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The Silk Road: A Very Short Introduction (Very Short Introductions Series)
by James A. MillwardThe phrase "silk road" evokes vivid scenes of merchants leading camel caravans across vast stretches to trade exotic goods in glittering Oriental bazaars, of pilgrims braving bandits and frozen mountain passes to spread their faith across Asia. Looking at the reality behind these images, this Very Short Introduction illuminates the historical background against which the silk road flourished, shedding light on the importance of old-world cultural exchange to Eurasian and world history. <p><p>On the one hand, historian James A. Millward treats the silk road broadly, to stand in for the cross-cultural communication between peoples across the Eurasian continent since at least the Neolithic era. On the other, he highlights specific examples of goods and ideas exchanged between the Mediterranean, Persia, India, and China, along with the significance of these exchanges. While including silks, spices, and travelers' tales of colorful locales, the book explains the dynamics of Central Eurasian history that promoted Silk Road interactions--especially the role of nomad empires--highlighting the importance of the biological, technological, artistic, intellectual, and religious interchanges across the continent. Millward shows that these exchanges had a profound effect on the old world that was akin to, if not on the scale of, modern globalization.
The Silk Road in World History
by Xinru LiuThe Silk Road was the contemporary name for a complex of ancient trade routes linking East Asia with Central Asia, South Asia, and the Mediterranean world. This network of exchange emerged along the borders between agricultural China and the steppe nomads during the Han Dynasty (206BCE-220CE), in consequence of the inter-dependence and the conflicts of these two distinctive societies. In their quest for horses, fragrances, spices, gems, glassware, and other exotics from the lands to their west, the Han Empire extended its dominion over the oases around the Takla Makan Desert and sent silk all the way to the Mediterranean, either through the land routes leading to the caravan city of Palmyra in Syria desert, or by way of northwest India, the Arabian Sea and the Red Sea, landing at Alexandria. The Silk Road survived the turmoil of the demise of the Han and Roman Empires, reached its golden age during the early middle age, when the Byzantine Empire and the Tang Empire became centers of silk culture and established the models for high culture of the Eurasian world. The coming of Islam extended silk culture to an even larger area and paved the way for an expanded market for textiles and other commodities. By the 11th century, however, the Silk Road was in decline because of intense competition from the sea routes of the Indian Ocean. Using supply and demand as the framework for analyzing the formation and development of the Silk Road, the book examines the dynamics of the interactions of the nomadic pastoralists with sedentary agriculturalists, and the spread of new ideas, religions, and values into the world of commerce, thus illustrating the cultural forces underlying material transactions. This effort at tracing the interconnections of the diverse participants in the transcontinental Silk Road exchange will demonstrate that the world had been linked through economic and ideological forces long before the modern era.
The Silk Road Rediscovered
by Anil K. Gupta Haiyan Wang Girija PandeA roadmap for understanding the business challenges and opportunities in ChinaBy 2025, China and India will be two of the world's four largest economies. By then, economic ties between them should also rank among the ten most important bilateral ties worldwide. Their leaders are well aware of these emerging realities. In May 2013, just two months after taking charge, Premier Li Keqiang left for India on his first official trip outside China, a clear signal of China's foreign policy priorities.The Silk Road Rediscovered is the first book ever to analyze the growing corporate linkages between India and China. Did you know that:India's Mahindra is the fifth largest tractor manufacturer in China?Tata Motors' Jaguar Land Rover unit is the fastest growing luxury auto seller in China?India's NIIT is the most influential IT training brand in China?China's Huawei has its second largest R&D center in Bangalore and employs over 5000 people in India?Shanghai Electric earns its largest revenues outside China from India?As these developments illustrate, pioneering Indian and Chinese companies are rediscovering the fabled Silk Road which joined their nations in ancient times. Winning in each other's markets is also making them stronger and whetting their appetite for further global expansion.This book examines how Indian companies such as Tata Consultancy Services, Mahindra Tractors, NIIT, Tata Motors/Jaguar Land Rover and Sundaram Fasteners have figured out how to win in China. Their experiences may inspire and offer lessons to other Indian companies. The book also examines how Chinese pioneers such as Lenovo, Huawei, TBEA, Haier and Xinxing have made a strong commitment to India and are beginning to realize the fruits of this commitment. The key lessons that emerge from these analyses are: the odds of success go up dramatically when executives adopt a global rather than local-for-local perspective and are skillful at learning on the ground.
