Loretta Napoleoni-Economist/Political Analyst

[Goodrum]

Wikipedia:

Loretta Napoleoni (born 1955) is an Italian economist, author, journalist and political analyst. She is an expert on the financing of terrorism and is well known internationally for having calculated the size of the terror economy.


Napoleoni was born and raised in Rome, Italy.

An active member of the feminist movement in the mid 1970s, she was a Fulbright scholar at Johns Hopkins University's Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) in Washington, D.C., and a Rotary Scholar at the London School of Economics (LSE). She has a M.Phil. in Terrorism from LSE, a Master's in International Relations from SAIS, and a Ph.D. in Economics from the University of Rome.

As an economist Napoleoni has worked for several banks and international organizations in Europe and the United States. In the early 1980s she worked at the National Bank of Hungary on the convertibility of the Hungarian forint that became the blue print for the convertibility of the ruble a decade later.

As well as lecturing regularly on the financing of terrorism, Napoleoni advises several governments on counter-terrorism. As chairman of the counter terrorism financing group for the Club de Madrid, she brought heads of state from around the world together to create a new strategy for combatting the financing of terror networks.

Napoleoni lives in London, England, and Whitefish, Montana, with her husband and children.


She is a member of the scientific committee of the Fundacion IDEAS, Spain's Socialist Party's think tank.

Since 2007 she has been Director of the first Italian investigative journalism course., and lectured at Cambridge University's Judge Business School.

From TED:

Once it was easy to know where our money was going. Now we live under a system Loretta Napoleoni has dubbed "rogue economics," where the blurry histories of the products we consume and the cash we invest make us complicit in financing barely legal credit schemes -- and even crime, if it's the slavery producing the beans for our lattes or the guts of our mobile phones.

The reach of the newly global market, as Napoleoni argues in her new book, Rogue Economics: Capitalism's New Reality, connects us all to the dark side, regardless of our intentions to be responsible -- and, she says, our deep connection to fishy credit and unregulated finance has laid the groundwork for the current economic crisis. Her previous book, Terror Incorporated, dives into the true economic impact of terrorism.

"Napoleoni argues that the crisis won't end until the excesses of globalization -- which include growing criminal markets in sex slaves and counterfeit drugs -- are brought under control."
Temma Ehrenfeld, Newsweek

Quotes from her TED Talk:

“I had failed the psychological profiling of a terrorist. The central committee of the Red Brigades had judged me too single-minded and too opinionated to become a good terrorist. My friend, on the other hand, she was a good terrorist because she was very good at following orders.”

“Contrary to what many people believe, terrorism is actually a very expensive business.”

Her talk, am thinking she is another obvious Rational:

Loretta Napoleoni: The intricate economics of terrorism

Excerpt only:

I'm going to show you how terrorismactually interacts with our daily life.15 years ago I received a phone call from a friend.At the time he was looking after the rights of political prisonersin Italian jails.He asked me if I wanted to interview the Red Brigades.Now, as many of you may remember,the Red Brigades was a terrorist, Marxist organizationwhich was very active in Italyfrom the 1960s until the mid-1980s.As part of their strategythe Red Brigades never spoke with anybody, not even with their lawyers.They sat in silence through their trails,waving occasionally at family and friends.

In 1993 they declared the end of the armed struggle.And they drew a list of people with whom they would talk,and tell their story.And I was one of those people.When I asked my friend why the Red Brigades want to talk to me,he said that the female members of the organizationhad actually supported my name.In particular, one person had put it forward.She was my childhood friend.She had joined the Red Brigadesand became a leader of the organization.

Naturally, I didn't know thatuntil the day she was arrested.In fact, I read it in the newspaper.At the time of the phone callI just had a baby,I successfully completed a management buyoutto the company I was working with,and the last thing I wanted to do was to go back homeand touring the high-security prisons.But this is exactly what I didbecause I wanted to knowwhat had turned my best friendinto a terrorist,and why she'd never tried to recruit me.(Laughter)(Applause)

So, this is exactly what I did.Now, I found the answer very quickly.I actually had failedthe psychological profiling of a terrorist.The center committee of the Red Brigadeshad judged me too single-mindedand too opinionated to become a good terrorist.My friend, on the other hand, she was a good terroristbecause she was very good at following orders.She also embraced violence.Because she believed that the only wayto unblock what, at the time,was known as a blocked democracy,Italy, a country run by the same party for 35 yearswas the arms struggle.

At the same time, while I was interviewing the Red Brigades,I also discovered that their life was not ruledby politics or ideology,but actually was ruled by economics...

[Goodrum]

Economist Loretta Napoleoni has debunked capitalism and decoded terrorist money laundering. Now she has followed the money to China with Maonomics: Why Chinese Communists Make Better Capitalists Than We Do, a contrarian look at the dragon that’s taking up increasing space in the world’s financial room.

