“Kissinger the Negotiator: Lessons from Dealmaking at the Highest Level,” by James K. Sebenius, R. Nicholas Burns and Robert H. Mnookin ’68 (Harper). HLS Professor Mnookin, who for many years chaired the school’s Program on Negotiation, joins two other Harvard-affiliated professors in a study of the former secretary of state’s public and private deal-making, based on extensive interviews with Henry Kissinger on negotiation strategy and tactics. Pointing to “remarkable levels of sophistication and consistency in his approach,” the authors detail Kissinger’s negotiations including with China, Vietnam, and his lesser-known initiative to contain Soviet influence over Southern African states. In particular, they praise Kissinger’s practice of “zooming out” to larger strategic goals and then “zooming in,” using interpersonal skills to persuade counterparts.
“American Capitalism: New Histories,” eds., Sven Beckert and Christine Desan (Columbia). HLS Professor Desan and her co-editor, the founders of Harvard University’s Program on the Study of Capitalism, present essays that demonstrate the centrality of finance in American history and how it shapes politics and culture. While contributors cover traditional economic topics such as the labor market and stocks and bonds, they also explore issues such as women’s rights and slavery. The essays offer new approaches to American capitalism, write the editors, as it continues to morph and perhaps play a less central role in the world.
“The Indian Legal Profession in the Age of Globalization: The Rise of the Corporate Legal Sector and its Impact on Lawyers and Society,” eds., David B. Wilkins ’80, Vikramaditya S. Khanna and David M. Trubek (Cambridge). “The Brazilian Legal Profession in the Age of Globalization: The Rise of the Corporate Legal Sector and its Impact on Lawyers and Society,” eds., Luciana Gross Cunha, Daniela Monteiro Gabbay, José Garcez Ghirardi, Trubek and Wilkins (Cambridge). The project on Globalization, Lawyers and Emerging Economies at the HLS Center on the Legal Profession has produced the first two volumes in a planned series. Co-edited by Wilkins, HLS professor and faculty director at CLP, each volume covers topics including the rise of the corporate legal sector, legal education, and regulation of legal services. Both India and Brazil in the 1990s moved from a closed economic system to one that was increasingly open to international investment and private enterprise, the editors write, which increased the opportunities and influence of the countries’ lawyers and contributed to a legal profession transformed in some of the most populous countries in the world.