The Puritan Gift: Reclaiming the American Dream Amidst Global Financial Chaos


 

 

puritan gift The collapse of Lehman Brothers and other Wall Street institutions sent shock waves around the world. But this was just the beginning. Whole nations have been dragged to the brink of bankruptcy. Banks on both sides of the Atlantic have been nationalised. The stock market is out of control and the global economy is in meltdown. Financial experts and the media are clamouring to tell us that these events are unprecedented and unpredictable. But is this really true or should we all have seen it coming? The authors of ‘The Puritan Gift’ saw the writing on the wall long ago. In this important book they offer a shocking exposé of the failures of the American financial system as well as vital lessons for the future. Tracing the extraordinary development of the managerial culture that underpinned three centuries of American commercial triumph, ‘The Puritan Gift’ shows how the current financial crisis has an old-fashioned cause: bad management. By distancing itself from the core values of innovation and discipline the ‘gift’ of the early Puritan settlers which underlay its past commercial and economic success America sacrificed its future prosperity and security. Now America and indeed the whole world needs to re-discover this ethical bedrock in order to revive the international economy and reclaim the American Dream for a new generation. ‘A goldmine of information’ – Myron Tribus, former Director of the Center for Advanced Engineering Study, Massachusetts Institute of Technology; ‘Very interesting, a fun read and a store of eye-opening anecdotes’ – Robert Chote, Director of the Institute for Fiscal Studies; ‘An important new contribution to the study of management’ – Professor Peter Kawalek, Manchester Business School; ‘bold, original and agreeably opinionated’ – Simon Caulkin, Observer
About the Authors

A mechanical engineer by training, Kenneth Hopper was born in Glasgow, Scotland, in 1926. He has been active throughout his professional life as a consultant on industrial matters in the U.S. and Europe. As a writer he has taken a particular interest in differing national managerial cultures, which encouraged him to go to Ireland when the ‘Celtic Miracle’ was getting underway, to Japan when that country’s ‘Economic Miracle’ was at its peak and finally to the United States. He is now U.S. citizen living in New Jersey. By his articles and lectures, Kenneth has been largely responsible for uncovering and publicizing the activities of the Civil Communications Section of the General MacArthur’s command in Tokyo after World War-II.

William Hopper, who is the younger brother, was born in Glasgow, Scotland, in 1929. A modern linguist by training, he has been an investment banker for over 40 years, beginning his career as a financial analyst at W.R. Grace & Co. in New York, then becoming personal assistant to Sigmund Warburg at S.G. Warburg in London where he now lives.As a Director of Morgan Grenfell in London, he pioneered the Dragon Bond Market in East Asia in 1976 with a fund-raising for the European Investment Bank (ranked by Institutional Investor as ‘Deal of the Year’) and launched the first Eurobond issue for an East European country (Hungary) in the same year.

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Genre: Financial Risk

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