British-based Napoleoni spent years researching what makes the Chinese the world’s economic success story while superpower America slides down a slippery slope. On Wednesday, while in Toronto, she explained why China is still the “inscrutable East.”

From:

Maonomics: Why Chinese Communists Make Better Capitalists Than We Do

Researcher, problem solver, theory, ideas...

Q: What “Western myths” stand in the way of understanding China?

A: The biggest one is that the Chinese are bad and we’re good. That they exploit their labour force and we don’t. Actually, it’s the other way around. It was the colonialists who went to China and introduced exploitation that was reminiscent of the industrial revolution. We have to understand that the Chinese are very different from us, and they don’t want to be like us at all.

Q: Including our insistence on democracy?

A: In the West, democracy means voting. For the Chinese, it’s quite different. It’s economic opportunity, and people’s participation at different levels. People who live in big buildings, for instance, meet and talk about their needs. Mao uses the word democracy continuously as a concept of “people’s rule,” not elections.

Q: And Mao Zedong probably killed more people than anyone on the planet except, perhaps, Joseph Stalin.

A: He was a dictator. But he did one remarkable thing: he reunited the country and ended the nightmare of colonization. That also killed a lot of people from 1860 to 1945. I don’t think China could have got where it is today without a regime that established the cohesion of the country. Would an open democratic system be better for China? Perhaps. But back in 1945, that is not a choice people were able to make.

Q: There are rumours in the West that Chinese communism will collapse.

A: If there was a Chinese Spring, they’d probably elect the Communist Party. In general, they’re very satisfied with it. That’s hard to understand in the West, where we are constantly dissatisfied with government. Of course, the Chinese aren’t totally happy, but compared with 20 years ago, they’ve moved ahead incredibly well, and there’s no desire to change things just now. They look at our kind of democracy and they don’t want it.

Quotations



“

Politicians are the great illusionists ... The reason why they are illusionists is because politics has lost control of the economy. Politics should be a battle of ideas, it is not any more a battle of ideas. There is no left, there is no right. Politicians, what they do is, they create a basic economic condition for the individual and a corporation in order to grow economically, to become rich. But to hide this kind of transformation to hide the true nature of the state which has now become a market-state -- they project illusions. This is the key problem, that we, the people, are on the receiving-end of these illusions and often we don't know what is real and what is not.”



— Loretta Napoleoni, Radio New Zealand interview

[Goodrum]

Pragmatism:

Q: Is there Chinese medicine for a healthier Western economy?

A: Pragmatism.

Forget ideology, and use whatever works.

We’re in a huge crisis and still defending the economic model that brought us there.

We’re afraid to re-think.

We don’t turn to the policy of (John Maynard) Keynes (who believed in government spending to create jobs) because we think it’s socialism.

If that’s what it takes to get through the crisis, why not?

The Chinese used capitalism to save their country, and it worked very well. We should take that lesson of pragmatism from them.

[Goodrum]

Loretta Napoleoni .. QUOTE:

I dislike this attitude that, you go on TV, you are vary famous, and because you are famous people listen to you. And that you dodge taxation. And I live in Great Britain, I'm Italian and I pay my taxes. I think people have to be ethical, people have to be moral in every single second of their life.

...

London is the tax haven of the rich and famous... if he goes to the [United-] States he will pay taxes because you can't dodge the taxes in the US. The system is much much tougher.

...
ON THE (undemocratic) POWER OF CORPORATIONS :

Who is king today in the world is the consumer.... We the people have to put pressure upon the politicians. Nothing is going to come from the politicians. It is us, the consumer and the voters that have to do something.

....

Politicians are the great illusionists. ... the reason why they are illusionists is because politics has lost control of the economy. Politics should be a battle of ideas, it is not any more a battle of ideas. There is no left, there is no right. Politicians, what they do is, they create a basic economic condition for the individual and a corporation in order to grow economically, to become rich. But to hide this kind of transformation to hide the true nature of the state which has now become a market-state -- they project illusions. This is the key problem, that we, the people, are on the receiving-end of these illusions and often we don't know what is real and what is not.

The reality .. is like the film The Matrix. If you break through this web of illusion, the world that is outside, the real world, is actually fairly grim.

[brian423]

Researcher, problem solver, theory, ideas...

Ideas, but not good ideas. In Napoleoni's world, anything not controlled by politicians poses a threat. "All Western economies at the moment are rogue economies, for the simple reason that politics has lost control of the economy.... So why is [the Internet] a mixed blessing? Because nobody can control the internet."—March 2008 interview with Democracy Now! She is such an authoritarian control freak that she excuses the bloody hands of Chairman Mao because, after all, colonialists killed people, too. I loathe her type: the know-it-all policy wonk who lacks the intellectual humility to acknowledge the wisdom of crowds that arises spontaneously in uncontrolled systems like the global marketplace and the Internet. No human being, certainly no elected or appointed official, has the credentials to outdo those systems.

