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A History of Corporations
by William Magnuson
A history of how corporate innovation has shaped society, from ancient Rome to Silicon Valley.
Americans have long been skeptical of corporations, and that skepticism has only grown more intense in recent years. Meanwhile, corporations continue to amass wealth and power at a dizzying rate, recklessly pursuing profit while leaving society to sort out the costs.
In For Profit, law professor William Magnuson argues that the story of the corporation didn't have to come to this. Throughout history, he finds, corporations have been purpose-built to benefit the societies that surrounded them. Corporations enabled everything from the construction of ancient Rome's roads and aqueducts to the artistic flourishing of the Renaissance to the rise of the middle class in the twentieth century. By recapturing this original spirit of civic virtue, Magnuson argues, corporations can help craft a society in which all of us—not just shareholders—benefit from the profits of enterprise.
"[T]his is an evenhanded, richly nuanced examination of the modern economy's central institution." - Publishers Weekly (starred review)
"Magnuson looks at how corporations operate in society but struggles to find a fresh perspective." - Kirkus Reviews
"Magnuson provides plenty of history and detail for each theme and enterprise, sometimes painstakingly so; each profile takes time to unfurl. Surprisingly, he is able to weave each together as the book progresses over the centuries. Readers interested in business and history will appreciate the depth of Magnuson's research and the lessons it reveals about corporations, past and present." - Library Journal
"Brilliantly conceived and enlightening at every turn, For Profit is a thrilling history of an institution that has shaped all our lives—for better and for worse." - Lawrence Wright, author of The Plague Year
"In this lively and informative history of the corporation, William Magnuson shows that corporations were born to serve the public interest—only to be used and abused time and again to maximize profits for shareholders and executives. A must-read for any student of the world's most influential form of economic organization." - Adam Winkler, author of We the Corporations
This information about For Profit was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
William Magnuson is an associate professor at Texas A&M Law School, where he teaches corporate law. Previously, he taught law at Harvard University. The author of Blockchain Democracy, he has written for the Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, and Bloomberg. He lives in Austin, Texas.
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