Ethics Books

Blue presents a five-step model to start a healing ministry, especially for those with little or no such background. This model originates from Fuller Theological Seminary's Professor John Wimber and has been tested in diverse denominational heritages, e.g., Presbyterian, Lutheran, Methodist, Baptist, Pentecostal. The five steps, with headings in Blue's own words, are:

(1) To Interview the Sick Person: The purpose is to gather pertinent information, anything from where it hurts to the person's family history, to estimate the condition's causes (natural, emotional, relational, spiritual), scope, history and significance. The symptoms of physical illness and mental disturbance are usually rooted in spiritual, emotional and relational causes that are not obvious at first. Open-end questions encourage the person's participation; the person is to be allowed to be the expert on his/her own pain. Listening between the lines is essential --- hurting persons may know more about their problems than they are willing to say, or they may be unaware of the underlying causes. Intense listening is indistinguishable from love; and love heals. Listeners must be worthy of trust. It is also essential to listen to God. God may at any moment communicate t us something vital about the person --- this is called a "word of knowledge" or a "word of insight".

(2) To Choose a Prayer Strategy: Blue actually presents no strategy beyond a general recommendation to be specific in the intercession to focus on the estimated root cause.

(3) To Pray for Specific Results: In order to monitor periodically the sick person's condition to determine what, if anything, is happening --- we are to pray for observable measurable results rather than with non-directive vagueness. The better we can see what God is ding, the better we can cooperate with God in his work. Any feedback from the sick person needs be honest accurate, avoiding any implicit or explicit pressure to report improvements when there is none; otherwise, spiritual and medical help might be prematurely stopped.

(4) To Assess the Result: If healing has only begun, then prayer may be continued. If little or n healing appears, the diagnosis might be wrong and further interviewing may be needed to gather more/better information.

(5) To Give Postprayer Direction: The healing process, once it begins, may be helped or hindered by the person's own thoughts and actions. For example, some sickness is caused by sin; and the healing may be neither significant nor permanent, unless the sins repented of. Good counsel and support are essential.

It is instructive to conclude by Blue's repeated reminder that the final comprehensive realization occurs only at our resurrection from the dead, and the greatest contribution to health and wholeness within the Christian community is not ultimately the healing ministry, but rather the preventive medicine of following Jesus.

The ability to heal is a spiritual gift seldom acknowledged in mainstream churches yet is an undeniable gift from God (See John 14:12 among others). This book is a must read for anyone interested in starting or being involved in a healing ministry or just curious. Either way, you'll be more informed by this straightforward and easy to read book.

In the initial part of this book Ken journeys people through the theology of Christian misconceptions about healing. He then set out a paradigm and praxis for people to minister Gods healing to others. He traces the various aspects of modern Christian thought about sickness and contrasts this with the biblical view. Ken also looks at the influence that a variety of historic/cultural/institutional world views have had on modern Christian thought regarding healing. This is a worthwhile book for anyone interested in healing. Ken has a profound Grace based theology and this is evident throughout the book. You will feel empowered reading this book and Ken uses numerous anecdotes skillfully.

This is one of the best books that I have read concerning the healing ministry. The first section, which covers theological hindrances, is the strength of the work. It will challenge both the skeptic and the enthusiast of divine healing. Blue brings a needed balance to divine healing literature. As a pastor in the charismatic tradition, I highly recommend this book.

Ken Blue, a pastor in San Diego, delineates the biblical foundation for a faith-based healing ministry. After identifying and refuting several erroneous mindsets impeding a biblically based healing ministry, he outlines a five-step model to start such a healing ministry.

Blue reasons from the Bible that God wills the ultimate healing of all spiritual, psychological and physical sickness. That God desires and wills to alleviate certain earthly sickness and pain --- was evidenced by Jesus' healing miracles that were actualized in love and compassion for the sick. When Jesus told his followers to preach the Kingdom of God, he also commended them to heal the sick and to cast out demons. Virtually every mass turning to God in the New Testament occurred with not only preaching, but with also the manifest power of God's healing. The Kingdom of God, often misunderstood as merely a spiritual state or a futuristic reality, may be advanced concretely here-and-now one person at a time as he/she is delivered from the dominion of darkness. This deliverance may come as the defeat and the driving off of sickness, often caused by the personalized evil of demonic presence.

One cognitive hindrance to a biblical healing ministry is the false ideal of "sanctification through sickness", traceable back to the Patristic church when Roman persecution seemed to purify and to grow the church and when a person's martyrdom brought him/her status within the church. With Constantine's state-alliance with the church, true confessors (no longer externally persecuted) self-persecuted through asceticism by degrading one's body. Supported also by the prevalent Greek thoughts, "sanctification through sickness" became established in the Patristic era and survived the Reformation. In modern days, this "sanctification through sickness" notion is justified by sickness' alleged educational or remedial value. When God sends sanctifying sickness, it is sent to modify bad behavior. Christians are not to passively accept sickness, but rather to stop sinning. The sickness lasts only as long as the sin continues and not interminably without explanation as chronic illness often does. Involuntary passive sickness is to be differentiated from voluntary active cross-bearing. Inevitable suffering due to persecution is likewise to be distinguished from evitable sickness. We are not to accept sickness passively as if it were good in and of itself, but to fight it with all we have; and the church has Christ's ministry of healing with which to fight it.

