Behaving Badly: The New Morality in Politics, Sex, and Business

Collinsworth (I Stand Corrected), a business consultant and former media executive, conducts an entertaining, if overly discursive, study of ethical quagmires and moral gray areas in modern-day business, interpersonal, and military practices. Taking a global view, she maps the moral landscapes of Swiss bank accounts and the murky waters of Japanese business practices, and compares American and French perspectives on monogamy. Determined to leave no stone unturned, Collinsworth subscribes to “Wolf of Wall Street” Jordan Belfort’s motivational newsletter and interviews a convicted murderer. She considers the “liberalization” of sexual mores via dating apps and wrestles with moral relativism: is it a necessary component of globalization, or the downfall of American society? Sometimes she makes an already expansive topic too wide in scope. Transitions are abrupt, and references to the Large Hadron Collider and Tiananmen Square are dropped in and quickly left behind for no discernible reason other than to cover as much ground as possible. She sets the scene for an interview with a Kurdish pop star and then fails to include a single word of it. Ending on a high note, Collinsworth speaks to 20-somethings who sound infinitely more reasonable than the so-called experts who dominate the rest of the book. (Apr.)