Can I strike a bargain with you, Goodrum? If I recognize Napoleoni as a Rational, will you do the same for John Stossel?

[Goodrum]

Knowledge, research, comparative work, directive at times, utilitarian, action orientated, observing, strategy of knowing, doing better, she is a Coordinating Rational, aligning herself partly with Thatcher, possibly more the Fieldmarshal than Arranger I am thinking...expressive, aligning people up, mobilising them, preemtive from a young age, driven...

From Charlotte Clarke's 10 questions, May 2012:

http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/2/e7395d22 ... z1wc5INWqG

In her spare time, Dr Napoleoni enjoys skiing and doing voluntary work with the Catholic church. She has written two novels and several non-fiction books, including Maonomics - Why Chinese Communists Make Better Capitalists Than We Do.

1. What is an average day at work like?

It varies a lot. I spend a lot of time travelling from one place to another where I give lectures. When I am not travelling I work alone or with my research assistants preparing lectures or writing a book. I have been writing a lot in recent years as these are indeed exceptional times. Often I do field work for my research, for example just a few weeks ago I spent a week in Greece.

2. What academic achievement are you most proud of?

Winning the Fulbright scholarship. I wanted to leave Italy and study in the US so badly. I had this dream since I was 10, but my family could not afford to send me there, so the only option was to win a scholarship. The Fulbright is by far the most prestigious in the US and winning it opened so many opportunities to win other scholarships. It was my ticket to the life of my dreams.

3. What is your biggest lesson learnt?

Never take anything for granted. Life is a constant battle and to make things easy you need to choose on which side you want to be. I have always being an outsider, my true strength is to look at institutions from the outside not from the inside. In 1992, I worked as a consultant at the International Bank of Reconstruction and Development when it was in its infancy. I felt suffocated by the international civil servants way of working.

4. Who are your business influences/heroes?

Deng Xiaoping, the Chinese politician because he changed China using wisdom and humility and Franz Kafka, the German author for the amazing insight into human life.

5. What is the worst job you have ever had?

When I was at London School of Economics, I worked as a barmaid at Mecca, which at the time was the biggest night club in London. My shift was from 7pm to 2am and it was very hectic, with lots of people. At midnight, a grid came down at the bar to prevent anyone from throwing bottles at us. It was scary but very well paid.

6. What advice would you give to women in business?

Help each other. Men are so used to networking through the old boys club but women seem afraid of each other. There is too much competition among women in business and not enough solidarity. I believe that to break the glass ceiling all we need is to stick together.

7. How do you deal with male-dominated environments?

It is not easy because I cannot stand big egos; humility for me is the biggest quality in any type of profession. Men do not enjoy being challenged by women, especially in sectors such as finance or anti-terrorism which are male-dominated industries. My strategy is the Mrs Thatcher approach: show them that you are smarter and that you know better. But I realise that is not the best solution, ideally men and women should work together as true partners.

8. What is the last book you read?

The Man Without A Face: The Unlikely Rise of Valdimir Putin by Masha Gessen. I tend to read mostly non fiction and to re-read the classics in fiction. Though I am very interested in young novelists, they have to be first class writers to appeal to me.

9. What is your life philosophy?

We are here for a reason which goes well beyond making money or being happy. We have a duty as members of society to defend the values we believe in. My generation spends too much time pleasing itself and not giving enough; true joy and success comes from giving, not from taking.

10. What are your future plans?

I want to write a novel describing what is happening in western capitalism. I think only fiction can explain the incredible changes which are taking place. I also think that the future generations will better understand what we are going though reading fiction. But I am not sure my publishers will back me on this plan.

[Goodrum]

“Learning is a two-way process”, China Daily

http://lorettanapoleoni.net/?p=583


From China Daily:

For more than three decades, China has looked up to and learnt from the West in its drive to catch up with the rest of the world. Quite a few even believe that the country has everything to learn from the West while the West has nothing to learn from China.
But that should not be the case today, at least according to Loretta Napoleoni, author of the new book, Maonomics: Why Chinese Communists Make Better Capitalists Than We Do.
In a talk at the China Institute in New York this week, Napoleoni claims the West has a lot to learn from the Chinese model. She describes the Western system as now obsolete and old and out of sync with globalization.
In Napoleoni’s view, China has handled the process of globalization much better than Western nations. It is wrong for the West to leave everything to the market in a globalized world.
The Italian economist argues that China’s transformations are not limited to reshaping the economy according to the principles of free trade, but also in the social and political arenas.
One of the world’s leading experts on money laundering and terror financing, Napoleoni admits she is not a China specialist and it is not a book about China, but about the world we are living in. She wants to use China as a benchmark to analyze the shortcoming of Western capitalism and she finds many.
She criticizes the West for constantly expecting China to fail and blaming all its problems on China and praises China’s success in poverty reduction. She says that the Chinese government has been much better in keeping the social contract with the people than many Western governments. China is giving the world the opportunity to have a new economic and political model, which can give birth to a new world order, she says.
However, it is wrong for Napoleoni to say that China benefits more than the West from globalization. Statistics show that the Western multinationals grab most of the profits while Chinese manufacturers receive only a meager share and China has inherited all of the environmental damage.
Also, while China’s progress has been phenomenal, the challenges it faces are still many and serious. In many ways, these challenges are far greater for China, which is still developing, than those facing the developed Western nations.
Nevertheless, Napoleoni is right in pointing out that every nation has something to offer. This includes the China miracle.

[Goodrum]

http://www.thedailybeast.com/newsweek/2 ... hocks.html

NEWSWEEK: What exactly is "rogue economics"?

Loretta Napoleoni: It's an umbrella term for black markets and criminal markets but also gray areas that aren't regulated. It occurs in periods of political upheaval when the economy moves faster than political sentiment and [at a rate which makes] politicians and governments lose control. The credit crisis is an example. Carlyle Capital borrowed $33 for every dollar it held in assets. Bear Stearns, its largest lender, went down when Carlyle Capital became insolvent. Nobody broke any laws because there was no legislation to limit debt exposure. But the consequences of their behavior negatively affected thousands of employees and depositors. Regulation would have prevented that … Right now, China can sell counterfeit products in the United States; they just alter the logo a little bit. You can buy anything on the Internet. It's a vehicle for prostitution, pornography, child pornography. Those are all examples of rogue economics.

You're critical of globalization. Why?

Globalization has helped rogue economics spread. In the 1970s, you knew where products came from; it was a smaller world. For example, now when you order fish in a restaurant, you don't know where it came from. Seventy percent of the fish we eat is black market, fished in violation of international laws. Our ignorance makes us unwilling partners in crime. Rogue economics is turning the global market into our worst nightmare.

You begin your book with the fall of the Berlin wall and the spread of democracy. How did these events lead to today's economic turbulence?

One example is the sex trade. After the collapse of communism, women from the former Soviet bloc were desperate. Unemployment went from virtually zero to 80 percent after the wall fell. So the women became prostitutes or sex slaves in the West. Also, the supply of labor in the West doubled as people came from the East. That led to a deflationary situation around the world in which interest rates fell and banks became more aggressive, looking for more and higher returns. Investment banks were hardly regulated; nearly everything was allowed.

[Goodrum]

So you'd like to see more regulation of American investment banks. Do you anticipate that will happen?

Yes, but you need global finance behind you. The bloodbath isn't big enough yet. Next in line are the British banks that went aggressively [into the] U.S. market. They're less capitalized than U.S. banks.

Do you expect to see a failure of a global British bank?

It's likely. And we won't be able to save it. We've already had the failure of a British bank, Northern Rock, which the British government nationalized in order to save it and prevent panic among depositors.

What might happen if a global bank fails? A 1929-like depression?

In 1929, no one realized what to do. This time, I'd expect four to five years of zero growth for the United States and the European community. The world's economy will move East. For example, after 9/11, fear of pipeline disruptions sent oil prices up from $18 a barrel to $100 and there's been an accumulation of money in the sovereign funds of Kuwait, Saudi Arabia … and Chile. They're keeping that money outside the balance of payments. It's true the Arabs invested in Merrill Lynch and the Chinese bought a share of Blackstone. But a lot of that money is in gold, and they will increasingly be investing among themselves, or in China, not in the West. They may as well wait until Wall Street reaches bottom.

So how will the West climb out of the rough period?

The West will have to rebuild and clean up the criminal economy that is contaminating everything else. It will have to regulate. Take Liechtenstein: it has been operating like an offshore bank providing shelter for tax evaders. Now Germany, Great Britain and the United States are all going after tax evaders [that may have used Liechtenstein as a haven]. Germany had to pay an informant to get information, but the cost was small compared to the money it will bring in.

How does rogue economics affect us as individuals?

It transforms all of us into the unwilling partners of rogue entrepreneurs, a disturbing thought. But the way forward is to become conscious of the new reality. As consumers and as voters we can say no to rogue economics and demand regulation. Globalization is a great thing, but it needs a legal framework in which to blossom.

(2008)

[Goodrum]

...or maybe an Arranger..