A second mistaken theology (found more likely among Calvinist-leaning churches) is divine determinism, that all pain or comfort must have been so decreed by God. "God is sovereign, so anything that happens to me must be God's will. If I get sick, then this must be God's will for me." This theology is an attempt to address the question why bad things happen to good people. There is a very true underlying premise that God is all-powerful and that nothing can happen that He says "no" to. This theology, however, takes it a step further and assumes that anything that happens is God's express will. It discounts human choice (though the Bible clearly teaches free will) and it discounts spiritual warfare. This outlook contradicts Jesus' evident desire in the Gospels to heal sickness. It presents a warped view of God as mean and that He desires for bad things to happen to us as part of His good plans. This could breed despair and passivity, as well as hostility towards God.

A third attitudinal hindrance is faith-formulas, found more frequently in Arminian-leaning churches. Faith-formulas presume that only if the Christian knows/believes enough/properly, health and prosperity may be fully and constantly available. This is human-centeredness and may possibly induce false guilt when the expected outcome is unrealized. Rather, biblical faith involves a child-like trust in God's love and power, despite sickness and need. Indeed, the Gospel's accounts and Blue's own experiences indicate no strict causal relationship between faith and healing. The present-life's experience of the Kingdom of God is partial and provincial and ambiguous, with an ebb-and-flow whose dynamics lies largely beyond the Christian's comprehension.

A fourth hindering mindset is the naturalistic worldview, which understands the world as a closed system governed only by the cause and effect of natural laws, discovered by empirical observations. Present-day western Christians often expect no miracles and consequently experience none. Blue's own experiences, however, indicate a high correlation between one's request for miracles and one's experience of healing.

Cardinal to a healing ministry are (1) a recognition that God desires wholeness and that God wills to heal the sick, (2) a sincere compassion for those in pain, and (3) a willingness to be vulnerable for possible humiliation and defeat without ever knowing why --- those who pray for the sick enter an unseen world of spiritual forces, which cannot be fully comprehended. However, the very worse that can happen is that nothing happens --- people would not be damaged by prayer, if people are not lied to and not flogged for their lack of faith, but reassured that nothing can separate them from the love of God. People do not regret being loved by God and his people.

If you read one book on Grace in your life, it sould be this one. Grace doesn't stop...it keeps going. The question is, "How for does it go?"

This was my first Capon book and it made me fall in love with his writing and the way he uses stories and dialogue to expound the meaning of grace.

I think almost all of his books are on grace and that's because he has been captivated by the grace of God.

This novel, like most of his other books, may not be that simple a read but once you get what he's getting at, then you start to stand in awe of the amazingness of God's grace.

Capon is pretty lutheran in his view on law and gospel and it shows clearly in his books.

This particular novel is interesting in the way he tries to convey God's grace to us. It's about two people who are married but carries on with an affair together. This story is meant to outrage us, but Capon uses this storyline to show us that God's grace is like that. Despite the sins we do, He still loves us and accepts us in Christ.

Has Capon gone a bit far in illustrating grace to us? Well, i don't know. All i can say is that he's at least half right! A good book to read and ponder about God's grace

This was my first Capon book and it made me fall in love with his writing and the way he uses stories and dialogue to expound the meaning of grace.

I think almost all of his books are on grace and that's because he has been captivated by the grace of God.

This novel, like most of his other books, may not be that simple a read but once you get what he's getting at, then you start to stand in awe of the amazingness of God's grace.

Capon is pretty lutheran in his view on law and gospel and it shows clearly in his books.

This particular novel is interesting in the way he tries to convey God's grace to us. It's about two people who are married but carries on with an affair together. This story is meant to outrage us, but Capon uses this storyline to show us that God's grace is like that. Despite the sins we do, He still loves us and accepts us in Christ.

Has Capon gone a bit far in illustrating grace to us? Well, i don't know. All i can say is that he's at least half right! A good book to read and ponder about God's grace

We have clear conceptions of important abstractions that we have heard named, but not defined, since we were children. We live with misconceptions born while we wait to understand when we are able. Unfortunately, these images take on a life of their own, and crowd out any possibility of there ever being any real understanding.

Grace is one of those concepts. We hear the word repeated in sermon and song, we use it ourselves in characature. The image of what we think Grace is limits our access to its reality in our lives.

Enter this annoying book. Capon twists and tweaks and disturbs our sense of what is right and wrong. OUR sense.
Only when the shocking first section is trumped by the final section do we realize what is happening to us. Even though he warns us repeatedly along the way, and taunts us into dialogue.

I admit the central section merely annoyed me without enlightening me ... yet. Maybe I will get it later. Sacred adultary, a mafia hit, and a coffee hour give-and-take seem unlikely parables to expain Grace. It works. With style and grace. Anyone who has tried to live a life of faith honestly in the midst of the contradictions of life will feel this book resonate within their soul.

No wonder it is subtitled "Romance, Law, and the OUTRAGE of Grace."

Capon continues to tantalise, entice and stimulate with this revised edition of Between Noon and Three. Capon captures the incredibly lavish Grace of God through a combination of wit, exegesis, and a carefully crafted story. This book is a real shock to the "grace-fearing spoilsport in every one of us". Capon confronts the menacing ugliness of legalism and drags it screaming into the light of the lavish Grace and Love of God. Capon expounds the Grace of God in such a way that one can't help salivating at the beauty of God made complete in his glorious Son. Throughout the novel one is continuously shouting AMEN (I Love you) to the Father who so loves his children that he does not give grace so that they will feel "much obliged" but rather extends totally free, unconditional, absolutely radical, all encompassing Grace. This is the grace for Dead people, and as Capon eloquently describes: all that is required of a dead body is to stink. I Love my God who makes the little, least, lost, last, losers and the DEAD - ALIVE! FREE and all this is GRATIS!

