Necessary Evil

A challenging and engagingly written book. Kinley's analysis is impressively wide-ranging, encompassing private and public finance issues including investment, tax and aid; risk and financial regulation; and human rights-impacting shortcomings in global financial architecture. He sets out a convincing blueprint for rendering the global financial system supportive rather than subversive of human rights.

Auteur
David Kinley is Professor and Chair in Human Rights Law at the University of Sydney, and an Academic Expert member of Doughty Street Chambers in London. He is a former Fulbright Senior Scholar at American University Washington College of Law, and has taught at Oxford and George Washington Universities as well as the Sorbonne. He is a co-author of The International Covenant on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights (winner of an American Society of International Law Best Book Award) and author of Civilizing Globalization: Human Rights and the Global Economy. Born in Ireland and somewhat educated in England, he now lives in Australia.

Texte du rabat

Necessary Evil is a penetrating investigation into how the financial system both advances and undermines progress in human rights. It will be an indispensible read for anyone interested in how global finance can be reformed in ways that will salvage its legitimacy and fulfill its role as a human rights provider, not a vandal.

Contenu

• Introduction

• Taming the money monster

• The argument

• The research journey

• The finance/human rights relationship

• Stages in the relationship

• Chapter 1 Strange bedfellows

• Hubris

• Finance as a utility

• Financial ownership

• Financial weapons of mass destruction

• Transformative powers

• Interdependency

• The poverty prism

• The public problem of private poverty

• Incentives and exceptionalism

• Anthropology on Wall Street

• Mission statement

• Chapter 2 Living together

• Ends and means

• Money as an instrument

• A common liberal heritage

• Human rights globalization

• Paying for rights

• Finding rights

• Human rights and the global economy

• Rights Politics

• Complicated confederacy

• Speaking different languages

• Missed opportunities

• Human needs and human rights

• Rights differences

• Rights impacts

• Chapter 3 Flirting with Risk

• The attraction

• From boring banking to fantasy finance

• The majesty and tragedy of leverage

• Human rights risks

• Rich world austerity

• Poor world impacts

• Faith

• Faith no more

• Greed

• Greed in finance

• When risk goes bad

• Risky lessons

• Conclusion

• Chapter 4 Private matters

• What money can buy

• The generation and investment of wealth

• Income

• Remittances and credit

• Rent-seeking

• Capital

• Capital and tyranny

• Capital gains

• Responsible capital

• The business of impact

• Equity and inequality

• Rewarding capital

• Consequences of unequal wealth

• Wealth and giving

• The givers

• The Receivers

• Mixed motivations

• How much is enough?

• The private/public connection

• Chapter 5 Public affairs

• Duty

• The voice of human rights

• Public funding of human rights

• Taxation, representation and rights

• The consequences of levying tax - a brief history

• Of ghosts and icebergs - the consequences of lost tax

• Tax as a force for good

• Aid and debt

• Development and human rights: more awkward than intimate

• Partnering with the private sector

• Getting the mix right

• Does 'new' aid work?

• Poorly

• Promising

• Possibly

• Conclusion

• Chapter 6 Cheating

• Consequences

• Deceit and subversion

• Illicit finance

• Tax evasion

• Tax free

• Tax sport

• Misappropriation

• Questions of impunity

• Regulatory capture

• Legal smoke screens

• Denial in finance

• Denial in human rights

• Wishful thinking

• Measuring progress

• Conclusion

• Chapter 7 Counseling and reconciliation

• What sort of counsel?

• The long shadow of financial exceptionalism

• Attitudes and culture

• Empathy

• Responsibilities

• Esteem

• Sleaze

• Capacity for change

• Regulatory intervention and risk

• Identification of risk

• Allocation of risk

• Risk and the rule of law

• Alternatives

• Reaching across the divide

• Conclusion