The Informant: A True Story

Midway through The Informant I found myself thinking if this was a novel I’d discard the premise as over convoluted and utterly unbelievable. Consider if you will, this case involves a well- known U.S. company cheerfully engaging in price fixing, indeed traveling to exotic locals to plan schedules for said price fixing. Additionally one of the central characters has mental issues that accelerate throughout the book and an odd fixation on John Grisham’s The Firm. Government officials are portrayed on a continuum from heroic to childishly petulant. The whole thing just seemed like an out of control legal thriller. Yet, these events and players were real.Kurt Eichenwald’s The Informant follows the FBI’s investigation into and later successful prosecution of Archer Daniels Midland a Fortune 500 company for price fixing in the commodities markets. I was a fan of Eichenwald’s Conspiracy of Fools where he juggled the numerous players, illegal deeds and hubris that led to the Enron collapse. In Conspiracy Eichenwald did a great job balancing the players and the misdeeds committed, and how both led to the collapse of Enron. The Informant written four years before Conspiracy is to my mind a weaker effort. Certainly ADM with their motto; "The competitor is our friend and the customer is our enemy” seems rife for a juicy expose. Somehow though the saga gets bogged down in minutia... The book illustrates what ADM did wrong namely price fixing, fraud etc. but never provides an overriding sense of how the corporation got there. With Conspiracy, Eichenwald showed how executive decision making and greed led Enron over a cliff. However with The Informant he never quite provides the context of how a grain producing company became so corrupt.In part I’d argue the weakness of the larger story is a result of Eichenwald’s near constant focus on Mark Whitacre. A high ranking executive at ADM, Whitacre later becomes a government informant who begins to manifest extreme mental health issues as events escalate. I can imagine how Whitacre was fascinating to follow and to some level to crack. He’s both a greedy manipulative liar and a needy people pleaser two qualities that seldom co-exist. However, I felt the focus on Whitacre became excessive and slowed the narrative of the story. At the very point when the story should be expanding and gaining momentum; Eichenwald increasingly narrows the story focusing more and more on Whiteacre’s misdeeds and the response of his handlers, and prosecutors to those deeds. The constant lies, delusions, omissions and schemes that become Whitace’s daily life just became excessive. The Informant begins to feel like a laundry list of Whitacre’s actions which drains the narrative.Now to be fair the book is called the Informant so the focus should naturally fall on Whitacre. However, I just felt Eichenwald did not temper that focus or retell the story effectively. Other writers like Norman Mailer in the Executioner’s Song or Joe McGinniss in Fatal Vision were capable of taking deeply unreliable narrators and using them to effectively propel a story even as their misdeeds came to light. But somehow Whiteacre never quite fits. He’s too manipulative on one hand and sickly needy to really be the center of the story.Despite this issue I would still recommend this book to those interested in learning more about international business, commodities and particularly the role of a government informant. Even as I tired of Mark Whitacre I could not stop reading about him and his strange, strange role in the unraveling of ADM’s power structure.

In short, this is a terrific book - a complex and absorbing read that has all the adrenaline and page-turning mojo of John Grisham's or Joseph Finder's best, while at the same time exposing graft, greed, corruption and bureaucratic bungling that, were this not a true story, would be discarded as being too unbelievable. It is also an exceptional character study, well drawn, sensitive, and convincing - one of those rare books that will have you telling friends and family "You've got to read this book."Mark Whitaker, the "informant", was a young, high flying, near genius senior executive - a division president in global food processing mega-giant ADM. Whitaker reports an attempt at corporate espionage and extortion from a Japanese competitor, and ADM brings in the FBI to track it down. Soon the case moves from extortion to price fixing, and Whitaker as turned informant, an unprecedented boon for the Feds to have someone on the inside with this much clout and credibility. But as a convoluted story unfolds to the FBI Special Agents working the case, inconsistencies and developments of increasing incredulousness start stacking up, Whitaker's motivations come under scrutiny. Clearly there is more to this guy than he is telling, and a hidden agenda - perhaps multiple hidden agendas - which always seem to be just inches out of the FBI's grasp. The intensity ratchets up as the stories of ADP and Whitaker and the boldness and stupidity of their respective scams escalate, reaching a climax as mind-boggling as the journey there.Author Kurt Eichenwalt, a reporter for the New York Times, does a remarkable job taking an extremely complex case, arcane anti-trust law, and Mr. Wizard-class science, and making it readable, understandable, and most important, entertaining. And give him credit for keeping politics and political commentary to a minimum - yet whether you're Democrat or Republican, Liberal or Conservative, expect to shocked - if not sickened - at the decidedly unhealthy bond between big business and the politicians whose hands are in their pockets. Sure, you'd be naive not to know corruption at the highest levels is far too common, but the blatant audacity depicted here is beyond frustrating - and all too relevant today as more and more corn-based ethanol finds its way into our gas tanks."The Informant" should be required reading for every Business and Law School, but is at the same time deserves broad appeal on the strength of the characters, the painstaking research and detail which adds depth and credibility without adding tedium, and a plot with more twists than a whole season of "The Twilight Zone." There's something for everyone here, and is perhaps the best non-fiction business book of all time, this one should definitely be on your "must read" list.

