cover image A Force for Good: How Enlightened Finance Can Restore Faith in Capitalism

A Force for Good: How Enlightened Finance Can Restore Faith in Capitalism

Edited by John G. Taft. Palgrave Macmillan, $27 (320) ISBN 978-1-137-27972-9

This thoughtful, albeit challenging, exploration of the hard road back to credibility for the financial industry, edited by Taft, CEO of RBC Wealth Management, attempts to show how the transparency and trust lost in the 2008 financial crisis can be restored. He rounds up a number of thinkers—authors, economists, academics, and politicians, among others—to consider how such a goal could be accomplished. Contributors include author Stephen B. Young, who suggests a social contract for financial intermediaries; former FDIC chair Sheila C. Blair, who discusses reforming mortgage securitization; and BlackRock vice chairman Barbara Novick, who writes about the needs of retirees. Other topics addressed here are bringing a focus on clients back to the financial system, restoring confidence in equity markets, achieving fiscal- and monetary-policy equilibrium, resolving debt, and so on. Collectively, contributors propose how the credibility of the financial industry can be restored, primarily through reform, restructuring, and a renewed focus on providing value to individuals. The tone is generally positive, and readers are likely to come away with renewed hope in our financial system’s future, but it’s hard to imagine a significant audience outside academia for these dense, specialized pieces. Agent: Leah Spiro, Riverside Creative Management. (Mar.)