Sometimes you really need to hear another perspective to help clarify your own view of the world. This text, with its myriad of viewpoints, gave me a boost of energy as I set out to analyze my organization.

Job well done.

Business as usual will be the undoing of capitalism. This book should be mandatory reading for all executive officers and shareholders. The thoughts illuminated in Marc Benioff's book provide a blueprint for corporate citizenry and social responsibility.

I was so impressed with this book! It is for all types of people - from students to successful business executives.

Having spent the last 2 years researching the CSR arena, it is a miracle to find a collection of such provocative, inspiring and well-told stories of the world's biggest corporations' commitment to the community. Each chapter pulls back the curtain on the real story of CSR in a different Fortune 500 company, focusing not only on the benefit to the community, but importantly, on the benefit to the company as well. I have yet to find a resource as valuable on the subject of CSR. It is a must-read for anyone working in a corporation - big or small.

In a world riddled with corporate scandals and corruption, this book provides a completely refreshing point of view. It is expertly written and provides invaluable insight. Fantastic!

Moral issues of race, air bombings of civilians, and kamikazes are only part of the story.
It's also a detailed general history of the causes and turning points of WWII.
And also an exciting tale of bravery.
In the Battle of Midway, I didn't know specifically about the bravery of the torpedo bomb plane pilots who chose to attack without fighter support. Because they had to go in low and slow, they were almost all wiped out and not one torpedo hit. But because the enemy Zero planes were all down low fighting the torpedo bombers, when the American dive bombers arrived at 10,000 feet, with no Zeros to stop them, they were able to sink the enemy carriers in the turning point of the Pacific. The author even quotes a novel by Herman Wouk to make it exciting.
He also makes exciting the story of Taffy 3. A small U.S. sea battle group that charged the much greater enemy and protected the American retaking of the Phillipines.
As for any second guessing of morality decades later, there is no easy answer. But the author gives you plenty of facts. I imagine both liberals and conservatives would find much to help their arguments.
To either, I can't recommend this enough.

In Choices Under Fire, Bess pens essays about the moral issues faced in World War II. You can read these essays independently from each other. Bess discusses racism, the kamikazes, the atomic bomb, bombing civilian populations, the battle of Midway, cooperating with Stalin, the holocaust, and the war crimes trials. None of this material is new; in fact, a lot of the material is familiar to most readers interested in World War II history. What is unique about this book is that Bass explores the moral dimensions of personal, collective and national choices.

Each essay starts with a view that is presented in most American World War II textbooks. Bess adds additional historical information, most of which is known but "forgotten" or rarely associated with the events being discussed. He then links this material to the moral choices made by the main actors in this situation and presents a more nuanced version of that event (for example, Japanese expansion is examined within the context of European imperialism, or the rational to bomb civilian centers, our alliance with Stalin to defeat a dictator like Hitler, and other such decisions).

One may not agree with some of the perspectives presented in this book, such as the attack on Pearl Harbor grew out of Japan's searing experience of helplessness before European and American domination, or that the judgments handed down to the Nazis at Nuremberg represented rough victors' justice, rather than morally clean verdicts. However, one needs to acknowledge that there could be divergent perspectives on the same set of events.

Armchair Interviews says: Very interesting perspective on WWII.

Reading this book forced me to fundamentally assess the choices I make in my own life. I know that the purpose of the book is to reflect on the choices of others during WWII, but I could not, as I read the stories of the polish soldiers who volunteered to kill Jews, or the french citizens who risked their lives to save them, or the discussions that lead to the very deceptive term "collateral damage", separate my own questions about what I would choose.
As we face the on-going war in Iraq, these questions take on even deeper meaning. One cannot walk away from this book without an understanding that everyday we make moral choices that shape the way we will interact with the world, when the chips are down. We must confront our own humanity, our own flaws even during "righteous wars" and realize that each of us define the image of oour society and that the choices we make really do matter.
Most importantly, the author makes the most compelling argument for peace and cooperation that I have ever read. This book will leave you deep in though about yourself and your country and the choices we make for some time. I think it is one of the best books I have ever read.

"Choices under Fire" is a baker's dozen of essays about the moral issues faced in World War II. The essays can be read separately. Among the subjects the author discusses are racism, the kamikazes, the atomic bomb, bombing civilian populations, the battle of Midway, cooperating with Stalin, the holocaust, and the war crimes trials. For a seasoned reader of World War II books most of the issues discussed and the conclusions drawn are not especially new or original. This is material that has been hashed over before.

However, I thought especially interesting -- and new to me -- was the comparison of the ordinary men in a special German unit charged with killing Russian Jews with another group of ordinary French provincials who took it upon themselves to rescue Jews. The author explores why two groups of similar people responded so differently to the choices they faced in the War. Also good was his account of the slow erosion during the war of the revulsion against bombing civilian populations. This led to the fire-bombing of Dresden and other cities. I would characterize the author's discussion of Hiroshima as sensible as opposed to much of the emotion aroused by this issue.

The author is fair-minded and objective about a number of controversial subjects.

Smallchief

Understanding history allows to explain the present

A candidate in the French presidential elections(Mr. Le Pen) recently compared the 9/11 attacks on the United States to the carpet bombing of Dresden and Marseille by the Anglo-American air forces during the WW II . It is not an isolated case of an abusive employment of historical facts for political manipulation. There is no other defense against such manipulation than knowing and understanding history.

