Beyond the Crash
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| Author | Gordon Brown |
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| Country | United Kingdom |
| Language | English |
| Subject | Global economics |
| Genre | Non-fiction |
| Publisher | Simon & Schuster |
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Publication date
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December 2010 |
| Media type | Hardback |
| Pages | 315 |
| ISBN | |
| Preceded by | The Change We Choose: Speeches 2007–2009 |
Beyond the Crash: Overcoming the first crisis of globalisation is a 2010 book by former UK prime minister Gordon Brown. The work argues that the only way to fully overcome the financial crisis of 2007–2010 is with further coordinated global action. Brown states that a shared "global compact" on jobs and growth should be central to effective action, with different regions called on in different ways to contribute to rebalancing the global economy while boosting growth. The book includes first-hand accounts of events leading to previous successful cases of international collaboration on economic affairs. There are specific suggestions about the different ways in which the world's nations and regions can help secure global growth, jobs and poverty reduction. A secondary theme of the work is that better global oversight is needed for the international financial system. Brown suggests that to function at their best, banks and markets need shared morals.
Brown started writing the book at the end of May 2010, completing it 14 weeks later while still attending to his work as an MP.
The book is divided into four parts and a total of eleven chapters. There is also a Prologue, an Introduction and a Conclusion.
The Prologue relates how Brown decided to go ahead with his ground breaking recapitalisation plan for British banks during a transatlantic plane flight on 26 September 2008.
The introduction takes the story in the prologue two weeks forward to 8 October, the day when the bank recapitalisation plan was announced. Brown describes how the crises evolved to become much wider than a banking crises - it became what he calls the first crises of globalisation, which if not overcome will threaten a decade or more of low growth, with millions left jobless and millions more in poverty. Brown recalls that in the last years of the 20th century, Europe and America had between them a majority share of the world's production, exports and investment. While after 2000 Europe and American had a minority share in all those areas, while still retaining a large majority of the world's consumption, financed by borrowing from the rest of the world. Brown states that this recently developed situation has become unsustainable. He says it's essential for emerging economic giants like China to further boost their consumption if global growth is to be optimised and the crises is to be fully overcome. The introduction also discusses the need for morality to inform the conduct of market participants.
Part 1 has only one chapter, which tracks the UK government's response to the crises starting from the Sept 2007 bank run on Northern Rock and ending on 13 October 2008 after Brown's bank recapitalisation plan had been announced. In contrast to the global focus found in the rest of the book, the focus here is largely on Britain and Northern Rock (who issued false figures for mortgage arrears - p24), with some attention to cooperation and dialogue with the US and Europe, especially to Brown's work in persuading them of the need to recapitalise their own banks fearing the threat of a recession (p27). There is a brief mention of Brown's push to gain consensus for a G20 "heads of state" summit.
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