The Emperor’s Nightmare

From angry shareholders to concerned chief executives, almost everyone knows at a gut level that the present political system is not working. This book finds the root cause to be poor corporate governance.

In the prequel to this book, The Emperor’s Nightingale, Robert A. G. Monks, one of the world’s foremost shareholder activists, had warned corporations against putting short-profit ahead of long-term value for all stakeholders. Few listened – and the result was system-wide trauma that only bold solutions can heal.

In The Emperor’s Nightmare, his latest book, Monks reveals what can happen when corporate leadership abandons the common good to court and conquer a powerful elite.

This insightful, honest, and direct portrayal of corporate governance and the surrounding political system will be of immense value to those interested in corporate governance – particularly shareholder and stakeholder advocates, and the true corporate leaders who serve them. In the end, better corporate governance means better democracy. This book shows the way.

Robert A. G. Monks, a shareholder activist who once waged a high-profile and prophetic proxy fight to save Sears Roebuck by serving on its board, began his career as an attorney and investment banker, but soon entered industry and public service. He served as CEO of Sprague, an old-line oil and gas company and then as director of the United States Synthetic Fuels Corporation under Ronald Reagan. He went on to head the Pension and Welfare Benefits Administration in the Department of Labor, where he was instrumental in the development and impact of the famed Avon letter, which successfully argued that pension fund trustees have a fiduciary duty to vote their proxies actively.

Monks, who makes his primary home in Cape Elizabeth, Maine, ran three Republican primary races to become the state’s US Senator, winning the 1976 primary but losing in the general election to popular Democrat Edmund Muskie. His opponents in the other primaries, Margaret Chase Smith and Susan Collins went on to make history as long-serving female senators. With longtime coauthor Nell Minow, he founded Institutional Shareholder Services (ISS), the first and still the leading proxy advisory service. He has written more than a dozen books on corporate governance, including landmark titles he coauthored with Nell Minow, Power and Accountability, and Corporate Governance, now in its fifth edition. Also of note are The Emperor’s Nightingale, the prequel to The Emperor’s Nightmare; Corporate Valuation for Portfolio Investment (with Alexandra Lajoux), and Citizens Disunited, an exposé on corporate greed.