Michael Bess' book is a milestone in our knowledge of the WW II which, despite its ambiguities, was a just war fought against an evil tyranny. Approaching the history of that war from an unfrequented avenue, the author brilliantly defends upholding of moral principles and imperatives in the course of war, irrespectively of how evil and monstrous our enemy is. He exposes a tremendous impact of the choices made under fire, be it by the Commander in Chief or by a foot soldier on the results of the struggle and on its perception decades after. Ultimately, keeping our hands clean is not only a moral but also a political imperative.

On the background of an impressive and vast panorama of WW II Bess exposes diverging perceptions between and within the major participating countries of the legacy of that war and asks Did we learn anything?" Certainly he is among those who did. Making a strong case for a need to follow the internationalist impulse in relations between countries and for the reconciliation between former enemies he articulates lessons which are far from a universal recognition but absorbed by many already.

I read the book from a multiple perspective of a veteran of WW II (fighting the Germans in Warsaw,Poland), a prisoner in a German P.O.W. camp, a former UN staff member and peacekeeper, and a resident of Germany now. In a rewarding experience I found myself in a full accord with the author's incisive insight into the neglected aspects of that titanic struggle and with his conclusions.

It is definitely the most important book about the WW II I ever read and I recommend it to everyone interested in explaining our present by understanding the past. It reads well and leaves you with a rich plate of food for thought.

I read this book when i was in 8th grade and i loved it ever since and used to own my own copy. It gave insight to the way i viewed our capitalist world. But why so expensive to buy it? this book has a knowledge that everyone should be able to get at a low cost, not because many of sellers want to make a profit off the book that is out of print, irony to those who read it and are selling and say its a great book. i passed mine on to a good friend.

I agree with both previous reviewers that the book is an extraordinary indictment of the dominant culture. But I got something else from this book as well. I read this that Forbes is saying that one of the reasons civilization is killing the planet is because of a spiritual illness with a physical vector. If I get the flu and then cough all over you, you might then get the flu, with all of its symptoms. If I have the cannibal sickness and I cough (or somehow otherwise transfer the disease to you) you will have to consume the souls of others in order to survive. You will become a vampire. Or to putthis another way, you will become a conquistador, a pornographer, a slaver, a businessman. I read this not only as a metaphor, but as a possible description of how things really are. And he makes a very convincing case. Wonderful and important book by a very wise man.

This is an incredible book. Jack Forbes brings up ideals on why we are so destructive in a whole new fashion. All of the other reviews ive read on this have been right on. Unfortunately this book is out of print and is up to 130.00 dollars. But over all this is a very important book that should demand re-printing. I recomend this book to anybody who agrees with the fact that industrial civilization is killing everything in its path...

An amazing perspective on the conditions of mankind. What Forbes tells us is that there is this negative consciousness, this spiritual sickness called "The Wetiko Psychosis" that gets passed on from being to being. It's an inherited twisted perspective on life, and feeling about life.. The bestowers for the last 500 years of the Wetiko disease have come from the European culture, although he mentions that many cultures through out history have endulged in Wetiko behavior, from Egypt, to Rome, to Russia, China. He's also mentioned that the once oppressed may carry on this mentality, this lunacy to a higher degree sometimes then the original oppressors/ colonizers.
There is authenticity in this book that isnt found that often. The reader learns so much about Native American phylosophy. It stays the course with you from beginning to end. When I first read the book, I was thinking to myself "hmm I dont know, thats stretching it isnt it? Cannibalism?" But the way he describes it, and in the way he means it, now I understand. We need to take a more compassionate and loving path. A path of power now because we're running out of time. We're all enduring the effects of it today and will for years to come. He says it wont change unless we change and heal ourselves first.

When I think of cannibalism I think of another person eating the body of another person. I don't think that way after reading this book, cannibalism has a totally different meaning to me.

Could we call it cannibalism when a Christian missionary goes into a Indian Village and gives them no other choice but to see God his way? Why couldn't the missionary just be happy in his own church with his own followers?

Is it cannibalism when a capitalist decides to turn a forest into two-by-fours? Wasn't the forest down the road that was turned into two-by-fours last week enough? Is the person with the chainsaw taking orders a cannibal to?

Forbes makes it clear that there has been, and still are, a lot of people suffering from the cannibal sickness among us who want to consume all life around them. He claims you don't have to eat another person all you have to do is control their heart and mind, you've than consumed them. And to survive in the cannibal's culture you almost have to become a cannibal yourself. It's contagious. It's the sickness that creates the pecking order were all familiar with. It's actually kind of scary, this culture just might consume itself if it isn't careful.

Forbes does show at the end of the book that there is another way. He shows that there has existed, and still exists, different "paths" to take that isn't offered by the cannibals.

A great book to help heal a sick culture.

i just wanted a light reading on love and this light read covers many major points of love that i never considered and gave me many "hah hah" moments.

too many books on the market claim to understand the concept of love and how it is experienced and how romantic love is, real love is, and the truth of it. this is the only book out so many i have studied that actually fits it to a tee! excellent book for putting love in a nutshell if love can so be put!

Armstrong brilliantly brings key texts in philosophy and theology (especially Augustine), novels, and paintings to bear on the topic of love. It is an intelligent but also accessible collection of brief meditations on what it means to seek and receive love. Armstrong's emphasis on the role of virtue (broadly defined in a classical rather than Puritanical sense) is especially useful.

I was given this by a flatmate for Christmas a couple of years ago after she was given a copy and adored it.

I love this book, it's a reality check on all the overblown, hyped up expectations we have about love and romance these days but manages to show that the real thing (facing each other over the breakfast table for the next 50 years) has a grace and beauty all its own.

Clearly whoever I lent it to loves it as well, I haven't seen it in AGES!!

