Markets, mobs & mayhem : a modern look at the madness of crowds
In this fascinating tour through cultural, global, economic, and business history, icon of the financial world Robert Menschel explores the phenomenon of crowd psychology and its effects on business and culture. Explaining how crowd psychology creates market bubbles and irrational exuberance, Menschel mines world history--from the rise of the Nazis in Germany, to the fanatical love of brands, to the Dutch tulip craze of the seventeenth century, to America's 1990s Internet bubble--to reveal how the behavior of crowds negatively affects the business world. Championing the causes of individuality a
1 online resource (xxvii, 226 pages) : illustrations
9780471267713, 0471267716
51209621
Foreword (W. Safire).Preface: An Epidemic of Fear.PART ONE: BOOMS, BUBBLESAND BUSTS.Introduction.The Bulb That Ate Holland: Tulipmania.Booms & Bubbles.New Lands, New Schemes: The South Se and Mississippi Companies.Panics & Runs.Crash: The Great Depression.He Said/She Said.Bernard Baruch on Basic Math & Eternal Truths.Making the Play: The Internet and the "New" Economy.A Bubble is a Bubble is a Bubble.Keeping Your Head When All About You Are Losing Theirs.PART TWO: RUMORS & SUGGESTIONS.Introduction.Chicken Licken's Apocalypes Now.Something from Nothing: The Alchemy of Suggestion.Tom Wolfe on Waiting for the Beatles.Waiting for Godot.Roswell, New Mexico: Things That Go Bump in the Night.James Thurber on the Day the Dam Broke.Keeping Your Head When All About You.Are Losing Theirs.PART THREE: FEAR & PANIC.Introduction.Worst-Case Scenario: The Martians Are Coming!Life Imitates Art, Art Imitates Life.The Iroquois Theater Fire: "They Had Gone Mad".The Mechanics of Disintegration.The Fall of Saigon: "If You Have Time, Pray for Us".Russell Baker: Roar of the Crowd, Inc.Harry Truman on the "Harvest of Shame": What Hysteria Does to Us.Keeping Your Head When All About You.Are Losing Theirs.PART FOUR: VIOLENCE & VIGILANTES.Introduction.Los Angeles, April 29 to May 1, 1992: Dance of Destruction.Riffraff or Resister?The Beast Within.Lynching: Thinking About the Unthinkable.An Outcome "Altogether Predictable".Mark Twain: "The Pitifulest Thing Out Is a Mob"."The Men Snarled and Shouted As They Flung Their Stones".Rwanda: When the Mob Is the State, Horror Becomes Ordinary.Keeping Your Head When All About You Are Losing Theirs.PART FIVE: LEADERS & FOLLOWERS.Introduction.Der Fuhrer: The Voice of the Mob.Lemming See, Lemming Do.Following the Leader: The Violence of Nonviolence.Leading the Followers: Fire Within Fire.Off with Their Heads.A Little Knowledge Is a Dangerous Thing.Hans Christian Andersen's Tale of Leaders & Yes-Men.The Mind of the Mob: Stupidity Accumulates, but Also Heroism.Rudyard Kipling on Leading and Following.Keeping Your Head When All About You.Are Losing Theirs.Acknowledgments.Text Credits.Illustration and Photo Credits.Index.