Born on this day…
October 2, 2008 by gbrown · Leave a Comment
Mohandas Gandhi 2 October 1968
Father of democratic India and a shining light for all that believe there is another way…
“My life is my message”
Dig that Tabla
February 28, 2008 by gbrown · 1 Comment
This reminds me of my business trip to Kerala last Summer courtesy of our friends at ActsInfo. There are a few ethnic instruments that are as inimitable as they are evocative of the culture which they hail from - Gamelan, Erhu and the Tabla are 3 that spring to mind. The latter is most noted for its hypnotic modulating sound caused by the stretching tone of the hide across the drums. When these guys play they often slip into a trance…
Freedom at Midnight
February 26, 2008 by gbrown · Leave a Comment
Currently reading “Freedom at Midnight” by Collins and Lapierre - the account of India’s struggle for independence through the eyes of its main actors - Mountbatten, Gandhi and Nehru amongst others.
The main interest is that of Gandhi’s part in the transition, his beliefs and his legacy. Through his doctrine of non-violence we still have today a viable model for change without bloodshed so uncommonly practised. More remarkably is his connection as kindred spirits with likeminded philosophers - Martin Luther King (to whom he was an acquaintance and friend), Henry David Thoreau, Einstein and Leo Tolstoy (both of whom he conversed avidly before his death).
Gandhi’s strict adherence to a principled life can only be admired. How else could such a man without office, power or title bring about change on such a scale without money or violence? As Gandhi himself said “My life is my message”.
“Generations to come will scarce believe such a one of flesh and blood walked on this earth” (Albert Einstein on Gandhi’s passing)
His legacy can only be reflected in the works of students such as Martin Luther King whose faith in the doctrine of non-violence itself created massive change for the better in people’s lives.
“Peace is not merely a distant goal that we seek, but a means by which we arrive at that goal” MLK
The Beginnings of the Imperial Dream
February 25, 2008 by gbrown · Leave a Comment
The trouble with history is history teachers. School left only and indelible impression of tedious history classes on a Wednesday afternoon with our socially inadequate teacher rambling on about the Bolsheviks, the Maginot Line and just about any historical subject that couldn’t be more irrelevant to the mind of a teenage boy.
Strange then that I was drawn to the book I am currently reading - The East India Company by Anthony Wild. Once I had overcome the knee jerk association of boring wednesdays and Clive of India I was drawn into a world of tea, piracy, treachery, humduggery and spices noted by one commentator as the “grandest society of merchants in the Universe”.
Indeed The Company did for global trade in the 17th century what Microsoft did to software in the 90s and Google respectively for the internet. It created the ecosystem.
India has always had a draw for me. I have visited a number of times, set up 2 offices in probably 2 of the most remote states and travelled from the very far rugged North on the Tibetan border in Sikkim down to the coconut backwaters of the Southern states of Kerala and Chennai.
Interesting that the Company had set up its original trading posts in the same locales our company had decided upon - Calcutta and Madras (now Chennai). But that’s where the similarities end. Wild claims that The Company was the largest, in real terms, in history turning over 10s of millions in the 16th and 17th centuries.
Beyond the obvious hiccups in its history such as the Black Hole of Calcutta and the ongoing subjegation of the locals, much of today’s corporate structures derive from The Company’s machinations - boards of directors, AGMs and dividend declarations all came from its initial blueprint.
But its legacy goes beyond corporate governance. Words familiar in our folklore derive from the company’s own history - The South Sea Bubble, pukka, Lloyds of London, mocha coffee, Boston Tea Party, stars and stripes, earl grey tea, The Stock Exchange, Pale Ale, tonic water, golf, the fur trade, slavery, tomato ketchup, Nutmeg, Opium, coffee houses, P+O and the Suez Canal are to name but a few whose history is inextricably intertwined with its own.
What it did unquestionably do was open up the world to trade - from coffee and textiles in its early stages to tea, opium, silks and tobacco in the 18 and 19th centuries.
When you read Wild’s account you find many parralels between the economic gunboat diplomacy of The Company and the modern antics of today’s multinationals. Ironically, its only the tools of their endeavours that have changed - India, Africa, China, Indonesia, Afghanistan and the Middle East all comprised the earlier playing and plundering grounds of the age’s zealous entrepreneurs.
As one Lord Palmerston commented “It is the business of government to open and secure roads for the merchant”.
How little has changed.
