Boris Johnson vs. British Officialdom

In 1989, the billionaire investor Warren Buffett wrote a letter reflecting on what was then his 25-year stewardship of Berkshire Hathaway. His “most surprising discovery” was “the overwhelming importance in business of an unseen force that we might call ‘the institutional imperative.’” Buffet told investors that he initially thought “decent, intelligent, and experienced managers would automatically make rational business decisions.” In fact, he discovered, this was untrue. The crucial thing was the system.

It was almost a law of business, Buffett wrote, that institutions will resist change, waste time, produce evidence to support the whims of whoever is in charge, and mindlessly imitate the behavior of rival companies. The lesson he took from his insight was to organize his company in ways that minimized the dangers of systemic failure and to invest in other companies