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A business biography of C. Y. Tung, founder of the Orient Overseas Container Line and philanthropist.

Shanghai-born and later Hong Kong–resident shipowner Tung Chao-Yung (1912–1982) is remembered worldwide as a champion for Chinese shipping, founding the companies Chinese Maritime Transport and Island Navigation, and pioneering container shipping for Asia in Orient Overseas Container Line/OOCL. Despite coming from a humble background, by the time of his death he controlled a huge fleet of passenger liners, bulk carriers, tankers, and container ships, while also being diversified into port terminals, dockyards, banks, and prime real estate. This business biography sets out his pathway from a junior executive in the early 1930s to one of the world’s leading private shipowners. The authors argue that Tung achieved his desire to develop Chinese ocean shipping through his ability to learn, innovate, network, and devise strategies through decades of rapid technical and organizational change. He also earned respect for his generous philanthropy. After his death, sons Tung Chee-Hwa and Tung Chee-Chen were able to navigate a financial crisis, restructure the group in the face of intensifying competition in the 1980s, and grow through the challenges and opportunities of globalization and advancement in supply chain management and technology within the industry in the 1990s through 2010s. OOCL became one of the most competitive liner companies in the industry until divestment in 2017. Eight decades since their establishment, privately owned Island Navigation and, now independently, Chinese Maritime Transport continue to trade globally in dry-bulk and tanker markets. C. Y. Tung (1912–1982) and the Rise of Modern Chinese Shipping concludes with an overview of the emergence of the state-owned PRC fleet and brief histories of other multi-generational family companies.

The institutional evolution of “corporate futurism” and its influence on our view of the role of private enterprise in society. 

While the bright capitalist future that the power elite of postwar America dreamed of hasn’t come to pass, its influence and repercussions continue to resonate. Gavin Benke shows that the cultural, intellectual, and political rise of neoliberalism was not inevitable. Instead, beginning in the early 1960s,  a group that he dubs “corporate futurists” imagined a differently shaped and community-minded version of capitalism. Most interestingly, Benke goes beyond the once-big names in the field (such as Alvin Toffler and Daniel Bell) to show how deep-seated and granular the engagement with futurism was. 

Using an incredible array of futurists’ reports, conference proceedings, and internal deliberations at places like the infamous RAND Corporation, Capitalism’s Tomorrows uncovers a moment of genuine introspection about capitalism’s development and shows how it is subject to our imaginative capacity and ability to shape how these systems work.

From Aunt Jemima and Uncle Ben to the Jolly Green Giant and Ronald McDonald, corporate icons sell billions of dollars’ worth of products. But only one of them was ever a real person—Colonel Sanders of Kentucky Fried Chicken/KFC. From a 1930s roadside café in Corbin, Kentucky, Harland Sanders launched a fried chicken business that now circles the globe, serving “finger lickin’ good” chicken to more than twelve million people every day. But to get there, he had to give up control of his company and even his own image, becoming a mere symbol to people today who don’t know that Colonel Sanders was a very real human being. This book tells his story—the story of a dirt-poor striver with unlimited ambition who personified the American Dream.

Acclaimed cultural historian Josh Ozersky defines the American Dream as being able to transcend your roots and create yourself as you see fit. Harland Sanders did exactly that. Forced at age ten to go to work to help support his widowed mother and sisters, he failed at job after job until he went into business for himself as a gas station/café/motel owner and finally achieved a comfortable, middle-class life. But then the interstate bypassed his business and, at sixty-five, Sanders went broke again. Packing his car with a pressure cooker and his secret blend of eleven herbs and spices, he began peddling the recipe for “Colonel Sanders’ Kentucky Fried Chicken” to small-town diners in exchange for a nickel for each chicken they sold. Ozersky traces the rise of Kentucky Fried Chicken from this unlikely beginning, telling the dramatic story of Sanders’ self-transformation into “The Colonel,” his truculent relationship with KFC management as their often-disregarded goodwill ambassador, and his equally turbulent afterlife as the world’s most recognizable commercial icon.

Winner, 2022 Goody Business Book Awards, Entrepreneur, General Category
Finalist, 2022 Goody Business Book Awards, Entrepreneur, Start Ups / New Business Category

With more than fifty years of professional experience, Mark C. Zweig has seen it all—from the fear and excitement of starting a new business to the joys and challenges of life as an entrepreneur. In Confessions of an Entrepreneur: Simple Wisdom for Starting, Building, and Running a Business, Zweig draws upon this wealth of experience to offer practical, easy-to-understand guidance for bringing a business to life and cultivating success at every stage of its development. The candid stories he shares from his career provide insight into the realities of business ownership and illustrate proven principles for both personal and professional success. Written by an entrepreneur for entrepreneurs, this book is an indispensable guide filled with wisdom for new and seasoned business leaders alike.

Why, despite the political advantages of business in the policy process, do business interests still sometimes lose policy fights in the political system? Money, mobility, connections, and incentives load the political system in favor of business interests. Against the odds, when the conspicuous corporation meets the virtuous politician, business often loses in the policy struggle. In answering this question, Neil J. Mitchell reassesses the dimensions of business power in the political system and provides a fresh consideration of how economic power translates into political power. Charles Lindbloom's analysis of business power provides a point of departure for an examination of the evidence on business influence over public preferences, on the importance of business confidence to politicians, and on the financial and lobbying activities of business interests. Mitchell then considers the position of labor unions--the traditional opposition to business--in contemporary policy making. Finally, he discusses the conditions under which business power breaks down. This is accompanied by an analysis of a variety of cases in which business has attempted to influence the policy making process to test his findings. Extensively researched, this book sheds new light on the activities of business in politics, on the strength of interests opposing business, and on business policy failures in the United States and the United Kingdom. The empirical analysis builds on survey data, extensive interviews, and archival research. The relationship between business and government is a core topic for economists, sociologists and political scientists, taking us from heroic struggles over policy to sordid episodes of political corruption. The book will be of interest to scholars in the social sciences and in business schools as well as to the general reader interested in power and influence in representative democracies. Neil Mitchell is Professor of Political Science, University of New Mexico.