- Making sense of Japan’s new immigration policy Emese Schwarcz, Diplomat
- Deportations with benefits Irfan Khawaja, Policy of Truth
- Democracy as an information system Henry Farrell, Crooked Timber
- Against debate Chris Dillow, Stumbling & Mumbling
Links
Nightcap
- Ethnicity and Philosophy Nick Nielsen, Grand Strategy Annex
- Revisiting the Dyson Sphere Caleb Scharf, Life, Unbounded
- Reading VS Naipaul Branko Milanovic, globalinequality
- Deep Learning and Abstract Orders Federico Sosa Valle, NOL
Nightcap
- Who is Joe Epstein? Jonathan Leaf, Modern Age
- “Company-style” paintings from 19th century Burma Jonathan Saha, Colonizing Animals
- Nazis: A Modern Field Guide Jonathan Kay, Quillette
- The Dangers of Letting Someone Else Decide Jonathan Klick, Cato Unbound
Nightcap
- Conservatives, sex, and the aspirations of women Rachel Lu, Law & Liberty
- Hello Mars, farewell Mars Caleb Scharf, Life, Unbounded
- Terrorism justified: a response to Vicente Medina (Machiavelli) Irfan Khawaja, Policy of Truth
- The third gender of southern Mexico Ola Synowiec, BBC
Nightcap
- The passion for a kind of justice born of righteous rage Waller Newell, Claremont Review of Books
- Zbigniew Brzezinski’s Cold War: Less Than Grand Strategy Andrew Bacevich, the Nation
- No, Sex Wasn’t Better for Women Under Socialism Cathy Young, Reason
- I am Ashurbanipal, king of the world, king of Assyria Samuel Reilly, 1843
Nightcap
- Israel’s political balagan Michael Koplow, Ottomans & Zionists
- A summary of the rights of British America Thomas Jefferson, Avalon Project
- Studying Singapore before it was famous Frank Beyer, Asian Review of Books
- The mystic life of Hermann Hesse Philip Hensher, Spectator
Nightcap
- No easy road: easements and occupation in the West Bank Irfan Khawaja, Policy of Truth
- Clouds over the Pacific: War, Stagnation, and the end of the Asian Century James Holmes, National Review
- Was philosophy founded by non-Western women? Dag Herbjørnsrud, Aeon
- Natural History of a Cherry Tree Nick Nielsen, Grand Strategy Annex
Afternoon Tea: “Shareholder Activism at the Dutch East India Company 1622-1625”
This paper explores the reason for the absence of control rights of shareholders in the Dutch East India Company (VOC) and the background of the conflict between shareholders and directors that arose in 1622/1623 when the VOC Charter of 1602 was extended.
The VOC was the result of a merger between several companies that had been trading in the East Indies between 1594 and 1602. The legal structure of most of these “pre-companies” which were incorporated for a single voyage to the East Indies, prevented shareholders from having actual influence. In most of these companies, the shareholders invested their money, not in the company itself, but via one of the individual directors. The relationship between a shareholder and most of the precompanies was therefore indirect, which impeded the exercise of control rights. Furthermore, shareholders may not really have been interested in their control rights given the high returns and the expectations of the newly opened trade route.
When these pre-companies were merged into the VOC in 1602, nothing changed with respect to the absence of shareholder control rights. The VOC, however, was established for a longer period and had to meet other more long-term challenges than those faced by the pre- companies. The failure to adapt the control structure to suit the different circumstances may have been a source of the conflicts that arose between the directors and shareholders between 1602 and 1623.
In 1622, upon extension of the 1602 Charter, a significant conflict erupted between the shareholders and directors. The so called dissenting participants complained about the numerous conflicts of interests that had been arising between the various directors and the VOC. They accused the directors of abuse of power, short-selling and self-enrichment. They argued that shareholder approval was required for the VOC to turn to the capital market to borrow funds. They also demanded that large investors be entitled to vote on the appointment of new directors. As the dissenting participants supported their arguments by referring to the English East India Company, the corporate governance of the EIC is briefly described.
Publishing their complaints in pamphlets, the shareholders mobilized public opinion and attempted to convince merchants not to invest in the Dutch West India Company, which was being incorporated at the same time. They exerted pressure on the government to ensure that more rights were granted to the shareholders when the VOC Charter was extended. To a limited extent, the activism of the “dissenting participants” was successful. The 1623 Charter granted certain rights to large investors, including the right to nominate new candidates for appointment as director. The 1623 Charter further regulated insider trading by the directors and encouraged the directors to pay a yearly dividend to the shareholders. In addition, a committee of nine shareholders was entrusted with the supervision of the VOC directors. This corporate body was known as the “Lords Nine” (Heren IX).
This is from Matthijs de Jongh, a judge in the Netherlands. Here is the link.
