Anglicisation eventually stifled the entre prenersiof the sasins, they become great anglipiles. And i think part of it is the upper english ar cracy at the time found working, you know, kind of not acceptable at the time. The difference between the fourth generation and the first generation is absolutely shocking. Here, the migrant family that came in with nothing was working 12 hours a day for six days. And then you shiftid to to the fourth generation, and they barely worked for two hours, three hours. They were spending huge amounts of money on their estates. And there all ther gein theraces. It was that that helped knit them into
The Sassoons were one of the great commercial dynasties of the 19th century: ‘the Rothschilds of the East’. In Global Merchants the historian Joseph Sassoon charts how his ancestors – Jewish refugee exiles from Ottoman Baghdad – built a vast enterprise of trade and influence across the world. He tells Tom Sutcliffe how their meteoric rise and ultimate fall mirrored the British imperial project.
At the height of their ambition the Sassoons led an extravagant lifestyle, but never quite overcame their origins to be accepted in upper class society in the West. Money, power, class and caste are at the centre of Pankaj Mishra’s new novel, Run and Hide. The heroes of his story are lower class Indians determined to succeed – at a time when success is counted in private jets and lavish parties, and failure leads to a global financial scandal.
The Head of Economics at the Open University, Professor Susan Newman, provided expert advice for the recent BBC 2 series, The Decade the Rich Won: Stories of power and influence, in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis. In her studies she’s interested in the question of how wealth is accumulated today, the impact of globalisation on national decision-making, and growing inequality.
Producer: Katy Hickman