The Silk Roads: A Brief History With Documents (Essays On Global And Comparative History)
by Xinru LiuFor more than 1500 years, across more than 4000 miles, the Silk Roads connected East and West. These overland trails and sea lanes carried not only silks, but also cotton textiles, dyes, horses, incense, spices, gems, glass, and ceramics along with religious ideas, governing customs, and technology. For this book, Xinru Liu has assembled primary sources from ancient China, India, Central Asia, Rome and the Mediterranean, and the Islamic world, many of them difficult to access and some translated into English for the first time. Court histories, geographies and philosophical treatises, letters, travelers’ accounts, inventories, inscriptions, laws, religious texts, and more, introduce students to the complexities of cultural exchange. Liu’s thoughtful introduction considers the many ways the peoples along the Silk Roads interacted and helps students understand the implications for economies and societies, as well as political and religious institutions, over space and time. Maps, document headnotes and annotations, a chronology, questions for consideration, and a selected bibliography offer additional pedagogical support.
Silk Stockings and Socialism: Philadelphia's Radical Hosiery Workers from the Jazz Age to the New Deal
by Sharon McConnell-SidorickThe 1920s Jazz Age is remembered for flappers and speakeasies, not for the success of a declining labor movement. A more complex story was unfolding among the young women and men in the hosiery mills of Kensington, the working-class heart of Philadelphia. Their product was silk stockings, the iconic fashion item of the flapper culture then sweeping America and the world. Although the young people who flooded into this booming industry were avid participants in Jazz Age culture, they also embraced a surprising, rights-based labor movement, headed by the socialist-led American Federation of Full-Fashioned Hosiery Workers (AFFFHW).In this first history of this remarkable union, Sharon McConnell-Sidorick reveals how activists ingeniously fused youth culture and radical politics to build a subculture that included dances and parties as well as picket lines and sit-down strikes, while forging a vision for social change. In documenting AFFFHW members and the Kensington community, McConnell-Sidorick shows how labor federations like the Congress of Industrial Organizations and government programs like the New Deal did not spring from the heads of union leaders or policy experts but were instead nurtured by grassroots social movements across America.
The Silk Weavers of Kyoto: Family and Work in a Changing Traditional Industry
by Tamara K. HarevenThis book is a poignant exploration of a vanishing world. Tamara Hareven integrates historical research with intensive life history interviews to reveal the relationships among family, work, and community in this highly specialized occupation. Hareven uses her knowledge of textile workers' lives in the United States and Western Europe to show how striking similarities in weavers' experiences transcend cultural differences.
The Silo Effect: The Peril of Expertise and the Promise of Breaking Down Barriers
by Gillian TettFrom award-winning columnist and journalist Gillian Tett comes a brilliant examination of how our tendency to create functional departments--silos--hinders our work...and how some people and organizations can break those silos down to unleash innovation.One of the characteristics of industrial age enterprises is that they are organized around functional departments. This organizational structure results in both limited information and restricted thinking. The Silo Effect asks these basic questions: why do humans working in modern institutions collectively act in ways that sometimes seem stupid? Why do normally clever people fail to see risks and opportunities that later seem blindingly obvious? Why, as psychologist Daniel Kahneman put it, are we sometimes so "blind to our own blindness"? Gillian Tett, journalist and senior editor for the Financial Times, answers these questions by plumbing her background as an anthropologist and her experience reporting on the financial crisis in 2008. In The Silo Effect, she shares eight different tales of the silo syndrome, spanning Bloomberg's City Hall in New York, the Bank of England in London, Cleveland Clinic hospital in Ohio, UBS bank in Switzerland, Facebook in San Francisco, Sony in Tokyo, the BlueMountain hedge fund, and the Chicago police. Some of these narratives illustrate how foolishly people can behave when they are mastered by silos. Others, however, show how institutions and individuals can master their silos instead. These are stories of failure and success. From ideas about how to organize office spaces and lead teams of people with disparate expertise, Tett lays bare the silo effect and explains how people organize themselves, interact with each other, and imagine the world can take hold of an organization and lead from institutional blindness to 20/20 vision.