Nightcap
- As economic freedom goes global, American conservatives turn inward John Tamny, RealClearMarkets
- Machiavelli was no Machiavellian Catherine Zuckert, Aeon
- Florentine liberty and Machiavelli’s The Prince Barry Stocker, NOL
- Scaling Up: a history of dragons! Tom Shippey, Literary Review
Nightcap
- A reassessment of socialism Branko Milanovic, globalinequality
- Mexico’s Postmodern Populism Angel Jaramillo Torres, American Affairs
- America’s zeal for intervention, challenged Jacob Heilbrunn, New York Times
- The Souls of Yellow Folk—A Review Daniel Oppenheimer, Quillette
More Longform essays
Barry’s essays on republican libertarianism (not what you think, American readers!) and British sovereignty and isolationism are up in the new ‘Longform Essays‘ section of the blog. You’ll see that there are more in the works, too, including essays by Zak, Rick, and at least one more from Barry.
These essays join Jacques’ work on legal immigration into the United States and protectionism/free trade, as well as Mary’s essay on education and its relationship with The State.
Editing these essays makes me the luckiest dude in all of libertarian-dom! I hope there are many more in the years to come.
I still pay attention to the news cycle, but it’s so outrageous these days that it’s hard to write about, let alone analyse or interpret. What a mess. I will say that corporate media is definitely skewed to the left.
Libertarians – and economists – haven’t done a good job of explaining the benefits of free trade. Telling the man on the street that free trade is a fundamental truth has not worked. “Democracy” is another major issue; people throw the word around like a baseball, but its fundamentals are rarely discussed. Given that we’ve gone to war over democracy, on numerous occasions, I think it needs to be discussed far more often.
At any rate, enjoy the essays!
Afternoon Tea: “Disjuncture and Difference in the Global Cultural Economy”
The central problem of today’s global interactions is the tension between cultural homogenization and cultural heterogenization. A vast array of empirical facts could be brought to bear on the side of the ‘homogenization’ argument, and much of it has come from the left end of the spectrum of media studies, and some from other, less appealing, perspectives. Most often, the homogenization argument subspeciates in to either an argument about Americanization, or an argument about ‘commoditization’, and very often the two arguments are closely linked. What these arguments fail to consider is that at least as rapidly as forces from various metropolises are brought into new societies they tend to become indigenized in one or other way: this is true of music and housing styles as much as it is true of science and terrorism, spectacles and constitutions. The dynamics of such indigenization have just begun to be explored in a sophisticated manner, and much more needs to be done. But it is worth noticing that for the people of Irian Jaya, Indonesianization may be more worrisome than Americanization, as Japanization may be for Koreans, Indianization for Sri Lankans […] Such a list of alternative fears to Americanization could be greatly expanded, but it is not a shapeless inventory: for polities of smaller scale, there is always a fear of cultural absorption by polities of larger scale, especially those that are nearby. One man’s imagined community is another man’s political prison.
This is from Arjun Appedurai, an anthropologist at NYU. Here is the link.
Nightcap
- The two afflictions that enhance the challenge for returning vets David French, National Review
- The varieties of Muslim faith become a vital form of diplomacy Bruce Clark, Erasmus
- How the Inkas governed, thrived and fell without alphabetic writing Christopher Given-Wilson, Aeon
- Qatar’s progress on its improbable World Cup David Conn, Guardian
Nightcap
- Libertarian populism is still relevant in the Age of Trump Kevin Boyd, American Conservative
- What others have said about America James Poulos, Law & Liberty
- In praise of Viktor Orbán Lee Congdon, Modern Age
- Beyond the SETI paradigm Nick Nielsen, Grand Strategy Annex
Afternoon Tea: “Albert Venn Dicey and the Constitutional Theory of Empire”
In the post-1945 world, constitutionalism has transcended the nation-state, with an array of transnational arrangements now manifesting constitutional characteristics — so says a growing number of scholars. This paper reveals an earlier but largely forgotten discourse of transnational constitutionalism: the constitutional theory of the British Empire in the late-nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Focusing on the work of Albert Venn Dicey, the paper shows that, when the Empire was at the height of its power and prestige, British constitutional scholars came to see the Empire as a constitutional order and project. For Dicey, a committed constitutionalist and imperialist, the central dynamic of the imperial constitutional order was balancing British constitutional principles with imperial unity. This paper focuses in particular on parliamentary sovereignty, a constitutional principle that for Dicey was both necessary for and dangerous to the Empire’s integrity. An exercise in intellectual history, the paper rethinks Dicey’s work and the constitutional tradition in which Dicey has played such an integral part, seeking to bring empire back into the picture.
This is from Dylan Lino, a legal theorist at the University of Western Australia’s Law School. Here is the link.
Notes On Liberty 