization, and the role of the public sector in helping SMEs to overcome resource deficiencies.

This comprehensive look at SMEs in the global marketplace will be of great interest to academics who study entrepreneurship, innovation, or international business, officials from public sector agencies with responsibility for helping SMEs to internationalize and become more innovative, and senior executives of SMEs or executives of larger companies who are considering collaboration with SMEs.

Contents: Introduction Part I: Innovation and Competitive Advantage Part II: Network Dynamics Part III: Technology and Enhanced Capabilities Part IV: Internationalization Part V: Role of the Public Sector Part VI: Executive Summaries Index

Contributors: J. Andrews, A. Camuffo, G. Cattani, S. Chamberlain, D. Crick, H. Etemad, M. Freel, A. Furlan, R. Grandinetti, T. Guay, J. Hoban, M.V. Jones, A. Kaufman, M. Kujawa, K. Lint, J.H Love, J.W. Lu, C. Maitland, D.J. Maslach, R.B. McNaughton, V. Ojala, T. O'Shaughnessy, J.M. Pennings, I.J. Petrick, S. Roper, M. Rosales, P. Shapira, M. Spence, J.P. Stites, G.I. Susman, P.M. Swamidass, M.I. Tambakeras, D. Ucbasaran, V. Vulasa, P. Westhead, C.H. Wood, M. Wright, Z. Wu, J. Youti

Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises in the Global Economy
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Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises in the Global Economy

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Entrepreneurship and globalization are two much-examined forces as we enter the new millennium--yet very little has been published on the intersection of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and the global economy. To close the gap, this volume delves into the intricate roles and consequences of such businesses on both global and domestic economies.

The first part of the volume provides an overview of the phenomenon of globalization, arguing that entrepreneurial discovery and technological change lead to globalization, which in turn leads to further opportunity for entrepreneurial discovery--no less for SMEs than for multinational corporations. In part two, the essays examine the role of SMEs in the global economy and why they are thriving. Part three reviews the roles of SMEs and innovators and examines their roles in direct foreign investment. Part four explores the role of technological diversity and knowledge spillovers as a way to explain the superior innovative performance of SMEs. Part five looks at the role of SMEs in technology transfer. Finally, part six examines the theoretical and policy implications of the international activities of SMEs, suggesting that policies should aim to reduce the costs in international expansion for SMEs.

This volume will provide the foundation for further study in SMEs and globalization. It will appeal to scholars and students in both international business and economics.

Zoltan J. Acs is Professor of Economics and Finance, University of Baltimore. Bernard Yin Yeung is Professor of International Business, University of Michigan.

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This report contains business intelligence information for succesful export-import, business and investment operations, strategic contacts and more... The report also contains selected information on investment and business opportunities, international economic projects, tenders, government projects, as well as, marketing and export-import opportunities information.

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