“The year 2008 was a reminder to those who had forgotten that there is such a thing as history and that the cycle of famine and feast in commerce, first identified in antiquity and well understood in the Middle Ages, was not suddenly abolished in modern times.”
— James Buchan
Author: James Buchan
Category: history
Tags: history, James Buchan
“Saudi Arabia is a puritanical state that claims a monopoly of wisdom and virtue.”
— James Buchan
Author: James Buchan
Category: wisdom
Tags: wisdom, James Buchan
“We read too much Shakespeare at school, and view our parliamentary politics as dynastic drama, in which an impatient crown prince frets at his long subordination and begins to scheme for the throne he knows he merits, was promised and has earned.”
— James Buchan
Author: James Buchan
Category: politics
Tags: politics, James Buchan
“In rising financial markets, the world is forever new. The bull or optimist has no eyes for past or present, but only for the future, where streams of revenue play in his imagination.”
— James Buchan
Author: James Buchan
Category: future
Tags: future, James Buchan
“One of the consequences of the Iranian revolution has been an explosion of history. A country once known only from British consular reports and intrepid travelogues is now awash with historical documents, letters, diaries, grainy video, weblogs and secret police files of questionable authenticity.”
— James Buchan
Author: James Buchan
Category: history
Tags: history, James Buchan
“The truth is, of course, that history is not completed in modern commerce any more than philosophy is perfected in political economy. In other words, there is nothing timeless or God-given about filling stations and penicillin and plastic bags.”
— James Buchan
Author: James Buchan
Category: truth
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“Nature is not simply a technical or economical resource, and human beings are not mere numbers. To suggest that one can somehow align all the squabbling institutions of science, environmental management, government and diplomacy in an alliance of convenience to regulate the global climate seems to me optimistic.”
— James Buchan
Author: James Buchan
Category: nature
Tags: nature, James Buchan
“Profits in business always depend on the rate of interest: the higher the interest, the higher the rate of profit required.”
— James Buchan
Author: James Buchan
Category: business
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“Rarely in modern times has there been such a revolution in commercial sentiment as occurred in 2008, or such a display in government and business of panic and helplessness.”
— James Buchan
Author: James Buchan
Category: business
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“Any new financial order for the world must tackle the three chief challenges of our age.”
— James Buchan
Author: James Buchan
Category: age
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“Even before he came to power in 1997, Gordon Brown promised to change the accounts to parliament from simple litanies of cash in and cash out, to a more commercial system that took notice of the public property the departments were using. This system is known as resource accounting.”
— James Buchan
Author: James Buchan
Category: change
Tags: change, James Buchan