The Asian Insider: Unconventional Wisdom for Asian Business

By Michael Backman
Published by Palgrave Macmillan, a division of Macmillan.
Hardback, 294 pages

The Asian Insider provides in-depth accounts of a wide range of aspects of Asian business and culture for readers
who wish to achieve a better than superficial understanding of the region. Rich in facts and anecdotes, part
management guide, part travel narrative, part polemic, the Asian Insider is a highly readable and entertaining.

It appeared in the top five on several non-fiction best seller lists in Asia soon after it was published.

CONTENTS

Chapter 1        The Asian Insider: An Introduction

Part I               How Asia Really Works
Chapter 2        Asian family Connections

Part II              Government, the Rule of Law and Democracy in Asia
Chapter 3        Is Democracy Always Good?
Chapter 4        Paying Peanuts: Politicians’ Pay in Asia
Chapter 5        Police Corruption an the Rule of Law in Thailand
Chapter 6        Executions and Extrajudicial Killings
Chapter 7        Government Statistics and Other Lies
Chapter 8        Thaksin Berlusconi and Silvio Shinawatra
Chapter 9        The End of Indonesia

Part III               Singapore and Malaysia
Chapter 10        Why Singapore is Different: The Babas of Singapore
Chapter 11        Reinventing Singapore?
Chapter 12        Singapore Inc. or Singapore Sink?
Chapter 13        Singapore’s Thriving Sex Industry
Chapter 14         Diversity and Decency in Malaysia
Chapter 15        Rumours and Gossip in Malaysia
Chapter 16        Meet Syed Mohktar Al-Bukhary

Part IV               Islam, Business and Asia
Chapter 17        Allahu Akbar! Islam in Asia
Chapter 18        Where so Asia’s Muslims’ fit in?
Chapter 19        Southeast Asia’s Arabs
Chapter 20        Pax Islamica: Malaysia and the Middle East

Part V                Japan, China, India and Korea: Asia’s Monolith Economies
Chapter 21        Land of the Setting Sun: The Inevitable Death of Japan
Chapter 22        Law, Order and China
Chapter 23        Is Booming China Threat to Asia?
Chapter 24        Shanghai: China’s Financial Capital
Chapter 25        And then there is Beijing
Chapter 26        The Dalai Lama Eats Meat
Chapter 27        The Indian Way
Chapter 28        The World’s Biggest Democracy
Chapter 29        Mumbai: India’s Financial capital
Chapter 30         India’s Great Software Revolution
Chapter 31         India: Back Office to the World
Chapter 32         Stunning Korea
Chapter 33         The Insider