
Good Chaps
How Corrupt Politicians Broke Our Law and Institutions - And What We Can Do About It
Simon Kuper(Author)
Profile Books Ltd (Publisher)
Published on 13. June 2024
Book
Paperback/Softback
224 pages
978-1-80522-122-7 (ISBN)
Description
A FINANCIAL TIMES BOOK OF THE YEAR 2024
'At a time when democracy feels threatened, Simon Kuper is fighting hard for a better vision of politics - he is brutally honest about our problems but never loses hope that we can build a better democracy' Rory Stewart
'An intelligible, compelling and enraging narrative ... how the Good Chaps get away with it' New Statesman
The 'Good Chaps' theory holds that those who rise to power in the UK can be trusted to follow the rules and do the right thing. They're good chaps, after all. Yet Britain appears to have been taken over by bad chaps, and politics is awash with financial scandals, donors who have practically bought shares in political parties, and a shameless contempt for the rules.
Simon Kuper, author of the Sunday Times Top Ten bestseller Chums, exposes how corruption took control of public life, and asks: how can we get politicians to behave like good chaps again?
'At a time when democracy feels threatened, Simon Kuper is fighting hard for a better vision of politics - he is brutally honest about our problems but never loses hope that we can build a better democracy' Rory Stewart
'An intelligible, compelling and enraging narrative ... how the Good Chaps get away with it' New Statesman
The 'Good Chaps' theory holds that those who rise to power in the UK can be trusted to follow the rules and do the right thing. They're good chaps, after all. Yet Britain appears to have been taken over by bad chaps, and politics is awash with financial scandals, donors who have practically bought shares in political parties, and a shameless contempt for the rules.
Simon Kuper, author of the Sunday Times Top Ten bestseller Chums, exposes how corruption took control of public life, and asks: how can we get politicians to behave like good chaps again?
Reviews / Votes
At a time when democracy feels threatened, Simon Kuper is fighting hard for a better vision of politics - he is brutally honest about our problems but never loses hope that we can build a better democracy -- Rory Stewart, co-host of The Rest is Politics Exposes the corruption permeating UK politics and the death of the so-called "good chap" -- 'Best summer books of 2024' * Financial Times * An intelligible, compelling and enraging narrative ... how the Good Chaps get away with it -- Will Dunn * New Statesman * Perfectly timed as a guide to what the new government should do, Simon Kuper's follow-up to the superb Chums is a snappy, incisive account of the debasement of British politics by money and influence. -- Matthew D'Ancona * New European * Simon Kuper has written a timely and compelling reminder to leaders of all political parties that, while living standards matter most to voters, Britain desperately need to improve and restore standards in public life too -- Tom Baldwin, author * Keir Starmer: The Biography * A document of our time * Sunday Times * Praise for Chums:'Brilliant ... traces Brexit back to the debating chambers of the Oxford Union in the 1980s -- James O'Brien An extraordinary book ... I got angrier and angrier and angrier as I read it -- Alastair Campbell A searing onslaught on the smirking Oxford insinuation that politics is all just a game. It isn't. It matters -- Matthew Parris A sparkling firework of a book -- Lynn Barber * Spectator * Exquisite and depressing in equal measure -- Matthew Syed * Sunday Times * This is the best detailed but lucid account I have read of how corruption surged in the UK -- Patrick Cockburn * i Paper * The book to read on corruption in the UK -- Patrick Cockburn * i Paper *
More details
Edition
Main
Language
English
Place of publication
London
United Kingdom
Target group
College/higher education
Professional and scholarly
Product notice
Paperback (UK-trade)
Dimensions
Height: 196 mm
Width: 126 mm
Thickness: 19 mm
Weight
180 gr
ISBN-13
978-1-80522-122-7 (9781805221227)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions

Simon Kuper
Good Chaps
How Corrupt Politicians Broke Our Law and Institutions - And What We Can Do About It
E-Book
06/2024
Profile Books Ltd
€11.49
Available for download
Person
Simon Kuper is an author and Financial Times journalist, born in Uganda and raised around the world. An Oxford graduate, he later attended Harvard as a Kennedy Scholar. He has written for the Observer, The Times and Guardian, and is also the author of Chums, Impossible City and The Happy Traitor.