Books

I have been a avid reader my whole life. For example, in high school I enjoyed re-reading Shakespeare over the summer. Geeky, I know. Lately my reading list has been determined mainly by my Sustainable MBA classes at Presidio Graduate School.

Here is what I have been reading lately. These are not meant to be book reviews but more of notes to myself reminding me what the book was about or what I found interesting.

Book: Managing for Stakeholders

Posted by: Max Dunn on September 2, 2009 17:41:13

 

I started my second semester at Presidio Graduate School and read this book for my Business, Government and Civil Society class. This theory of managing a business to create value for all stakeholders is in many ways the successor to the triple bottom line theory - profit, people and planet.

Note that "stakeholder" is not the same as "shareholder". Stakeholders include all the groups of people that businesses should be responsible to including customers, employees, suppliers, financiers, communities and more. This book also discusses ethics in depth and how ethics should be inseparable from leadership and all aspects of the business.

 

Book: $20 Per Gallon

Posted by: Max Dunn on August 9, 2009 16:11:38

$20 Per Gallon: How the Inevitable Rise in the Price of Gasoline Will Change Our Lives for the Better by Christopher Steiner

What would the world be like if gasoline was $20 per gallon? When that little car trip from San Jose to SF and back costs $80 in gas? When the cheapest roundtrip flight to the East Coast costs over $4,000? That will be a different world than the cheap-energy world we live in today!

And that world is closer than many may think. My own prediction is that before the end of 2012 we are going to see $200 oil and occasions when gas stations won't have any gas to sell. But regardless of whether peak oil is in 3 years or 30 years, there is no doubt that most of us will see it, and our kids won't enjoy the benefits we enjoyed of cheap oil.

So the book $20 Per Gallon which speculates about what changes will occur in our world with increasing oil prices is a great exercises we should spend more time on. And the ultimate message of this book is a hopeful one; that while increasing oil prices will cause many short-term problems, in the long-term reducing our dependence on oil will change our lives for the better.

Read more...

 

Book: Blueprint for a Sustainable Economy

Posted by: Max Dunn on August 9, 2009 15:41:37

Blueprint for a Sustainable Economy
by David Pearceand Edward B Barbier

When some books are finished, we have a clear idea exactly what they are about. Others discuss so many different things that it is harder to pinpoint their message. BluePrint for a Sustainable Economy falls into the later category.

Maybe some excerpts from the conclusion of this book can best summarize it:

"Everything we do has an environmental impact, and economic decisions pervade all that we do. Ultimately, the prospects for the natural environments some 100 years hence are not good. We can do the best we can, and that means addressing all those issues that are the subject of policy decisions by households, corporations and governments. That means getting rid of perverse subsidies, establishing property rights to the environment, creating markets, taxing polluters (and that is all of us), and changing our accounting systems. We know what we need to do. We need to get on and do it."

This book was rather academic, and at times a little slow. But overall, it was a pretty interesting read and covered some great topics that will be very useful for moving towards a more sustainable economy.

 

Books: Ecological Economics

Posted by: Max Dunn on July 24, 2009 07:12:53

Ecological Economics: Principles And Applications
by Herman E. Daly and Joshua Farley

Is it weird to love a textbook? If so, then I am very weird because I LOVED this book! It is right up there with Natural Capitalism in explaining why sustainability is important and why our current systems are failing us and future generations.

How does ecological economics differ from neoclassical economics? Take the example of a ship. Neoclassical economics is concerned with efficiently distributing the load so the ship floats evenly on the water. Ecological economics, on the other hand, tries to make sure that the ship is not loaded with so much cargo that it sinks!

Daly and Joshua continue the metaphor (paraphrased): "Ecological economists look at the Earth as tha ship and gross material production of the economy as the cargo. The seaworthiness of the ship is determined by its ecological health, the abundance of its provisions, and its design. Evidence exists that the cargo hold is already too full for a safe voyage and many passengers have not been allowed the basic necessities for the voyage. To make room for an ever-growing cargo, we have ripped out components of the ship we deem unimportant (forests, fisheries, wetlands). Ecological economics also assumes that our goal is not simply to load the ship to the limit, but to preserve areas of the ship for our comfort and enjoyment and to maintain the ship in excellent condition for future generations."