The Silo Effect: Why putting everything in its place isn't such a bright idea
by Gillian TettEver since civilised society began, we have felt the need to classify, categorise and specialise. It can make things more efficient, and help give the leaders of any organisation a sense of confidence that they have the right people focusing on the right tasks. But it can also be catastrophic, leading to tunnel vision and tribalism. Most importantly it can create a structural fog, with the full picture of where an organisation is heading hidden from view. It is incredibly widespread: the chances are these 'silos' are rife in any organisation or profession, whether your business, or your local school or hospital.Across industries and cultures, as this brilliant and penetrating book shows, silos have the power to collapse companies and destabilise financial markets, yet they still dominate the workplace. They blind and confuse us, often making modern institutions act in risky, silly and damaging ways.Gillian Tett has spent years covering financial markets and business, but she's also a trained anthropologist, having completed a doctorate at Cambridge University and conducted field work in Tibet and Tajikistan. She's no stranger to questioning the assumptions and practices of a culture. Those in question - financial trading desks, urban police forces, surgical teams within medical clinics, software debuggers and consumer product engineers - have practices and rituals as ordered and intricate as those of any far-flung tribe.In The Silo Effect, she uses an anthropological lens to explore how individuals, teams and whole organisations often work in silos of thought, process and product. With examples drawn from a range of fascinating areas - the New York Fire Department and Facebook to the Bank of England and Sony - these narratives illustrate not just how foolishly people can behave when they are mastered by silos but also how the brightest institutions and individuals can master them. The Silo Effect is a sharp, visionary and inspiring work with the insight, prescriptions and power to remove our organisational blinders and transform the way we think for the better.
Silos, Politics and Turf Wars: A Leadership Fable About Destroying The Barriers That Turn Colleagues Into Competitors (J-b Lencioni Ser. #17)
by Patrick M. LencioniIn yet another page-turner, New York Times best-selling author and acclaimed management expert Patrick Lencioni addresses the costly and maddening issue of silos, the barriers that create organizational politics. Silos devastate organizations, kill productivity, push good people out the door, and jeopardize the achievement of corporate goals. As with his other books, Lencioni writes Silos, Politics, and Turf Wars as a fictional-but eerily realistic-story. The story is about Jude Cousins, an eager young management consultant struggling to launch his practice by solving one of the more universal and frustrating problems faced by his clients. Through trial and error, he develops a simple yet ground-breaking approach for helping them transform confusion and infighting into clarity and alignment.
Silva UltraMind's Intuitive Guidance System for Business
by Jose Silva Katherine Watson Ed BerndSILVA ULTRAMIND'S INTUITIVE GUIDANCE SYSTEM FOR BUSINESSThe secret to business success is intuition. It's not just a matter of following you hunches. It's about following the right hunches. Being able to sense people's inner thoughts and needs helps you say and do the things needed to quickly reach your goals and achieve success.Many people know this, but many also believe that a good sense of intuition is something that you're just born with-not something that you can develop and train.Jose Silva, developer of the world-famous Silva Mind Control Method, had proved them wrong. Now, with Mr. Silva's state-of-the-art UltraMind Intuitive Guidance System for Business, you can learn how to use your intuition regularly and reliably.You will learn how to:Program yourself to do the right thing at the right time in order to take advantage of opportunities and increase income.Sense what other people's real wants and needs are so that you can say the right thing at the right time when negotiating, managing subordinates, or reporting to superiors and shareholders.Learn mental techniques to establish immediate rapport with co-workers, customers, clients, and suppliers.Program your work environment for success.Trust your judgment and your decisions and end doubt and second-guessing.
