Stanford University Press Blog

Innovation helps shape the HP Way

Looking at the histories of big companies, we often contribute their successes to the competent leaders and the loyal employees who follow their direction. But what if defiance could be even more of a breakthrough for a company’s success? In their book, The HP Phenomenon: Innovation and Business Transformation, Charles H. House and Raymond L. Price explain how not following the leader can yield great results for the individual, the leader, and the company. In a recent review in Forbes, George Anders commends House and Price for pointing out many of these sorts of bottom-up instances of success that were possible at HP.

It would seem like bad leadership to allow dissention to continue in your company, and even worse if these ideas that the leader rejects are good ones! As House and Price reveal, it is not bad leadership to create a company that is smart enough to run itself. One of the most intriguing anecdotes in the book is that of Charles House himself. As an HP engineer in the ‘60s, House was set on pursuing a large-screen electrostatic monitor. When he was told, “When I come back in a year, I don’t want to see that product in the lab!” by a superior, he took it as incentive to get the monitor out of the lab – and into production as soon as possible. When the monitor turned out to be a great success, House was awarded the “HP Award for Meritorious Defiance”. 

Who knew that ignoring a direct order from a superior could lead to success for all –profits for the company, awards for the defiant, and a successful product, which always reflects well on the leader. While House and Price’s account is certainly not advocating for complete defiance in business relations, it points out how success can come from the most surprising innovations.  For HP, seeking new methods of business management and surprising the world with new techniques is what helped to create the HP Way. Despite some flaws along the way, the stories of unexpected as well as the intricately planned successes leave House and Price very optimistic about the future of this ground-breaking company.

Demands for Net Neutrality: What have we been missing?

Most of us like to think that we have control over what we view on the internet, but as recent controversies involving broadband providers and internet search engines suggest -- perhaps we don’t. In an Op-Ed in the Short Stack column of The Washington Post, Dawn Nunziato addresses the issue of protecting free speech in the internet age. Nunziato, author of Virtual Freedom: Net Neutrality and Free Speech in the Internet Age, draws on her knowledge and research of First Amendment violations on the internet to uncover how internet providers and websites are limiting users’ freedom.

Nunziato explains that the FCC is now working toward requiring broadband providers to be neutral parties within internet communications. But why should the FCC have to take such measures?  Aren’t we already free to express and view whatever we want on the internet? After all, that’s what blogs like this one are for.  But according to Nunziato, not everyone is enjoying the same rights.

In both her book and the Op-Ed, Nunziato references occasions where companies like Verizon, Google, and Comcast have limited the actions of certain users. “In 2007, for example, Comcast blocked access to legal peer-to-peer file-sharing applications and then withheld information from its users (and the FCC) about its actions.” How is it that these sorts of violations to our right to free speech have been going on right before our eyes? 

Nunziato asserts, “The FCC and the EU should act now to require that the handful of powerful companies who serve as the gatekeepers for Internet expression fulfill their obligations to the public free of discrimination and censorship to protect our free speech interests in the digital age.” 

So the next time you’re on the internet, ask yourself: Just how much have I been missing?

The Roots of Israel's Obsession with Iran

In an interview with Swati Pandey of Zocalo Public Square, Israeli scholar, Hagai Ram and author of  Iranophobia: The Logic of an Israeli Obsession,  remarks that he became "increasingly disenchanted" with the Israeli ways of understanding Iran, "While there are many good reasons for the Jewish state to be apprehensive of the Islamic republic, I felt there was also a great deal of irrationality involved in that apprehension, and it is the cultural roots of that irrationality I sought to investigate in my book."  Read the full interview here. The book steps back from all-too-common geopolitical analyses to show that Israel's disagreements with Iran are as much a product of shared cultural trajectories and entangled histories as they are strategic concerns and political differences.  In an article in Informed Comment, Ram discusses how Israel has time and again (ab)used the specter of the “Iranian threat” in order to  divert attention from its own oversights,  such as the war crimes associated with its military strike in Gaza earlier in the year, and the continuation of the state-sanctioned apartheid regime in the Palestinian territories.

New Missile Defense: What future will Obama's decision hold?