'..... there seems to be a rarer - but still real - possibility of love growing over time and becoming stronger and deeper.' Anyone who can write this has an extraordinary view of love - challenging the common view that it must fade and be replaced by a comfort of familiarity. Armstrong links this growing love to music (which makes so much sense to me) and katabasis (a new word for me - but a feeling I know so well) giving me such strong encouragement in my feeling that real love can never die - one I find so much opposition to in the community around me.

I picked up John Armstrong's book because I have been doing some work with Dr Francis Macnab, whose book 'Hungry for Love' had been an awful confrontation. At every step of the way it seemed I was in opposition to Dr Macnab although I actually like the man. Was it his ideas that confronted me, or was it something about my view of love? (I now believe Dr Macnab's audience - perhaps subconsciously defined by Dr Macnab himself - is all those people for whom 'love' has failed. I am simply not one of them.)

There is so much insight in this slender book of John Armstrong that I recommend all should read it - those in love, those hoping to be in love, those recovering from disappointment and those who seem to have lost love. I learned much about myself by reading this book, and that is useful. But most of all I keep coming back to the radiant message '..... there seems to be a rarer - but still real - possibility of love growing over time and becoming stronger and deeper.' If only we could all achieve it!

other recommendations:
Francis Macnab - Hungry for Love
Ivan Turgenev - Spring Torrents (quoted by Armstrong)
Ernest Hemingway - Spring Torrents (a rather different novel)
Anna Kavan - Let Me Alone
Anna Kavan - A Scarcity of Love
Alma Schindler (Mahler) - Diaries

The author has given a great expose' on the problems of abuse that exist in corporate America. The expectation that corporate boards are serving as a watch dog in their duties is a myth that is propigated by the illusion of proxy voting and "independant" directors. I would love to hear more about solutions that are available to small shareholders to counter this movement. A listing of websites and ideas on how shareholders can consult other experts on issues of the day when corporate boards are meeting is important and could have helped in this book as well. Still a great read for all shareholders to understand the landscape of corporate governance. dls

Corpocracy both delights and informs in a way only Bob Monks can. His lifework has been delineating the underlying dynamics of corporate power to devise a system that combines wealth creation with societal interest. No one else can write as well about "How CEOs and the Business Roundtable Hijacked the World's Greatest Wealth Machine" because no one else has been as engaged as Bob Monks from so many angles. His insights into pivotal points of view and decisions are enlightening.

For example, he points to the role of Douglas Ginsburg, a leader in the field of law and economics, in instilling a belief that it is okay for corporations to violate environmental laws, as long as they account for possible sanctions in their budget. Under Ginsburg's view, according to Monks, people aren't motivated by moral or social obligation but by simple desire and cost-benefit analysis.

Then there is Bob's analysis of Lewis Powell's court decisions. His finding of a constitutionally protected right to "corporate speech" provided the judicial framework for management "to commit untold corporate resources to influence public opinion and public votes - resources so huge and unmatchable that individual contributions are now all but meaningless in state and nationals elections."

And, of course, the Business Roundtable holds a special place in Bob's heart. The "BRT has come to function in significant part as an agent for the CEOs...who have established themselves as a new and separate class in the governance of American corporations, answerable to virtually no one, accountable only to themselves."

Monks appears to be a believer in the forces of markets but regulated to ensure a level playing field. Without that, the overall effect has been to turn the stock market into "a gigantic, round-the-clock casino that runs the biggest game the world has ever seen." Market values and goals have become national goals. Corpocracy is another top-notch effort from the individual who continues to have greater lasting impact on the field than anyone else. Still, I would have placed a different emphasis in the "How to Get it Back" portion of the book.

Monks may be A Traitor to His Class, but he is also a gentleman, reluctant to force change. In his flights of fantasy, Bob dreams of a president who will use his/her powers to end conflicts of interest and compel good governance in contractors. "The framework is in place. The laws exist," he insists. Yet, two pages later he notes the need for legal changes. He reminds us the First Amendment "was not meant to protect the Church from government intrusion, but rather to protect the government... We need similar protection today from the dominant institution of our own time, the corporation."

How can we get shareowners to think of themselves as long-term owners rather than as betters at what Bob calls the biggest casino the world has ever seen? If they know they are owners, what tools can we make available so that voting is not only easier but also more intelligent?

While Bob's focus has been on institutional investors, retail investors also deserve attention. There are dozens of efforts underway. Here are four worthy of further attention:

* Facilitate the ability of proxy assignments, so that retail investors can vote by brand...like CalPERS, Domini, TIAA-CREF, or Fidelity.
* Andy Eggers' Proxy Democracy system would allow retail investors to discover how trusted institutions are voting.
* Glyn Holton's idea of a proxy exchange would allow retail investors to assign proxies to an intermediary that would find like-minded voters.
* Collectively Paid Proxy Research, based on the ideas Mark Latham laid out in Proxy Voting Brand Competition builds off Monks' ISS idea but eliminates the "free rider" issue.

When, on some future date, the Mount Rushmore of Corporate Governance is carved into some mountainside, Bob Monks' profile should be chiseled into the stoneface in a position roughly corresponding to that of Washington's or Jefferson's. Present at the creation, Bob Monks has had a career in corporate governance that spans the transition from the early era when governance activists were seen as gadflies, tilting at windmills, to the current era when Institutional Shareholder Services (his creation) wields enormous power. Been there, done that - you name it and Bob Monks has done it because he has done everything in corporate governance.

