Confessions of an Economic Hit Man | 
| Author: John Perkins
Publisher: Plume
Category: Book
List Price: $15.00
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Avg. Customer Rating:  606 reviews
Sales Rank: 568
Media: Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 320
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.6
Dimensions (in): 7.9 x 5.3 x 0.7
ISBN: 0452287081
Dewey Decimal Number: 332.042092
EAN: 9780452287082
ASIN: 0452287081
Publication Date: December 27, 2005
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Amazon.com
John Perkins started and stopped writing Confessions of an Economic Hit Man four times over 20 years. He says he was threatened and bribed in an effort to kill the project, but after 9/11 he finally decided to go through with this expose of his former professional life. Perkins, a former chief economist at Boston strategic-consulting firm Chas. T. Main, says he was an "economic hit man" for 10 years, helping U.S. intelligence agencies and multinationals cajole and blackmail foreign leaders into serving U.S. foreign policy and awarding lucrative contracts to American business. "Economic hit men (EHMs) are highly paid professionals who cheat countries around the globe out of trillions of dollars," Perkins writes. Confessions of an Economic Hit Man is an extraordinary and gripping tale of intrigue and dark machinations. Think John Le Carre, except it's a true story. Perkins writes that his economic projections cooked the books Enron-style to convince foreign governments to accept billions of dollars of loans from the World Bank and other institutions to build dams, airports, electric grids, and other infrastructure he knew they couldn't afford. The loans were given on condition that construction and engineering contracts went to U.S. companies. Often, the money would simply be transferred from one bank account in Washington, D.C., to another one in New York or San Francisco. The deals were smoothed over with bribes for foreign officials, but it was the taxpayers in the foreign countries who had to pay back the loans. When their governments couldn't do so, as was often the case, the U.S. or its henchmen at the World Bank or International Monetary Fund would step in and essentially place the country in trusteeship, dictating everything from its spending budget to security agreements and even its United Nations votes. It was, Perkins writes, a clever way for the U.S. to expand its "empire" at the expense of Third World citizens. While at times he seems a little overly focused on conspiracies, perhaps that's not surprising considering the life he's led. --Alex Roslin
Product Description
From the author of the phenomenal New York Times bestseller, Confessions of an Economic Hit Man, comes an expose of international corruption and an inspired plan to turn the tide for future generations
With a presidential election around the corner, questions of Americas military buildup, environmental impact, and foreign policy are on everyones mind. Former Economic Hit Man John Perkins goes behind the scenes of the current geopolitical crisis and offers bold solutions to our most pressing problems. Drawing on interviews with other EHMs, jackals, CIA operatives, reporters, businessmen, and activists, Perkins reveals the secret history of events that have created the current American Empire, including:
How the defeats in Vietnam and Iraq have benefited big business
The role of Israel as Fortress America in the Middle East
Tragic repercussions of the IMFs Asian Economic Collapse
The current Latin American revolution and its lessons for democracy
U.S. blunders in Tibet, Congo, Lebanon, and Venezuela
From the U.S. military in Iraq to infrastructure development in Indonesia, from Peace Corps volunteers in Africa to jackals in Venezuela, Perkins exposes a conspiracy of corruption that has fueled instability and anti-Americanism around the globe, with consequences reflected in our daily headlines. Having raised the alarm, Perkins passionately addresses how Americans can work to create a more peaceful and stable world for future generations.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 601 more reviews...
 The dark side of our contemporary empire April 30, 2008
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
The British wore their empire proudly, we as Americans try to deny our dark side. Whether you finally choose to play down this dark side or come to the conclusion that things must change, you should at least read this insider's story and weigh his conclusions.
What this story reveals is painful at times, but Perkins writes with an engaging and deeply personal style. What some reviewers are interpreting as egoistic actually is breaking new ground. His work is a twist on the traditional Calvinistic "confessional" tract: a call for a secular spirituality that can embrace and make demands on capitalism for the sake of democracy.
It is hard not to feel jealous of Perkins, however, as he travels the globe with all his power, money, and privilege. It is as if he is a successful Faust: he made his bargain with the devil and yet has never had to pay his pound of flesh.
Perhaps he has now made a bargain with the Light Side to speak and write and lead us all to find a better way. He's got his work cut out for him, since most of us participate in some way in the present system. We all need conversions. I basically trust the guy, but each reader must reach his/her own very personal judgments about his story.
The way to read his story is with an open mind and heart: does what he is saying help to explain things you have read and seen? What defensive reactions are you experiencing and why? What inner work do you need to do to free yourself from the mentalities of empire? Or would you rather go on denying, willing to make the compromises of a hitman even though the world has had enough of that game?
Or, perhaps, his piece of the puzzle is too dark, too one-sided, or not exactly what we need as a world right now? Is the truth too hard to stomach, or can it motivate us to change? Those who disagree with Perkin's call to change need to come up with their own way to understand the failures of the West in our engagements around the world. The statistics of failure are too stark. The cries of anger and pain are too clear.
Just as our international corporations have pillaged other countries, this same corporations-government has blatantly pillaged us in Iraq. I was deeply offended as an American citizen by the irresponsible "use" of money. Their(our) behavior made it clear to me before I even read this book that this was business as usual for them, so I was not surprised by John's confession. Much of what John reveals is actually crying out in the newspapers and around us day after day.
