1) The intelligent investor: This is a classic book on value-investing written by Benjamin Graham who is called as the father of value-investing as well as the dean of security analysis. There are many approaches to investing but the investment based on the inherent value of the business was pioneered and perfected by Ben Graham. The approach of Graham has stood the test of time over decades surviving the worst bear markets of stock market history. The book was first published in the 40s and subsequently edited by Graham till his death in the 70s. This particular edition which I’ve read has commentaries by financial journalist Jason Zweig.
The book in its outset explains a very important but often neglected point of investment: the difference between investment and speculation. Then starts building methodically the approach, discipline required for value investor. The approach is explained through various historical data, companies.
It explains meticulously all the factors that are involved in investment process. Graham does analysis with microscopic details. Graham’s theory was well known in investment circles all over the world but was made popular by his most famous student Warren buffet.
The book has its positives in its meticulous and comprehensive approach to value investing but at times gets boring when it goes into the details of US stock market history. An Indian version of the book explaining the concepts of Graham with Indian stock market history can be useful for Indian investors.
The concepts that are explained in the book require some basic knowledge in finance and investing. A layman who is new to the world of investment will find it difficult to stomach the concepts presented. This is a single, most reliable work on value investing that can’t be missed by the people from world of finance in general and investment in particular.
2) The clash of civilizations and the remaking of world order: This is an important work of Samuel Huntington which attempted to explain geo-politics in the post-cold war world. Ideology formed the central role in international relations in the cold-war era. But after the collapse of Soviet Union and ending of cold war, the place of ideology will be supplanted by culture and civilizations. Thus the book predicts there will be clash of civilization & Global politics will be multi-polar and multi-civilizational.
The author defines what civilization is and recognizes five major civilizations in the present world: Chinese, Japanese, Indian, Islamic, and Western. The west rose to prominence in the 16th century and the author categorically says it’s not due to any superiority of its civilization. In his own words “The West won the world not by the superiority of its ideas or values or religion (to which few members of other civilizations were converted) but rather by its superiority in applying organized violence”. But there can be no denying the fact that the west is the cradle of majority of political ideologies of the world like: liberalism, socialism, anarchism, corporatism, Marxism, communism, social democracy, conservatism, nationalism, fascism, and Christian democracy. The common denominator of all these are they are the product of western civilization.
For a universal civilization to emerge there should be a universal language and universal religion. That possibility looks unlikely. It predicts that by the about the third decade of the 21st century, Islam will be the dominant religion of the world displacing western Christianity. The reason being, Christianity spreads primarily by conversion, Islam by conversion and reproduction. It also predicts that by the middle of 21st century, the western grip on the world economy will be over. The main civilizations that are positioned to challenge the west are Confucian and Islamic.
All the civilizations should necessarily have core state which can lead all other nations of that civilization. “Islam, Latin America, and Africa lack core states. Islamist fundamentalism rejects the nation state in favor of the unity of Islam just as Marxism rejected it in favor of the unity of the international proletariat.” The future fault lines are likely to arise from interaction of “Western arrogance, Islamic intolerance, and Sinic assertiveness.”
The role of religion in the fault line war is emphasized by using the Islamic example (Afghan-Soviet war of the ‘79). The role of religion is downplayed by myopic seculars, and those who want to be politically correct. “In the end, the Soviets were defeated by three factors they could not effectively equal or counter: American technology, Saudi money, and Muslim demographics and zeal”
Then comes one of the most discussed and debated part of the book: The incidence of Islam’s bloody borders. “While at the macro or global level of world politics the primary clash of civilizations is between the West and the rest, at the micro or local level it is between Islam and the others.” It quotes many examples in this context: The situation in Bosnia, Kosovo, Cyprus (Muslim Turks and Orthodox Greeks), Chechnya, India, Malaysia, Indonesia, Middle East, Sudan & a few others.
Then, the possible causes of Muslim conflict propensity are analyzed. A few of them are:
1) Islam has from the start been a religion of the sword and that it glorifies military virtues.
2) Islam originated among “warring Bedouin nomadic tribes” and this violent origin is stamped in the foundation of Islam.
3) Muhammad himself is remembered as a hard fighter and a skillful military commander. (No one would say this about Christ or Buddha.)
4) The doctrines of Islam, it is argued, dictate war against unbelievers.
5) The Koran and other statements of Muslim beliefs contain few prohibitions on violence, and a concept of nonviolence is absent from Muslim doctrine and practice.
6) Even more than Christianity, Islam is an absolutist faith. It merges religion and politics and draws a sharp line between those in the Dar al-Islam and those in the Dar al-harb. As a result, Confucians, Buddhists, Hindus, Western Christians, and Orthodox Christians have less difficulty adapting to and living with each other than any one of them has in adapting to and living with Muslims.
7) From its origin in Arabia, the spread of Islam across northern Africa and much of the Middle East and later to central Asia, the Subcontinent, and the Balkans brought Muslims into direct contact with many different peoples, who were conquered and converted, and the legacy of this process remains.
On an ending note, the book predicts the war based on civilization between different civilizations, most likely involving Muslims on one side and non-Muslims on the other. The book envisages a hypothetical global civilizational war between China & the US, and between India & Pakistan. The US, Europe, Russia and India would engage in a global struggle against China, Japan and most of Islam. The global power would shift from the west to the east and then towards south. The great beneficiary would be India.
The cycle of civilization is explained beautifully in this paragraph: “When civilizations first emerge, their people are usually vigorous, dynamic, brutal, mobile, and expansionist. They are relatively uncivilized. As the civilization evolves it becomes more settled and develops the techniques and skills that make it more Civilized. As the competition among its constituent elements tapers off and a universal state emerges, the civilization reaches its highest level of Civilization, its “golden age,” with a flowering of morality, art, literature, philosophy, technology, and martial, economic, and political competence. As it goes into decay as a civilization, its level of Civilization also declines until it disappears under the onslaught of a different surging civilization with a lower level of Civilization.”
To avoid major inter-civilizational wars, the core states of each civilizations should stop meddling in conflicts with other civilizations, the author advocates. Also, an international order based on civilizations is the surest safeguard against world war.
This book advocates a model based on civilizations for the interactions in global politics. But the truth is that as many experts say, global politics is too complicated to be captured by any single model.