President Obama’s recent decision to eliminate a missile defense system plan has stirred up quite a controversy in domestic and international politics.  Instead of setting up a limited missile defense system in Poland to intercept potential long-range nuclear missiles from Iran – which, at present, haven’t been developed there – Obama has decided that the US should arrange a shorter range missile interceptor near Iran for the medium range missile threat. Some say that this decision is a concession to Russian complaints that the longer range set-up would provide the U.S. with an opportunity for a first-strike.

In a recent op-ed in the Short Stack column for the Washington Post, Thomas Graham co-author of Preventing Catastrophe: The Use and Misuse of Intelligence in Efforts to Halt the Proliferation of Weapons of Mass Destruction,  gives his opinion on Obama’s decision to change the strategy from the Bush administration’s more aggressive stance on missile defense.  He explains that after a long history of unsuccessful nuclear defense plans, a more realistic plan has now been introduced. Some fear that a new wave of nuclear proliferation could soon develop, leading to more dangerous and paranoid international relations. Graham points out that by changing our missile defense plan, the Obama administration is hoping to “reset” relations with Russia while also defending from the very realistic possibility of Iranian medium-range missiles.  It will be interesting to see how this decision plays out: Will it buy us more cooperation with Russia for future nonproliferation and help us to defend from the very real threat posed by Iran? Or, in terms of defending its NATO allies in Eastern Europe, is it dangerous and unwise move for U.S. foreign policy?

Confronting the Bomb: Can individuals make a difference?

Can ordinary citizens really bring change to international politics? We may think this question applies only to current times when we talk of Gov 2.0 and governments outsourcing ideas from citizens on Twitter. As the nuclear disarmament campaign shows, grassroots movements have had an impact in previous decades as well.

Larry Wittner, author of Confronting the Bomb, A Short History of the World Nuclear Disarmament Movement, provides a brief look at the history of the anti-nuclear movement and how it affected world leaders. In an interview with Marshall Poe of New Books in History, Wittner draws on his book to explain how nuclear disarmament has developed and how it has been affected by public movements. 

Wittner's book includes many interesting quotations from world leaders that evidence just how excited international leaders initially were about the advent of the Bomb. Winston Churchill loved the bomb and saw it as a way to win wars and maintain international influence. Eisenhower viewed the bomb as a positive addition to the U.S. arsenal, saying "My administration looks on nuclear weapons as no different than a bullet." The general consensus among leaders was that bigger and better weapons lead to better defense and therefore a safer environment.                                                         

As Wittner goes on to explain, the public saw nuclear weapons in a different light. From the early 1970's to its height in the early 1980s, an anti-nuclear movement had people all over the world protesting the Bomb. As Marshall Poe himself reminisces, he never thought that his small protests really had a big impact.  However, Wittner explains that the  growing anti-nuclear campaign had a huge influence on world leaders' decisions, from small protests to gatherings of almost 1 million people. At the beginning of Ronald Reagan's term as president, he made clear that  nuclear weapons  were a positive addition to U.S. defense.  But as time went on and as the disarmament campaign grew, the nation watched Reagan make a complete turn around. He began to consider the call for disarmament. Even leaders of other countries began to change the way they viewed nuclear weapons. After 1985, Nikolai Gorbachev said "new thinking" was needed. Gorbachev and Reagan met many times and were able to come to agreements for lessening the nuclear arsenals in their countries.

As leaders began to heed the requests of the public, people of the anti-nuclear movement became comfortable and complacent. The movement has since died down. Toward the late 1990's, the anti-nuclear movement became less prolific.  As a result, nuclear weapons began to increase again. In 1996, a Republican Senate rejected a nuclear test ban treaty, and later, during George W. Bush administration, the President began to pursue the creation of new nuclear weapons. Free from the pressure of the nuclear disarmament campaign, the government is at liberty to pursue nuclear weapons -- but, as Wittner explains, the movement is reviving.

Wittner's book goes into a brief history of the advent of bomb and a more detailed  history of the movement against it. Though the movement has had its ups and downs, Wittner is confident that it is resurging and as history shows, ordinary people can make a big difference.
    