 

Book: The Powers to Lead

Posted by: Max Dunn on July 22, 2009 14:51:20

The Powers to Lead
by Joseph S. Nye

Interesting book. Talks about how effective leaders use both soft and hard power, and Nye terms this "smart power". This is a research book with lots of references, not a rah-rah-go-go book, which makes it more reliable but a little less interesting to ready. Some quotes:

• I define a leader as someone who helps a group create and achieve shared goals.
• We can think of leadership as a process with three key components: leaders, followers, and contexts.
• Police power, financial power, and the ability to hire and fire are examples of tangible hard power.
• This is soft power: getting the outcomes one wants by attracting others rather than manipulating their material incentives.
• (Quoting GE CEO Jeff Immelt) When you run General Electric, there are 7 to 12 times a year when you have to say, 'you're doing it my way.' If you do it 18 times, the good people will leave. If you do it 3 times, the company falls apart.
• The ability to combine hard and soft power into an effective strategy is smart power.
• Transformational leaders empower and elevate their followers.
• Three skils are particulary important for soft power: emotional intelligence, communication and vision. The two key hard power skills are organizational and political.

 

Book: The Starfish and the Spider

Posted by: Max Dunn on July 17, 2009 10:41:14

The Starfish and the Spider: The Unstoppable Power of Leaderless Organizations
by Ori Brafman and Rod A. Beckstrom

This book is not about what it claims to be. The title says it is about "leaderless organizations", but that is not true. This book is about decentralized organizations without traditional leaders, and that is a big difference.

Let's look at some of the organizations it discusses:

• Napster, started by Shawn Fanning
• Apaches, led by Nant'an - spiritual and cultural leaders
• Kazaa, formed by Niklas Zennstrom
• Alcholics Anonymous, started and led by Bill Wilson
• Craigslist, run by Craig Newmark
• Wikipedia, guided by Jimmy Wales

Hmm, none of these organizations sound "leaderless" to me. However, it is true that they are all decentralized organizations that don't have traditional leadership.

Brafman and Beckstrom highlight this point by discussing the differences be a traditional leader, like a CEO, and one that acts more like a catalyst. This table sums up this point nicely:

CEO	Catalyst
The Boss	A Peer
Command-and-control	Trust
Rational	Emotionally Intelligent
Powerful	Inspirational
Directive	Collaborative
In the Spotlight	Behind the Scenes
Order	Ambiguity
Organizing	Connecting

 

To highlight the point that this book is not about leaderless organization, the last two chapters discuss hybrid organizations - those that have components of both centralization and decentralization - as well as finding the best balance between the two.

Overall, a very well written, enjoyable and useful book for anyone thinking about building or being involved with a 21st century organization. However, don't expect this book to be about leaderless organizations, regardless of what the title says.

 

Book: The Undercover Economist

Posted by: Max Dunn on July 7, 2009 08:04:52

The Undercover Economist: Exposing Why the Rich Are Rich, the Poor Are Poor--and Why You Can Never Buy a Decent Used Car!
by Tim Harford

When I get a book from the library, I don't underline memorable sentences like I usually do; instead, I attach little yellow stickies. By counting the stickies, I can see how much of the book I want to remember. So on the little yellow sticky scale, this book rates a 14 - pretty good!

One thing I liked about this booked is that it covered common economic principles in a straightforward way that could be understood by anyone. Harford writes, "Economist tech to call this 'own-price elasticity.' Personally, I think 'price sensitivity' is a bit more descriptive." Here are some other interesting points:

• Even if markets are not perfect, the can convey tremendously complex information. (Page 65)
• The nonmarket system suffers suffers from a serious problem: the truth about values, costs and benefits has disappeared. (Page 69)
• Why are taxes inefficient? Because they destroy the information carried by prices. (Page 71)
• Complete, free, and competitive markets are just a bizarre economists' fantasy. However, this fantasy helps us understand why economic problems arise and helps us to move in the right direction to patch them up. (Paraphrased, page 78)
• We should worry about costs and benefits missing from the market transaction. The trick is to mimic perfect markets by getting (consumers) to pay all of the costs of their actions. ('Externality costs', paraphrased, page 87)
• Economists care about the environment but dream of a world where it is no longer an issue that invites moral posturing, but is properly integrated into markets and the world of truth, which would provide both the information and the incentives necessary to persuade ordinary people to behave in an environmentally responsible way. (Page 102)
• Environmental regulations are not a major cost; labor is. The most pollution-intensive American firms spend only 2 percent of their revenues on dealing with pollution. (Page 215)
• The transport costs of moving a CD player from Osaka harbor to the port of Los Angeles are less than the costs of someone driving to Best Buy and back home with the CD player. (Page 219)
• Taxes on transportation fuels are consistent with free trade and much better for the environment than trade restrictions. The worst environmental problems today are caused by poverty not wealth. (Page 221)
• The environmentalist movement should demand free trade immediately. (Page 221)
• Sweatshops are the symptom, not the cause, of shocking global poverty. Workers go there voluntarily, which means that their alternatives are worse. (Page 222)

 

Book: Jesus, Interrupted

Posted by: Max Dunn on July 5, 2009 08:32:30

Jesus, Interrupted: Revealing the Hidden Contradictions in the Bible (And Why We Don't Know About Them)
by Bart D. Ehrman

Gnosis: to know, Agnosis: not knowing. 

