Corporate Restructuring

In the 1980s, the business world saw a number of gargantuan mergers and acquisitions featuring ``white knights,'' convoluted ``poison pill'' and ``PAC-Man'' defenses and ``barbarians at the gates'' that transformed business. Donaldson ( Strategy of Financial Mobility ) meticulously explores resultant restructuring in this superb study. The author, an emeritus professor at Harvard Business School, views the last decade's changes in corporate restructuring in the context of the ``evolution of financial strategy and structure since World War II.'' He examines the economic structure of the 1970s and 1980s, investor discontent, voluntary and involuntary corporate restructuring, board revolts and fundamental changes in managerial operations. Donaldson's extensive use of statistical data, case studies (General Mills, Burlington Northern and CPC International) offers a useful framework for his consideration of implications for corporations of the '90s (Apr.)