Ultimately, this is a book about spirituality. If we reflect deeply on what each of us have experienced, read, seen, and know about the present state of our society, and our corporate, governmental, and institutional culture, we have to admit that we have slid down the wrong track over the last decades and need to embrace change with courage, a clean heart, and a new commitment to our deepest principles and values.
 Lunch with this egomaniacal con-man would be a total nightmare April 21, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
I picked up the book in Abu Dhabi, where it was prominently displayed in that corpotacracy Western cultural imperialist bastion the "Virgin Megastore"... in Abu Dhabi Mall (built by Australian imperialist construction firms!!!)
While I found part of the book interesting (he is a good storyteller, and his accounts of Trujillo in Panama in particular are fascinating) the book was incredibly disappointing as a whole.
This is due primarily to:
1. The lack of any substantive facts about his "EHM" work or the results of it, for which we are left to simply take him at his word;
2. His deeply self-centered and dangerously oversimplified notions of how the world economy works, colored with further personal narratives of dubious factual quality and very weak sourcing; and
3. The relentless self-aggrandizing and redemption-seeking that just kills the style and completely erodes his credibility.
As a memoir naturally whole book is about the author, John Perkins, but this does not keep him from including an additional 4-page timeline of his life and his achievements, and 3 more pages about... himself. I mean, this guy has such an ego I am certain having lunch with him would be a nightmare, just from reading the book.
Throughout the whole book, Perkins dubiously links himself to major world events, another reflection of his pathologically self centered world-view.
In the chapter "Pimping and Financing Osama bin Laden", he somehow links his brief and negligible work in Saudi arranging an escort for an unnamed member of the royal family to Osama bin Laden.
He links himself an his work to Osama via... a US News and World Report article and another article in Vanity Fair - which he probably picked up at a supermarket check-out isle.
Overall the book weaves a decent story and provides an interesting look at some of the many evils of US foreign policy - but it is by no means credible, and by no means well balanced or complete.
Perkins, based on his numerous other titles on Amazonian spirituality et al, may have had a bit much ayahuasca to remember all of the events clearly enough and as such, his book makes for a bit of a waste of time compared to the many other titles on the subject.
 A good read despite the author's ego April 20, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
This was my first introduction to the dark side of globalization, so I was fascinated with the stories despite the author's obvious love affair with himself. I have read some of the other reviews attacking the book's credibility, but I believe that the despicable interventions into developing economies to make a quick buck are real. Why wouldn't they be? We see that sort of slash-and-burn capitalism rewarded every day in the US. Companies are bought, sold, and merged with no regard for peoples' jobs or local economies. Shareholders and CEOs are the only concern. I started with Perkins' other book on the topic, The Secret History of the American Empire, which is more of the same.
That said, it is really important for smart people to start reading credible accounts of the failure of Chicago School economics, which will be revealed as one of the biggest frauds of our day and a true threat to democracy. Selfishness wins in the short term, but true self interest dictates that we invest in fair play, sharing resources, and placing justice above all. In the long run, the success of the community benefits the individual the most. Market forces do not naturally tend toward peace and equal rights, which people universally demand and deserve. Sorry to ruin the frat party.
I'm surprised John Perkins is still alive April 6, 2008
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
Thank you for talking John.
Turn off your desperate housewives, and American idol long enough to see what is really going on in our world.
Wake up people!
 In addition to the big problems .... March 30, 2008
2 out of 3 found this review helpful
I bought this book in hardcover a few years ago, and only read it recently after I started looking into why globalization has so many critics (despite its inevitability, and the fact that the IMF and the World Bank are benevolent organizations). I came away with the conclusion that Perkins is an utter charlatan.
Put aside the big whoppers (that Perkins was secretly working for the NSA because he once interviewed there, that the CIA killed two Latin American leaders within a three-month period recently, or that the U.S. had no evidence against Manuel Noriega, who was tried and convicted in a public trial in Miami.) It is the small fibs that give him away.
Perkins claims that he went to Brown on an athletic scholarship. This would make him the only person who has ever received an athletic scholarship from any Ivy League college, in history. OK?
What does the U.S. hope to obtain when it coerces third world countries into signing crushing loan agreements that will bankrupt them with debt? To Perkins, it is leverage to obtain these countries' votes at the U.N. Huh? Since when does the U.N. vote on something in which the U.S. depends on the individual votes of Latin American and African countries? It's not like the U.N. enacts legislation that the U.S. is pushing. Perhaps Perkins was referring to the U.N. Security Council, where any member country can veto a proposal. Problem is, the third world countries he discusses are never on the Security Council.
How about this one: the reason American economics professors do not teach the truth about what the U.S. does in the developing world is because American colleges are run by multinational companies, and these professors would be fired if they taught the truth. Seriously, I am not making this stuff up. Has Perkins ever heard of tenure? How does he explain Noam Chomsky or Howard Zinn?
In the course of "Confessions," Perkins is visited in a dream by Jesus, who is actually a South American peasant. Shortly after 9/11, Perkins has a mysterious conversation with a Afghani pedestrian near Ground Zero in New York, and he explains the truth about American peridy.
This is an utterly goofy book. I suppose it is what one would expect from someone who thinks that illiterate cultures can teach us how to travel through time. (My one star reflects that fact that I found myself engaged as I noted how many unbelievable claims leaped off the pages.) In the preface, Perkins described how one publisher recommended that he publish this as a novel. Any doubt why?
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