The Silver Bull Market
by Shayne McguireFrom one of the world's most respected authorities on precious metals investment--a thoroughly researched volume on the investment prospects for silver, the other gold.Gold, outperforming stocks for over a decade, has finally been recognized as a serious asset class to be included in any solid, diversified investment portfolio. Considering present inflationary concerns related to accelerating fiscal crises in Europe, the United States and likely Japan in the years ahead, gold is widely held in the largest professionally-managed portfolios in the world. But silver, which has been moving in the same direction as its sister metal for forty years--and actually outperforming gold over the last ten years--has yet to be taken seriously in the investment world. Widely perceived as an erratic, unpredictable metal best left to speculators, silver has been disdained primarily for its volatility. Taking the long view, as well as a hard look at silver's investment demerits, Shayne McGuire examines current global financial conditions in order to provide a full and frank assessment of present and future opportunities for investors who may be considering buying silver.Silver is being rediscovered as a viable alternative to gold, and demand for the metal as an investment vehicle has risen sharply over the past few yearsThough more volatile than gold, silver is highly correlated with the more expensive metal and should continue moving in the same direction (as it has for thousands of years)Widely considered a precious metals expert within the institutional investor community and author of Hard Money: Taking Gold to a Higher Investment Level, McGuire manages a portfolio with over $850 million in precious metals investmentsWhile the investment literature is overflowing with books on how to invest in gold, this is the first serious book in decades offering expert insights, advice and guidance on investing in silver
Silver Bullet Selling: Six Critical Steps to Opening More Relationships and Closing More Sales
by Paul Bartick G. A. BartickBased on ten years of extensive research and interviews with thousands of top sales performers in a variety of industries, Silver Bullet Selling reveals the secrets all great sales professionals have in common.<P><P> It's not what you say that determines your success in sales; it?s how you execute the sales process to create a unique buying experience for customers. This book shows you how to apply the silver bullet selling method to launch your sales through the roof. Read it, and fire away at the competition.
The Silver Bullets of Commercial Negotiation: Strategies and Tactics
by Christopher LennonThis book empowers you to immediately grasp the opportunities that present themselves in international commercial negotiation, and to be able to create and maintain positive, mutually beneficial relationships with other parties that are long lasting and productive. International commercial negotiations are a vital element of today’s business world. But how do you conduct them successfully? And how well trained, prepared and knowledgeable are those conducting the negotiation? What makes this book different is that it encapsulates the core ‘need to know’ elements of negotiation that can make or break a deal. It is written to be user-friendly and an easy read – it offers simple advice that will be immediately useful to the commercial negotiator and makes many complicated issues easily understandable. ‘Silver Bullets’ are provided, distilling the critical factors that have significant implications for the negotiated outcome. This book has been written with the experienced business professional who is engaged within commercial negotiations in mind. It provides new insight into how to add value in terms of negotiation skills and operational efficiency. The book has been deliberately written in a non-technical, easy-to-read style that will have broad appeal.
The Silver Bullets of Project Management
by Christopher LennonThis book provides practical guidance for corporate decision makers, project managers, project engineers, and for those wishing to grasp the key issues that define project success. The book represents a distillation of years of practical experience and offers a clear and concise ‘blueprint’ for how to approach projects and their management. This book is designed to be ‘clean and simple’ in its delivery – allowing the reader to immediately have ‘take aways’ that could be implemented within a project, adding value to any approach dealing with the key common problems and issues that arise within the project medium. The book can be applied to a wide range of scenarios in which project management is required – from setting up an organisation, creating distribution networks, bringing new technology to market, and to designing a leadership and training architecture within an organisation. The book, in addition to being a go-to reference book on project management for professional project managers and business leaders, is also ideal for postgraduate and undergraduate students studying project management. It is written to be user friendly, yet provides a wealth of information and tips that will enhance the readers knowledge and understanding of managing projects.