Washington Post's Short Stack Column Invites SUP Authors to Comment

As we get ready for President Obama's pivotal address on health care this evening, Richard Scheffler's op-ed serves as a reminder of how badly the current system is in need of reform, and that settling for status-quo is not a sustainable option. James Surowiecki in an insightful piece in the New Yorker has diagnosed our reluctance for health care reform as "status-quo bias."  It's the desire to keep the health benefits we have unless, of c0urse, you happen to be one of the 46 million Americans who do not have health insurance.

Professor Scheffler points out that our current health care system suffers from problems with supply as much as growing demand, "The system now under-provides basic primary care -- which is key to a well-functioning system. The health workforce needs to be reconfigured. We need more primary care doctors, nurse practitioners and physician assistants, and we need them right away. If we do not have an adequate number of primary care providers, then the reforms will surely fail." In his book, Is There a Doctor in the House?: Market Signals and Tomorrow's Supply of Doctors, Scheffler argues that a crucial component of health care reform should involve forecasting the "right" ratio of doctors to the population and making sure that primary care providers are adequately compensated.

Wayne Logan's op-ed discusses the need for reassessing the criminal registration laws in light of the Jaycee Lee Dugard case. In his critique of current laws, Logan writes,  "the nationwide social experiment of registration and community notification laws, affecting hundreds of thousands of individuals and their families, imposes significant costs. It also distracts from other -- possibly preferable -- public safety strategies. The system demands a closer look. Indeed, it would be difficult to identify any other social policy of such magnitude that has evaded a critical review."

Professor Logan's book, Knowledge as Power, provides the first in-depth study of criminal registration and community notification laws, examining the potent forces driving their rapid nationwide proliferation in the 1990s through today, as well as exploring how the laws have affected the nation's law, society, and governance.

Pardis Mahdavi on elections in Iran and the Role of Women

Commenting on the continued protests surrounding the disputed presidential election in Iran, Pardis Mahadavi, author of Passionate Uprisings Iran's Sexual Revolution writes:

"Earlier today (Friday, June 17) thousands of protesters marched the streets of Tehran, pumping their fists into the air and chanting “Coup! Government resignation”. Some wore green (to indicate their allegiance to Mir Hossein Moussavi) many did not. Up until now, much of the recent media depictions of the situation in Iran paint a picture of a stolen election, and a discontented public demanding a recount at least, and the installation of their preferred candidate. While the election has presented frustrated Iranians with a catalyst and a reason to protest, what we are witnessing in Iran is not a simple protest over election fraud. Rather, disenchantment with the regime, and the desire to mobilize a civil rights type movement in Iran has been building for many years. This election, the overt nature of repression and fraudulent behavior has given many people the window they were looking for to mobilize a movement that goes beyond election politics. The protesters want change: they want to change the system of Islamic jurisprudence, and fundamentally, they want their rights back. While some might see the protests as “calming down” or “dying down”, the reality is that people have tasted the sweetness of voicing their discontent, and they have no plans of backing down easily."

From advocating for polygamy to enforcing the "morality police," Ahmadinejad has women in Iran fighting for their rights. An article in Salon.com takes a look at the women protesters and their courage, from verbal protest to dying in the streets, as was the case for Neda Agha-Soltani. who has become a symbol for the feminist movement. This article points out that though these types of protests have been going on for decades, this one is different because the world is watching.

Mahadavi remarks in this article, "There is a bit of neoliberal rhetoric. You know, we need to save these women, they're repressed and don't know it,' which is not the case. These women are finding agency in all sorts of pockets, in all sorts of ways. We can identify, but because the situation is so much more complicated than we realize, we really can't understand," she says.

Mahdavi's book Passionate Uprisings tells the stories of Iran's youth and their intertwined quests for sexual freedom, political reform, and a better future – but not a future without risk. The young people of Iran face serious consequences for their attempts to change their social atmosphere. Mahdavi's book shows how sexual politics and youth culture is changing the course of Iranian politics. 

What is Cheney Defending?

Shirley Anne Warshaw was interviewed by the Rorotoko blog about her new book, The Co-Presidency of Bush and Cheney.

"In the past month or so, we have seen former Vice President Cheney aggressively respond to charges by President Obama that the Bush administration exacerbated America’s friends and foes with its policies of torture, prisoner abuse, and inadequate trials."  Warshaw argues that this is because the policies of the Bush administration were very much Cheney's policies so it is only fitting that he is defending them.

