| Details | Join author William Dalrymple for a fascinating exploration of his latest book The Anarchy: The Relentless Rise of the East India Company, a comprehensive look at the most powerful corporation in history. A group founded in 1600 by pirates, adventurers, merchants, and ambitious London officials, the East India Company began as a modest venture to import spices from the East Indies, occasionally indulging in a bit of “privateering” to obtain their goods. In August 1765, the East India Company defeated the young Mughal emperor and set up, in his place, a government run by English traders who collected taxes through means of a private army. Over the course of its 274-year history, the corporation gained an astonishing amount of power, becoming a global empire that subjugated whole nations for the profit of a handful of elites in the boardrooms of England. By comparison, Google and Microsoft—companies we now consider behemoths—look small. The East India Company foreshadowed the modern world in striking ways, and The Anarchy provides a look at the beginnings of practices that define business today, from lobbying to monopolies. The freedom that the East India Company was granted will sound familiar to readers who worry about the lack of oversight of Facebook, Amazon, or similar companies. Using previously untapped sources, Dalrymple tells the story of the East India Company as it has never been told before and provides a portrait of the devastating results of the abuse of corporate power. William Dalrymple is the author of nine books about India and the Islamic world, including Return of a King: The Battle for Afghanistan, White Mughals, and City of Djinns: A Year in Delhi. He writes regularly for the New Yorker, the New York Review of Books, and the Guardian and is one of the founders and a codirector of the Jaipur Literature Festival. |
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