The Silver Economy: An Ageing Society in the European Union (Routledge Studies in the European Economy)
by Agata Niemczyk Katarzyna Szalonka Anna Gardocka-Jałowiec Wioletta Nowak Renata Seweryn Zofia Gródek-SzostakThe definition of “old” has evolved intensively over the years due to demographic changes, and the ageing population is one of the most frequently discussed issues in recent decades. The profile of the 21st century senior is completely different from the senior in the second half of the 21st-century senior is completely different from the senior in the second half of the 20th century, not to mention earlier periods in history. As an increasing group of benefactors of human activity, they create demand for products and experiences. The system of goods and services that aims to leverage their purchasing potential and satisfy their consumption needs, including living, health, tourism, cultural, information, and communication needs, has been referred to as the so-called Silver Economy. The book reviews the phenomenon of ageing of the EU’s population over 50. It also presents a multidimensional view of the potential for the development of this group’s economic, social, medical, family, personal and technological demand in the early 21st century. The book analyses the market behaviour of seniors and argues that the Silver Economy will grow in importance and profitability every year in various areas, both public and private. This includes health, finance, employment, leisure and well-being, education, and the use of digital tools. This publication is recommended for policymakers and business players who are considering how to achieve economic development through the growing and changing demand of the ageing population. For the world is now facing a challenge that no community has ever faced before – the coexistence of a long-lived population on the one hand and the growing popularity of digital technologies on the other. Chapter 4 of this book is available for free in PDF format as Open Access from the individual product page at www.routledge.com. It has been made available under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives (CC-BY-NC-ND) 4.0 license. The publication was financed by a subsidy for the University of Wroclaw, Funds for the “Excellence Initiative – Research University” program, a subsidy for the University of Bialystok and a grant from the Krakow University of Economics (057/ ZZE/2022/POT).
Silver in England
by Philippa GlanvilleFirst Published in 2005. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.
Silver Lake
by Liz Kind David J. CollisDave Roux, co-founder and chairman of Silver Lake, a private equity (PE) firm specializing in technology investments, was meeting with the firm's investment committee via video conference to discuss options for Silver Lake's future growth. While the private equity market had suffered since the economic crisis in the fall of 2008, Roux believed a number of opportunities still existed. There was significant interest within the firm to continue to offer new asset class investment products and to open additional outposts in foreign countries. Nonetheless, questions had risen internally regarding how much and in which directions to grow. Roux wondered how the firm could take advantage of the market potential while continuing to remain true to its original vision.
Silver Lake and Private Equity in Brazil: Carnaval or Calamity?
by Stephen J. Goldstein Aldo MusacchioThis case describes the recent boom in Brazil and recent developments in the private equity industry in that country. At the center of the case is Dave Roux, partner of the technology-focused, private equity firm Silver Lake, who is examining whether to open an office in Brazil. His decision will depend on the state of the Brazilian economy, of the private equity industry, and, ultimately, on the value proposition of Silver Lake. Is the current boom in Brazil a sign of a structural change or is it a bubble? Is it too late for a private equity firm to go to Brazil? Is the Brazilian market too saturated? How do private equity firms add value in Brazil? What's the right entry strategy for a private equity firm in Brazil? Should Silver Lake open an office in Brazil?