What do we know about the New Testament?

• Was Jesus in doubt and despair on the way to the cross (Mark) or calm and in control (Luke)?
• Did Jesus' death provide an atonoment for sin (Mark and Paul) or not (Luke)?
• Did Jesus perform signs to prove who he was (John) or did he refuse to do so (Matthew)?
• Must Jesus' followers keep the law if they are to enter the Kingdom (Matthew) or absolutely not (Paul)?
• What day did Jesus die on? Passover (Mark) or the day of preparation for Passover (John)?
• Who actually wrote the books of the New Testament?
• Who made the decisions about which books were finally included in the New Testament?

 

Book: Why Your World is About to Get a Whole Lot Smaller

Posted by: Max Dunn on June 2, 2009 07:43:59

Why Your World Is About to Get a Whole Lot Smaller: Oil and the End of Globalization
by Jeff Rubin

I expected a lot more from an economist. Lots of peak-oil books are written by people with no technical background and no imagination which limits them to a vision of a post-peak world that looks just like the 1800's. But one written by an economist should have more, well, economics.

There are two key questions that will dramatically shape the reality of our post-peak future.

1. How quickly will oil decline?
2. How much energy does it really take to produce each good?

Questions #1 is critically important. While the US took over 30 years for oil production to decline in half, Cantarell will only take 5 years. If the decline in worldwide oil production is slow, we will have time to switch to alternative energy sources. However if it is fast, we might not even have enough time and oil to build the necessary wind turbines and solar panels no matter how motivated we are.

Question #2 is also important. Those with no imagination can only see that in the past we didn't have oil, so life after oil peaks must look like life in the 1800's. However, there is one thing I can say for sure - the world won't move back but must move forward. Yes, people might grow more food locally and cut down on needless consumption, but it will still be more efficient to grow food in areas that have the water, sun and soil and by people that have the most expertise and we will still have some luxury goods produced afar.

Unfortunately, Rubin doesn't try to be an economist and look at the economics of a post-peak world. Instead, he just provides some naive opinions. For instance, he questions whether lithium-ion batteries will be able to stand up to years of driving because, "the one in my wife's laptop couldn't even handle her daily email before catching fire and frying her hard drive." What kind of argument is that?

There is so much other wrong information in the book it is hard to catalog it all. Just regarding electric vehicle's Rubin says:

• "We won't have the spare power capacity to charge them up." Umm, have you heard of off-peak power?
• "The emissions from the power plants would offset all the emissions savings from switching to electric cars." No. Even with pure coal-fired electricity, less CO2 is created.
• "Every day vehicles come out with new power-sucking features such as onboard computers and entertainment systems". Huh? If Rubin did the math, he would discover that these use just a small fraction of the total power required to move the car.

Don't even get me started about his conclusion where he states that a megawatt hydroelectric power turbine would only save a barrel of diesel fuel a day (it would actually save over 70 barrels!).

Okay, even with the disappointment that this economist didn't use much economics in his analysis, I did think this was an entertaining book and would be good for people that aren't familiar with peak oil to get an introduction to the very sobering fact that very soon, oil production will decrease and this will drastically change our way of life.

 

Book: Why We Make Mistakes

Posted by: Max Dunn on June 2, 2009 07:27:23

Why We Make Mistakes: How We Look Without Seeing, Forget Things in Seconds, and Are All Pretty Sure We Are Way Above Average
by Joseph T. Hallinan

This was a good followup to Predictably Irrational - it covers similar territory, just more broadly and not as rigorously. Its conclusion was similar too, "We are blinded by the effects of habit and hubris and hobbled by a poor understanding of our own limitations. . . . Human decision making operates on two levels -- one more rational, on move visceral - and that these two constantly trade off. . . . Many of our mistakes happen while we are operating in one condition but think we are operating in the other."

 

< Previous (3 of 7) Next >