The World for Sale: Money, Power and the Traders Who Barter the Earth’s Resources tells a story about an industry that I didn’t know existed in the first place. Written by two journalists, it is about the people and corporations that trade in the world’s natural resources. It’s an industry that really came into existence after the Second World War with a small group of people who became the middlemen (and they were all men) between countries that had resources and the corporations and countries that wanted to buy them in increasing quantities.
As an arc, it’s the story of how these traders worked in the shadows of the world economic system, often bypassing or breaking the rules, and making huge sums of money for themselves in the process. Part of what made it fascinating is that the industry grew almost entirely from one small company, with each subsequent company as a breakaway from the one that preceded it. The characters themselves were all exceptionally ambitious risk-takers, often amoral (as they claimed) and sometimes immoral (as implied by the authors).
What was also so interesting was that these groups who operated in the shadows in order to avoid unwanted attention for their questionable activities, over time moved into the mainstream (often against their will), and became today’s largest natural resources companies, like Glencore and Xstrata.
I think the book could have been shorter and told the same story, but it was well written, enjoyable, and a lens on an opaque industry.
Just Because I Liked It:
- Is anti-semitism in the workplace real? Absolutely. Take a look at this ingenious and disturbing research study by the ADL.