Silver Lining
by Scott D. AnthonyExperts agree: The turbulence triggered by the economic shock of 2008 constitutes the "new normal." Unfortunately, too many managers have become paralyzed by it, capable only of slashing costs indiscriminately.Though examining spending during recessions makes sense, the smartest executives do much more. As Scott Anthony reveals in The Silver Lining, these leaders continue innovating-by stopping ineffective initiatives, changing key business processes, and starting more productive behaviors. Result? Their companies emerge from downturns stronger than ever.Providing a wealth of ideas, tools, and examples from diverse industries, Anthony explains how to safeguard your company's profitability during even the toughest recessions. You'll discover how to:Prune your innovation and business portfolio to liberate resources for more promising initiativesAdopt a radical new market-segmentation scheme that helps you re-feature your offerings to reduce costs while delivering new value to customersReinvent your innovation process to drive fresh growthMitigate innovation risks by conducting strategic experiments and forging alliances with customers and other external entitiesAppeal to increasingly value-conscious customers to fend off low-cost attackersIn today's brutal economic climate, executives must pare costs to the bone while planting and nurturing seeds for tomorrow's growth. The Silver Lining explains how to master this seemingly impossible challenge.
The Silver Market Phenomenon: Marketing and Innovation in the Aging Society
by Cornelius Herstatt Florian KohlbacherThe current shift in demographics - aging and shrinking populations - in many countries around the world presents a major challenge to companies and societies alike. One particularly essential implication is the emergence and constant growth of the so-called "graying market" or "silver market", the market segment more or less broadly defined as those people aged 50 and older. Increasing in number and share of the total population while at the same time being relatively well-off, this market segment can be seen as very attractive and promising, although still very underdeveloped in terms of product and service offerings. This book offers a thorough and up-to-date analysis of the challenges and opportunities in leveraging innovation, technology, product development and marketing for older consumers and employees. Key lessons are drawn from a variety of industries and countries, including the lead market Japan.
Silver Opportunity: Building Integrated Services for Older Adults around Primary Health Care
by Xiaohui Hou, Jigyasa Sharma, and Feng ZhaoWe live in a rapidly aging world, in which people who are age 60 and older outnumber children under the age of five. This book reveals large and growing gaps in care for older adults in countries at all income levels and shows how to leverage reforms for improving health outcomes for older adults and create healthier, more prosperous communities. Aimed at policy makers and other health and development stakeholders who want to promote healthier aging, Silver Opportunity compiles the latest evidence on care needs and gaps for aging populations. It argues that primary health care should be the cornerstone of integrated service delivery for older people, but primary health care systems must first build their capacity to respond to older people’s health needs. It presents an original framework for policy action to advance primary health care†“centered, integrated senior care; documents the experiences of pioneering countries in delivering community-based care to older people; and provides recommendations for decision-makers. The framework presents four policy levers with which to improve health care for seniors—financing, innovation, regulation, and evaluation and measurement—or FIRE. Finally, the book posits that by acting now, countries can leverage population aging to accelerate progress toward health equity and universal health coverage.
Silver Opportunity Case Studies: Experiences with Building Integrated Services for Older Adults around Primary Health Care
by Xiaohui Hou, Jigyasa Sharma, and Feng ZhaoHealth care systems must be prepared to address the expanding and complex needs of an aging population. Rather than a “silver challenge,†? this situation should be seen as an opportunity to reevaluate and reorganize the health care delivery system holistically. Silver Opportunity Case Studies presents a comprehensive examination of care for older adults in diverse economic and geographic contexts through a collection of country and regional case studies. This collection of case studies complements the synthesis volume of global evidence—Silver Opportunity: Building Integrated Services for Older Adults around Primary Health Care—by offering practical insights for decision-making, sharing knowledge, and encouraging cross-learning. The book provides a deeper understanding of the complexities involved and highlights key issues and current practices at the country level. The overarching goal of the volume is to inform policy makers, health care professionals, and other stakeholders about effective practices for caring for older adults and to support the development of evidence-based policies that enhance their health and well-being.d well-being.