So what does Bob Monks have to tell us at a time when the conventional wisdom is that corporate governance activists have triumphed and managerial discretion has been constrained? As usual, his views are counter-intuitive: Corporations are today beyond shareholder control and dominate the political process, emasculating meaningful regulation. Many of his assessments are tart, pungent and disenchanted: "the SEC has become an advertisement for the mandatory sunset of government agencies" (p. 167); today, "we are . . . under the thumb of a corporate oligarchy, bent on plundering and unchecked by any effective ownership," (p. 191); "without effective regulation . . . and without institutional pressure to reform, most corporations - and the largest among them - will loot their own resources to enrich the very few at their helm" (p.186). Basically, he views corporations as self-perpetuating hierarchies in which boards are manipulated by senior executives.

These assessments will seem unduly harsh to many of us, but this is a work of advocacy. Like Emile Zola writing "J'Accuse" in defense of Captain Dreyfus, Monks is not worried about overstatement. Still, if Bob Monks is not always fair, he is often fascinating. The strength of this book is not the nuanced subtlety of its judgments, but its description of life on the cutting edge of corporate governance - how it is actually practiced.

Prescriptively, Bob Monks focuses more on shareholders than boards. He seems most annoyed with his own alma mater, Harvard, and similar foundations for their passivity as investors, and he is similarly critical of "socially responsible investors" who have strong prophylactic rules for what corporations may not do, but exercise little oversight over how they do what they may do.

Monk's greatest concern is the sheer power of the "corpocracy." The danger is clear and present in his view that corporations, organized through groups such as The Business Roundtable, can dominate the political process and thwart the democratic majority. This book was written before the SEC in late 2007 rejected proposals for greater shareholder access to the proxy statement - a decision which he would no doubt cite as proof of his hypothesis. In truth, fear of corporate power is a recurrent theme in the classic literature of corporate governance. As he well knows, seventy five years ago, Adolf Berle and Gardiner Means concluded their book, The Modern Corporate and Private Property, with a warning that the power of the corporation was coming to rival that of the state. But then came the New Deal, and a wave of regulation.

Writing at the end of the Bush Administration, Bob Monks is similarly positioned to Berle and Means, who wrote in 1932; each warned about excessive corporate power after an era of rampant deregulation. But will the world look the same in five more years? Who knows? Ironically, the latest development may be the appearance of major corporations in China, Russia and elsewhere that are clearly puppets of the state. Sovereign wealth funds similarly show that globally the balance of power between the state and the private corporation may be shifting towards the state.

Still, if Bob Monks has not charted the future in all its complexity, he describes the excesses of the present with passion and anger. "Corpocracy" is a call to arms to investors to forego passivity and protect themselves. In essence, he is saying: "Shareholders, arise; you have nothing to lose but your chains."

Robert Monks begins by informing readers that he is a strong supporter of for-profit corporate enterprise. He then goes on to recite how the leaders of these enterprises have recently run amok in the U.S.

"Efficiency," without regard for externalities (eg. pollution, off-shoring American jobs), using "GWAP" reporting (Gee, Whatever Accounting Principles), surrounded by board member, accounting firm, pay, board-evaluation consultant, and stock analyst conflicts of interest, fortified by think-tanks funded by corporations, and beyond accountability via ending the "one share, one vote" rule - their top leaders enjoy scandalous pay and retirement packages, without regard to organizational performance.

At they same time today's corporations are expanding their realms by privatizing government roads, health care, and warfare functions, in the supposed name of efficiency - while actually usually costing more, providing lower service levels, and/or even less accountability. (Helping vitiate a key Democrat-party base of government workers, and gaining increased lobbying influence are additional benefits.) Other government "benefits" today's organizations enjoy include toothless law and regulation enforcement (eg. SEC, DOL), and the ability to shed expensive pension obligations through bankruptcy or simply walking away.

Monks sees pension funds as having a key role in taming today's out of control corporations. Specifically, he touts Hermes Investment Management Company (a London pension fund for phone workers) as an example of what could be done. Monks also praises Elliott Spitzer for accomplishing far more than the SEC or DOL with fewer staff, CEOs Gary Immelt of G.E. and Frank Blake of Home Depot (replaced Robert Nardelli) as examples of principled leaders.

One final comment: Late in his book Monks almost off-handedly remarks that 10% of market value ($1 trillion) was transferred from investors to corporate principal offers. He also asserts that about 95% of all stock options go to the top 15 or so officers. I don't for a moment question his conclusions - Monks' reputation is quite solid. However, I do wish he spent more time elaborating and emphasizing these points.

Corpocracy is an ugly word, not just because of its mixed roots, but because of the governance situation in the United States which it has been coined to describe. In this compelling book, Bob Monks has summarised the means by which American business interests have conspired to suborn the state. No-one else has his authority or breadth of experience in this field of corporate governance. A corporate lawyer and banker by calling, he headed the division in charge of ERISA in the political field and he helped launch Institutional Shareholder Services and LENS to prove that active investors create value. He has distilled his remarkable range of experience into a brief and highly readable polemic. In doing so, he argues that the balance of power between corporations, those who own their shares and those charged with regulating their conduct has to be redressed.

It might, at first sight, seem that the situation which he analyses so penetratingly is peculiar to the United States and that the wider world need not actively concern itself with the author's message. This would be to underestimate the importance of this book. The lessons to be drawn from the consequences of the rise of the political power of American business, which it chronicles, are universal. In addition, given the global reach of American corporations, the need to restore their accountability to their investors within an effective regulatory framework has global implications.

