Asian Godfathers: Money and Power in Hong Kong and South-East Asia

By Joe Studwell. 330 pages. Published by Profile Books, London

(Read part 2 of this story here.)

We present herewith the first of two excerpts from “Asian Godfathers”, a unique book on the role of monopolies and crony capitalism in East Asia. Much, mostly hagiographic, has been written about the fabulously wealthy group of mostly overseas Chinese whose names are familiar throughout the region and have been widely as…