Crisis of Conscience

Whistleblowing in an Age of Fraud

By: Tom Mueller

Narrated by: Mark Deakins

"A call to arms and to action, for anyone with a conscience, anyone alarmed about the decline of our democracy." — New York Times-bestselling author Wendell Potter

"Powerful...His extensively reported tales of individual whistleblowers and their often cruel fates are compelling...They reveal what it can mean to live in an age of fraud." — The Washington Post

"Tom Mueller's authoritative and timely book reveals what drives a few brave souls to expose and denounce specific cases of corruption. He describes the structural decay that plagues many of our most powerful institutions, putting democracy itself in danger." —George Soros

A David-and-Goliath story for our times: the riveting account of the heroes who are fighting a rising tide of wrongdoing by the powerful, and showing us the path forward.

We live in a period of sweeping corruption -- and a golden age of whistleblowing. Over the past few decades, principled insiders who expose wrongdoing have gained unprecedented legal and social stature, emerging as the government's best weapon against corporate misconduct--and the citizenry's best defense against government gone bad. Whistleblowers force us to confront fundamental questions about the balance between free speech and state secrecy, and between individual morality and corporate power.

In Crisis of Conscience, Tom Mueller traces the rise of whistleblowing through a series of riveting cases drawn from the worlds of healthcare and other businesses, Wall Street, and Washington. Drawing on in-depth interviews with more than two hundred whistleblowers and the trailblazing lawyers who arm them for battle--plus politicians, intelligence analysts, government watchdogs, cognitive scientists, and other experts--Mueller anatomizes what inspires some to speak out while the rest of us become complicit in our silence. Whistleblowers, we come to see, are the freethinking, outspoken citizens for whom our republic was conceived. And they are the models we must emulate if our democracy is to survive.

A sad but true tale of the decline of America

Pay attention idiots, this is everywhere around you. Maybe you are a participant, or one of the individuals building your wealth… hopefully you have the courage to stand up.
After all your kids will only waste it

Everyone should read this

Crisis of Conscience is incredibly well researched and well written. The book gives a psychological, historical, and current perspective on corruption and whistleblowing. Mr. Mueller has taken an extremely complicated topic and an enormous amount of facts and information and laid it out in a very engaging and logical way. A famous quote says "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it" I would add that without works that explore the parts of our history that are often glossed over or omitted such as Crisis of Conscience, Shock Doctrine, Medical Apartheid, and The New Jim Crow we will never escape it. Finding solutions to problems must start with a careful and comprehensive review of history and facts. It is very hard to fix problems that have not been exposed and identified. I would encourage everyone who cares about the future we are creating for our children and grandchildren to read this book and think carefully about how we can move towards a more just and equitable world.

more detail than it needed

the info is important. he is very thorough but too much so. it becomes tedious. very long book. could not listen to much of it.
length did not make it easier to understand, in fact, more difficult to follow.