Silver, Trade, and War: Spain and America in the Making of Early Modern Europe
by Stanley J. Stein Barbara H. SteinChosen by Choice Magazine as an Outstanding Academic TitleThe 250 years covered by Silver, Trade, and War marked the era of commercial capitalism, that bridge between late medieval and modern times. Spain, peripheral to western Europe in 1500, produced American treasure in silver, which Spanish convoys bore from Portobelo and Veracruz on the Carribbean coast across the Atlantic to Spain in exchange for European goods shipped from Sevilla (later, Cadiz). Spanish colonialism, the authors suggest, was the cutting edge of the early global economy. America's silver permitted Spain to graft early capitalistic elements onto its late medieval structures, reinforcing its patrimonialism and dynasticism. However, the authors argue, silver gave Spain an illusion of wealth, security, and hegemony, while its system of "managed" transatlantic trade failed to monitor silver flows that were beyond the control of government officials. While Spain's intervention buttressed Hapsburg efforts at hegemony in Europe, it induced the formation of protonationalist state formations, notably in England and France. The treaty of Utrecht (1714) emphasized the lag between developing England and France, and stagnating Spain, and the persistence of Spain's late medieval structures. These were basic elements of what the authors term Spain's Hapsburg "legacy."Over the first half of the eighteenth century, Spain under the Bourbons tried to contain expansionist France and England in the Caribbean and to formulate and implement policies competitors seemed to apply successfully to their overseas possessions, namely, a colonial compact. Spain's policy planners (proyectistas) scanned abroad for models of modernization adaptable to Spain and its American colonies without risking institutional change. The second part of the book, "Toward a Spanish-Bourbon Paradigm," analyzes the projectors' works and their minimal impact in the context of the changing Atlantic scene until 1759. By then, despite its efforts, Spain could no longer compete successfully with England and France in the international economy. Throughout the book a colonial rather than metropolitan prism informs the authors' interpretation of the major themes examined.Silver, Trade, and War is about men and markets, national rivalries, diplomacy and conflict, and the advancement or stagnation of states.
Silver, Trade, and War: Spain and America in the Making of Early Modern Europe
by Stanley J. Stein Barbara H. SteinA look at the interaction of America, Spain, and Europe between 1500 and 1750, focusing on Spain’s role in Europe’s expansion across the Atlantic.The 250 years covered by this book marked the era of commercial capitalism, bridging late medieval and modern times. In 1500, Spain brought American silver back home across the Atlantic in exchange for European goods. Spanish colonialism, the authors suggest, was the cutting edge of the early global economy. America’s silver enabled Spain to bring elements of capitalism into its late medieval society. However, the authors argue, silver gave Spain illusions of wealth, security, and dominance, while its system of “managed” transatlantic trade failed to monitor silver flows that were beyond government control. While Spain’s intervention reinforced Hapsburg efforts at hegemony in Europe, it also led to proto-nationalist state formations, notably in England and France. 1714’s Treaty of Utrecht emphasized the lag between developing England and France, and stagnating Spain, and the persistence of Spain’s late medieval structures. These were basic elements of what the authors term Spain’s Hapsburg “legacy.”Over the first half of the eighteenth century, Spain under the Bourbons tried to contain expansionist France and England in the Caribbean and to create policies competitors seemed to apply successfully to their overseas possessions, namely, a colonial compact. Spain’s policy planners (proyectistas) scanned abroad for models of modernization adaptable to Spain and its American colonies without risking institutional change. The second part of the book analyzes the projectors’ works and their minimal impact on the changing Atlantic scene until 1759. By then, despite its efforts, Spain could no longer compete with England and France in the international economy. Silver, Trade, and War is about markets, national rivalries, diplomacy, conflict, and the advancement or stagnation of states.
Silvio Napoli at Schindler India (A)
by Michael Y. Yoshino Christopher A. Bartlett Perry L. FaganA young Italian MBA working for a Swiss multinational is sent to India to establish a subsidiary and implement the strategy he prepared at headquarters as a strategic planner. This case focuses on three core strategic decisions he must make as his plan is challenged by his local Indian management team and Schindler's European plants supplying him. A rewritten version of an earlier case.