Not only did Cheney have major influence over foreign policy but he also had all the legal arenas stacked with his supporters in order to push his agenda through the Justice Department. According to Warshaw, Cheney "had his hand in almost every area of domestic policy" by stacking the White House with his own staff of trusted insiders. The Bush/Cheney working relationship came to work so well because George Bush was focused on creating a moral and civil, faith-based society, leaving Cheney to take care of everything else.

Cheney staffed the administration with pro-business executives and "shaped the Bush administration’s energy, environmental, pro-business, and national security policies." From environmental regulations to government outsourcing, Cheney was bent on creating a business-friendly society.

Warshaw remarks, "I hope that The Co-Presidency of Bush and Cheney sheds new light on the limited agenda that George W. Bush had as president and the far larger agenda that Dick Cheney had as vice president – as well as the tools Cheney employed to move that agenda forward."

Palestinian Identity in the Israeli Army: Fighting on the the wrong side?

Surrounded, by Rhoda Ann Kanaaneh, takes a close look at the Palestinians who choose to serve in the Israeli army. It takes up the question of why they join and how it reflects the cultural interaction between the Israelis and Arabs in Israel . In the last week, the book was reviewed in both  Jordan Times and the Jerusalem Post in Israel. It is a statement of the social and political implications of Arabs in Israel as a whole, even though it focuses on a small percentage of Palestinians who choose to fight for the Israeli army.

Surrounded contains over 70 interviews with soldiers and provides a unique perspective on their experiences in acceptance and integration into the Israeli military. Kanaaneh not only provides insights into how nationalism factors into wars and why they are fought, but provides an interesting viewpoint by which to view the ethnic tension and relations between Palestinians and Israelis. She first gives the reader a sense of what it is to live as an Arab in Israel and the identity issues that Arabs struggle with when living there. With the many different categories that Israeli Arabs identify with (Muslim, Druze, Christian), how do these soldiers view their relationship with a volatile and fractured state?

Kanaaneh grapples with these questions of identity as she assesses the status of the Arab soldiers in their own communities and compares the situation of the Palestinians in Israel not only with other Palestinians in West Bank and Gaza strip but with other colonial situations around the globe: Indians who served in the British army, Buffalo soldiers in America, and, more recently, the US speeding up citizenship processing for green card holders who served in Iraq. Throughout the book, questions of conflicted identity are highlighted, as are the relationships between ethnic discrimination and military conflict -- issues that are not just pertinent to Arabs and Israelis but of truly universal interest.

California - A nation-state within a state?

In a recent broadcast of the radio show Which Way, LA? Stanford University Press authors Jim Flanigan - Smile Southern California, You’re the Center of the Universe - and Abe Lowenthal - Global California, Rising to the Cosmopolitan Challenge -  share their insights on the current and future prospects for California. Can the most prosperous state in the US , the hub of agriculture, industry and innovation be regarded as a nation-state?

For Abe Lowenthal the answer is a resounding "Yes." Lowenthal’s ideas focus on the fact that California has all the qualities of an internationally active nation-state but lacks the ability to use them in order to further their international interests. Even though “California was born with international DNA" as he put it, it is inwardly focused.  The state has the opportunity to influence the federal government, has a large congressional delegation, and has the most internationally diverse population in the country, and has not harnessed the tools to become an actor on the international stage.

Although Flanigan’s book is focused on southern California, he makes the point that global trade is central to California’s economy in particular (the state is the country’s largest exporter and importer of goods and services) and that the state is crucial in developing US trade links with Latin America and China. With a growing population due to second generation immigrants, an entrepreneurial economy, and the largest university research complex in the country, California is primed for interacting at an international level. 

Both Flanigan and Lowenthal agree that the political elites of California should come together to leverage the state’s global clout rather than remaining partisan and focused on local issues only. Even in the current recession, California has the capacity to yield a lot of influence.

Flanigan leaves us with a reassuring note, in light of the current economic downturn. He admits that trade may be down and deficits high, but China and other Asian developing countries are not going to stop development. They’re going to continue to develop, and we’re going to have a role in it. Flanigan assures us that the economy and trade of California flourished wildly in the past and even though it’s at a standstill now, “you know it’ll come back.”