Corpocracy is not a lament, though it describes much that is lamentable. It is a sober and arresting account of the manner in which the author's personal efforts to persuade the appropriate authorities, regulators and major investing institutions to do their duty, morally and juridically, has met with little effective response. The book's impact is all the greater for the restrained manner in which Bob Monks describes how those appointed to discharge their statutory and fiduciary duties repeatedly failed to do so. Inaction by the gatekeepers, left the field open to the untrammelled rapacity of imperial CEOs.

The balance of power between boards and CEOs in the United States remains a paradox, given the country's regulatory history of preventing accretions of power in relation to trusts and to banking. Nowhere else would it be possible to elect a director on a single vote, nowhere else could shareholder votes be invalidated by "ballot stuffing", nowhere else are shareholders so limited in their ability to raise issues at AGMs, which some directors may not even bother to attend. The prevailing concept of CEO/chairmen selecting their outside board members, thus compromising their independence, strengthens the hand of the CEO at the expense of that of the board.

The response to this imbalance in governance terms is the financial track record of US corporations, but at whose expense has it been achieved? Bob Monks' answer is:

"History will look back on the 1990s and early 2000s as a time when the principal officers of public American corporations transferred from shareholders to themselves approximately $1 trillion - or 10 percent of the market value of public exchanges. This must be the largest peacetime movement of wealth ever recorded, and it was accomplished through stealth that amounted to theft and in a spirit of regulatory permissiveness that certainly rises near to the level of criminal neglect." In addition, there is the extra 5 percent of profitability that the Corporate Library metric tells us is lost through bad practice, plus the opportunity cost of boards focusing on short term personal aggrandisement at the expense of sustainable profitable growth. As the one member of the SEC, who opposed the Committee's recent decision to limit the ability of shareholders to put forward resolutions, said: "Corporate governance in the United States is not well served by inattentive boards that are effectively unaccountable to shareholders."

Inevitably one of the headline manifestations of this lack of accountability has been the grossness of the rewards, which some of these principal officers have arrogated to themselves, for failure as well as success. There are attempts to justify these excesses by analogy with the earnings of stars of sport, stage and screen or by claiming that they are market determined. The analogy with the stars is manifestly spurious. The stars earn what their individual talent commands in the hotly contested market for entertainment. The profits of a corporation are earned collectively and represent the sum of the efforts of everyone in an enterprise. The issue therefore is how they should be distributed in a form that would be generally perceived to be fair and in accordance with the concept of natural justice.

A corporation's pay structure should meet the test of equity, rewarding those working for it, from top to bottom, in relation to their contribution to its performance. Ignoring equity in rewards sows the seeds of social division and dissension with its longer term consequences. What seems to have set the bounds to the multiple by which the earnings of the principal officers of companies exceed those of the average employee in most countries is a sense of social cohesion. The multiple varies by country and through time, but it represents a social constraint or discipline, which carries with it economic advantages not to be ignored.

The fact that shareholders are outraged by the grosser excesses of the pay packages of the principal officers of some corporations is no more than a symptom of the lack of accountability of US boards to those who own their stock, hence the theme of the book. It is a cause which Bob Monks has espoused and pursued with a determination and energy that is wholly admirable and selfless. In spite of setbacks, he believes that this essential accountability can be restored. He sees no cause for new laws, agencies or fiscal measures, though the existing statutory and regulatory framework should be effectively enforced. He argues that it is the major investing institutions that carry the obligation to themselves and to society to restore trust in the capitalistic system.

They have the power to reform the governance of corporations and they have a straightforward economic incentive to do so. The obligation, however, of the great foundations, among the investing institutions, to play their part in bringing about reform goes beyond the calculus of financial gain. It lies at the heart of their creation. They directly assist their chosen causes, but that is within the wider context of a market system which provides them with the ability to do this. They have a responsibility to maintain the means by which they fulfil the aims for which they were founded.

The book's message is therefore optimistic, provided that it is heeded in time. Trust and accountability can be restored, but it will take courage and above all leadership to do so. What is needed is enlightened leadership by those in a position to exercise it in the investing institutions and in corporations themselves. In Bob Monks' words:

"It demands that those with a majority stake in the corpocracy - its principal owners and beneficiaries - lead the way back to the broad light of day. The hour is late. The sun won't always be waiting."

Read Corpocracy and judge for yourself!

I very much enjoyed Dr. Bakan's book. It was truly thought-provoking, and jelled a number of thoughts and ideas I had had in the past about the how and why of corporations. I have started up a company of my own in the past, and plan to do so again in the future. After having read Dr. Bakan's book as well as "Big Vision, Small Business" by Jaimie Walters, I have definitely changed my mind about HOW to set it up and run it!. I think this should be read by anybody and everybody in corporate and government roles today...As Dr. Bakan says, it isn't the cure-all, but it may nudge a few people to work towards the appropriate solution!

I think this should be required reading for all citizens.

Exposes (without ideological idealism) the facts about corporations. Most people have vague misgivings about corporations, but don't have much of an idea of why. This book helps to clarify and explain what we instinctively feel.

I got a kick out of the psychological assessment of the corporation, a legal person without moral conscience, as a psychopath.

corporations rule the world. if you don't agree you are living in a dream world. extremely importaint topic. A must read.

I highly recomend this book for anyone that is even remotely interested in globilization and the corporate world. It shows just how much of our daily lives are influenced and even controlled by corporations. It makes you realize that no matter what they say, a corporation really does only look out for itself, and any advertisements that claim that corporations help communities and people and save the environment out of their own good will have absolutely no truth to them. It also makes you realize how far a corporation will go to save a few dollars, knowingly putting lives at risk in the process.
The book is also very well written, with plenty of explinations, so you don't need a background in economics to understand it.
In short, I totally recomend this book to anyone that wants to know the truth about the corporation. It will make you sick to realize what lengths they will go to in order to exploit everyone and everything.