先日、米国司法省（反トラスト局）の方の講演を聴いた時に紹介されていた本です。映画にもなっていますが、本の方が良いとのことだったので読んでみました。主にリジンという飼料添加物をめぐるカルテル事件（同業者間での価格・販売数量の調整・密約）に関するノンフィクションです。米国１社（ADM）、日本２社（味の素、協和発酵）、韓国２社（Sewon、Cheil）の計５社によるカルテル事件なのですが、そのうちADMの役員の一人（Mark Whitacre氏）がある事件を切っ掛けにＦＢＩの協力者となります。ＦＢＩは、同氏の協力の下、カルテルが行われている会議をビデオ撮影・録音すること等により、証拠を集めていきます。そして、その証拠に基づき、司法省（反トラスト局）が家宅捜索に踏み切るのですが、その後、Whitacre氏が別の横領事件等に関与していることが疑われるようになり、その影響を受けて、カルテル事件の捜査も予想していなかった方向へと展開していきます。本書は、当時の隠し撮りしたビデオや録音、各種文書、そして１００人以上の関係者へのインタビューを基にして書かれたノンフィクションであり、当時の出来事や、関係者の人物像等が丹念に描かれていて、John Grishamの小説にひけをとらないくらい面白かったです。読んでいて「本当にノンフィクションなの？フィクションでは？」と思うくらいでした。また、当時、Whitacre氏がJohn Grishamの"The Firm"の映画を観ていたこと、本事件の捜査中に、司法省（反トラスト局）が別のカルテル事件でGE（General Electric）に完敗していたこと等、個人的に興味深い箇所が沢山ありました。その他、ＦＢＩと司法省（反トラスト局）との意見対立や、司法取引における被告側弁護士と司法省（反トラスト局）との駆け引きも、読んでいて興味深かったです。「カルテル」というあまり一般的ではない分野の事件を扱ったものですし、ページ数も500頁以上ありますので、なかなか手が伸びにくい本かと思いますが、思っていたよりもずっと面白く、当初はいつものペースで１ヶ月ぐらいかけて読み終えるつもりだったのが、話に引き込まれて２週間で読み終えてしまったくらいなので、お勧めできる本だと思います。

Jumped around like a kangaroo on steroids. But there was just enough information at each step, to bring the reader along on a thrilling ride through what one of the characters in the story actually described as a plot like a "two-bit detective novel". And he's right! But it works because this is non-fiction. The fact is, if this were a fictional story, it would be considered too bizarre to be believed. But as a factual accounting, this one is a real page-turner. No dead space. Just a riveting read, right through to the end.Excellent. Highly recommended.

Plot 3*Characters 4*Overall I enjoyed the book but I found it rather long. It literally was the fact that it described a true story (in perhaps such great detail to be a bit incredulous) that prompted me to carry on.The author demonstrated an impressive commitment to the story that helped, but I think the volume of research overwhelms the ability to tell the story in a succinct manor.

Very entertaining and eye-watering when you realize it is a true story. Kurt has a pretty good style of writing, sometimes gets tangled with too many details for too long, but not so that you wanted to stop reading. It is a book you read every day until finished.

I enjoy reading well written true stories.