I'm looking at "Business and Human Rights," a new book by Florian Wettstein. With a mammoth title like that: what more specific can we say about its subject? Well, apparently the subject named in that title, BHR for short, is an academic discipline now, encompassing ethical, legal, and managerial perspectives. And this new book is intended as a textbook, for use in BHR courses. The author, Wettstein, is a luminary in the field. He is the editor-in-chief of the Business and Human Rights Journal, apparently published out of Switzerland, where Wettstein is a professor at St Gallen University. There is another body of literature about "corporate social responsibility" or CSR, but Wettstein seems to be eager to consider CSR and BHR separately, and to consider BHR (as the title of the book hints) at much more length. Here is a random quote from the book's discussion of indigenous peoples around the world as examples of targets of corporate nastiness....
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Adler Yacht, a Switzerland based company with its construction sites in Italy, recently unveiled the Suprema 76 foot motor yacht, a landmark move of the hybrid technology into yachting. The Suprema’s propulsion system consists of two Caterpillar C18 1,150 hp diesel engines, a 170 kWh lithium polymer battery, and two ATE 100 kW e-Units used to control operations and the transitions between the electric motor and the combustion engine. Those are specs I've lifted from ad copy. It sounds like an impressive piece of work. There have always been electric boats afloat [well, "always' here means since Edison's day]. It's one classic way of keeping a propeller turning. But the so-called "battery on board" systems have generally been limited to rivers and harbors. Battery tech historically hasn't generated the oomph necessary to take a vessel out into the open sea. That is changing, as the Suprema's hybrid system shows. The Suprema can t...
I generally ask myself at this time of year what were the biggest stories of the past twelve months in business/financial news. Of course, I choose the ones I do largely because they illustrate an important theme, and in the list below I'll spell out and boldface the theme. Yet the theme itself isn't the story. In terms of regional mix, with this line-up I've one whole-Pacific-basin story (March). One story is Australian (December), two European (January and June), one Chinese (May) and one Middle Eastern (July), The remaining six are US based (February, April, August, September, October, November). A nice thematic point: I both begin and end with issues over different currencies both traditional and innovative. January: Currency wars I: Switzerland abandons a peg of the franc to the euro (at 1:1.20) that has lasted for more than three years. The suddenness of the abandonment takes many market participants by surprise. February: Economics of crude oil ...
Hmmmm. Swiss voters, by referendum resoundingly rejected a minimum wage proposal. They rejected a proposal, specifically, that would have set the minimum wage at 22 Swiss francs per hour, which is roughly US$25. If I understand this rightly, that would have been the highest minimum wage anywhere. So some Swiss, at any rate, wanted to go from the back to the front of the pack in terms of the minimum wage, in one big bound. (They have no such minimum now, this would have created such an institution, not merely increased an existing number.) It was so soundly defeated that none of Switzerland's cantons voted in its favor. This raises a lot of questions. Unfortunately, I'm feeling too indolent these days to do my own research. Maybe one of my readers will oblige by addressing these questions. Such as: how easy or difficult is it to get such a proposal on the ballot in Switzerland? Also, who were the intended beneficiaries of the passage...
Leonhard Euler (1707-1783) was surely one of the most prolific of great mathematicians. Among his contributions, we need to mention two, each of which comes down to us as a single letter: the letter e and the letter i . E uler was born in Basel, Switzerland, so his life and work might fittingly be considered a riposte to the old anti-Swiss jibe (originally from The Third Man ) that Switzerland has produced nothing for all its years of peace and democracy more than the humble cuckoo clock. Since Euler’s day and because of his work, i stands for the simplest of the numbers that Descartes had called “imaginary.” This i refers to the square root of -1. We don’t need to bother ourselves further with the question “ what is the square root of -1?” It is simply i , by stipulation. We don't end there, of course, but we can start from there and build something new and important. Also since Euler’s day and because of his work, e stands for perhaps the m...