For me, this wasn't one of those 'couldn't put it down' books. Just the opposite in fact. A quarter or a half a chapter was about all I could take at one time. And I dreaded going back to it, which I did, and will continue to do for years to come. Maybe I'm just a soft-hearted wimp, a daydreaming fool who believes in the innate decency of mankind. Maybe that's why at times this book brought tears of shame, and pity, and rage, to my eyes. But please read this book. Do whatever it takes: beg, borrow, or buy, but please read this book.....!

Y ENSEÑARLES, PARAS SIEMPRE, EL CAMINO CORRECTO A LA FELICIDAD Y, UN DIA, AL CIELO!

and happy peoples, translated into TEN PROMISES we vow to keep and make our children learn... A very special book to teach the children: You can't imagine how they enjoy "promising " and what good it does to their lives !

la extraordinaria IDEA DE DIEZ PROMESAS...
DIEZ PROMESAS QUE, CON TODO AMOR, HABRAN DE HACER NUESTROS NIÑOS.
Todos sabemos que, lo que se fija en la mente de los pequeños, no desaparece jamás...Y estas son promesas PARA UNA VIDA BONDADOSA Y FELIZ !

CON ESTE TIENES!
Si logras que te hagan estas diez promesas SOBRE NUESTROS PROPIOS VALORES,
..TUS HIJOS SERÁN UNA LUZ PARA SUS PADRES, PARA QUIEN LOS CONOZCA Y PARA EL MUNDO !

EN ESTE LIBRO Y HACE MUCHOS AÑOS !
Cuando pequeñitos, los encaminamos para que ante Dios, hicieran estas maravillosas diez promesas.
QUINCE AÑOS MÁS TARDE... TODOS LOS EX NIÑOS LAS SIGUEN CUMPLIENDO !
Un libro extraordinario y un resultado DESLUMBRANTE

Do it for yourself: This book at first will transform your general perspective and when you get it, believe me, your life becomes wiser and better after reading it.

John Marks Templeton's most important discovery is that our lives are shaped by certain eternal laws. He has established several foundations to advance spiritual developments and offers free literature plus newsletter to all who ask. Enjoy a visit to the Templeton Foundation . He rose from humble beginnings to lead a 30-billion dollar group of investment companies and established the Templeton Prize for Progress in Religion, which exceeds the Nobel Prize in financial value. This beloved book includes two hundred "laws of life" and appeals to all on the spiritual path. Contributors to "Laws" include Ralph Waldo Emerson, Jesus, Dr. Wayne Dyer, Benjamin Franklin, Dr. Gerald G. Jampolsky , and Eric Butterworth . Endorsements include Dr. Robert Schuller, Billy Graham, and Dr. Norman Vincent Peale.

This is a must for anybody's personal library. No matter where you are in life, Sir John has done us all a great favour by writing this book. He uses a range of philosiphies and theologies to explain everyday events in our lives.
Are you overwhemled or caught up in day to day events? Mr. Templeton's collections of various authors and his own works will explain sometimes difficult situations into easy to understand english. For example, lesson "No one knows the weight of another's burden" on page 20 is about the young man in a male therapy group.
The men were in a group session and the person in the story is a new participant. The mediator explained that each person would have a few minutes to explain his problem and what they plan to do about it. Natually, the new person thought with his marital break down, near bankruptcy and poor health, his would be one of the saddest cases.
Before it was his turn to speak, a handsome young man in his 20's revealed that he was terminally ill and had 6 months to live. Rather than dwell on it, he decided to take up flying lessons and live! Naturally, everybody else was taken off guard and rediscovered the gifts they have.
Templeton's 200 lessons in this book address almost every situation around. You don't have to be struggling with life to enjoy this. Everybody needs a bit of down to earth insiration and you'll have it with this!

We're told to love other people as we love ourselves in the first part of this book. This teaching of Jesus Christ, known as the Golden Rule is the starting point of human relations building in this book's discussion on the laws of life. Another principle Jesus taught is found near the conclusion, i.e., that of giving. Templeton writes "Giving makes you a magnet for success" (p. 299).
In between these two principles there are numerous other words of advice.
On individual growth, Edison is quoted saying "If you are doing anything the way you did twenty years ago, there is a better way" (p. 273).
We're reminded of the fact that "success feeds on itself and creates move success" (p. 259).
Writing on the quality of life being manifested by one's thoughts, Templeton observes quotes Arnold Patent (p. 251) who noted "What we focus on expands."
A discussion on work being a revelation of one's gift is worth attention. He cites the Latin origin of the word "vocation" as being "to call" and goes on to say that one's work is a person's calling. He encourages readers to find their individual calling.
Perception is discussed along with opportunity as he asks readers to ask themselves a question. "As yourself from time to time what you are doing to prepare yourself for success" (p. 175). He adds "Have you trained yourself to recognize opportunity when it knocks?" (p. 175).
On page 163 there's an insightful quote from Calvin Coolidge, "no person was ever honored for what he received, but for what he gave."
The books' weakness is that he ties Christianity into all the other religions of the world, ignoring its distinguishing difference. It is the only religion whose leader made the claims He made and whose body has never been discovered by critics who denied the Resurrection.

Great therapy. It is an easy read. Something you can open a few minutes a day to lift your spirits, and it doesn't hurt to read over and over again. It may not dazzle your senses (nonfiction), but it should make you feel good.