Kindleberger

Kindleberger (pronounced khin-dil-berg-ah)

A family name of Germanic origin.

As “Kindleberger Moment” & “Kindleberger Trap”, two related terms describing different aspects from an underlying problem in international political economy and named after economist Professor Charles P. Kindleberger (1910-2003) whose writings inspired their coining.  Professor Kindleberger’s middle name was “Poor” and while that may seem more appropriate for a monk than an economist, it didn’t appear to hamper his career.

The surname Kindleberger is of German origin, functioning as a habitational or topographic name, the construct being Kind(l)- + -berg + -er.  Kind (kid, child, young person) was from the Middle High German kint, from the Old High German kind, from the Proto-West Germanic kind, from Proto-Germanic kindą & kinþą, from the primitive Indo-European ǵenh- (to give birth); there were many local dialect variations.  Berg (mountain, hill) was from the Middle High German bërc, from the Old High German bërg, from the Proto-West Germanic berg, ultimately from the Proto-Germanic bergaz; it may be compared with the Dutch berg, the German Low German Barg, Berg & Biärg, the West Frisian berch, the English berry & barrow, the Danish bjerg and the Swedish berg.  The –er suffix (in this context) was appended to indicate inhabitant or person from a specific locality.  The “-berg” element thus in general was used in the names of those living near a specific hill or a place named with those combined linguistic roots and Kindleberger would likely have began with someone who was the (probably male) offspring of someone named “Berg”, “Berger” or such.  As a compound surname, it may in some instances have referred not to individuals living near mountainous regions but those (likely female) who were known for their roles as caretakers of children; the etymological structure can indicate a connection between familial roles and the natural landscape.  The name dates from at least the Late Medieval period (when surnames became hereditary) and records of use exist in several German-speaking regions, clusters found concentrated in areas like the Rheinland-Pfalz (Rhineland-Palatinate) region that, while not characterized by alpine peaks, does have a topography noted for rolling hills, low mountain ranges, and deeply carved river valleys.  As internal migration increased (notably within the Holy Roman Empire), like many European surnames, variations like Kindleberger and Kindelberger spread and this occurred internationally during the nineteenth & twentieth centuries; outside of Europe, the Kindleberger name is most likely to be found in the states of the north-eastern US (the largest concentrations historically in West Virginia, Ohio & Pennsylvania).  Kindleberger is a proper noun; the noun plural is Kindlebergers.

A red meteor observed by US-born astronomer Stephen James O'Meara (b 1956) in the skies above Maun, Botswana.

Asteroid 42354 Kindleberger was named after the professor.  Originally listed by the International Dark Sky Discovery Center in Fountain Hills, Arizona on 12 February, 2002 (and provisionally allocated ID 2002 CK43), it was discovered by Charles Juels (1944–2009) and Paulo Holvorcem (b 1967), both amateur astronomers.  Paulo Holvorcem (b 1967) is a mathematician based in Brasília (one of a handful of “created” capital cities), Brazil while Charles Juels (1944–2009) was a US psychiatrist practicing in Phoenix, Arizona; after retirement, he became one of the planet’s most prolific discoverers of asteroids, minor planets and such.  The naming conventions administered by the IAU (International Astronomical Union) permit those who discover minor planets to submit potential names, once the orbit officially is confirmed.  Professor Kindleberger was honoured in recognition both of his academic contributions to the discipline of economics and the role his books (especially Manias, Panics, and Crashes: A History of Financial Crises (1978) played in explaining such phenomena to a non-specialist audience.  The choice (within certain limitations) is in the hands of the discoverer(s) and other economists have had asteroids named after them.  Red-tailed asteroids are rare but do exist, 3200 Phaethon's (provisionally 1983 TB) vivid tail made of sodium vaporized from the rock by the heat of the Sun, inducing  fluoresce an orange glow.  Definitely the next red-tailed asteroid should be named after Lindsay Lohan.

The World in Depression, 1929-1939 (1973) by Charles P. Kindleberger.

A “Kindleberger Moment” is a critical point in global history when the world’s dominant power (of late typically a hegemon) ceases providing economic leadership and no other country is able or willing to assume the role.  MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) Professor of Economics Charles P. Kindleberger illustrated the concept during his study of the Great Depression of the 1930s, arguing the global economy “crashed” (ie suffered a significant decline in economic activity, employment, trade etc) because (1) the economy of the previously dominant power (the UK) had been too weakened by the First World War (1914-1918) to be able to provide the necessary leadership and corrective mechanisms and (2) the rising power (the US) was both also greatly affected by the downturn and anyway uninterested in becoming entangled in international affairs.  A Kindleberger moment can be considered a “global power vacuum”, the previous leader withdrawing from maintaining and contributing to global rules, trade agreements, and international organizations with no successor available.  At such moments, competing rising new powers tend to focus only on their own interests instead of supporting global stability, meaning the international system faces heightened risks of financial collapse, trade wars, political instability and related chaos (mass irregular migration, border conflicts etc).  Of late, there has been renewed interest in the Kindleberger moment as doubts have been raised about the ability of the US to continue in the rule it has fulfilled since 1945 at a time when the PRC (People’s Republic of China, 1949-) is becoming increasing powerful and assertive but has neither the capacity nor (apparently) the inclination to be the world’s “indispensable nation” (ie “global policeman and banker”).

Professor Kindleberger in his office at MIT, Cambridge, Massachusetts.

As an economist discussing the smooth operation of the international economy, Kindleberger didn’t attach to the concept of “hegemon” the negative connotations vested famously by the Italian Marxist theorist Antonio Gramsci (1891-1937) who had used to idea in a predictably Marxist way (of a “ruling class & ruling culture” able within a society to exert control and maintain power for its own economic benefit).  For Kindleberger, a hegemonic power was a highly desirable element in an inter-connected world economy that in the absence of such an authority would inevitably descent into conflicts that likely would spread.  A Kindleberger moment occurs when there’s hegemonic absence (or even significant deficit) in which the international system lacks a power willing and able to supply essential stabilising functions including:

(1) Maintaining an international trading system in which markets were free, open and transparent.

(2) Providing a system in which international capital flows were regulated to the extent of ensuring stability.

(3) Maintaining a stable monetary system by providing a stable, convertible reserve currency, able to be used by trading nations.

(4) Acting as a lender of last resort.

(5) Coordinating international responses to economic and other crises.

The related “Kindleberger Trap” (a term dating only from 2017) describes the structural dilemma that can arise from the world entering a “Kindleberger Moment”.  Were there always a nice symmetry in that as one power withdrew from the role, another took over on a “business as usual” basis, it would be a smoothly run world but in international relations things tend to be more messy and depending on the dynamics, things can take decades or even centuries to be resolved (for better or worse).  As a rising power acquires sufficient economic, military and geopolitical weight, it might be expected to contribute to maintaining the international order (from which, by definition, it has gained that strength) at a time when the established hegemon simultaneously is reducing its capacity or willingness to carry the burden but history suggests conflict is more likely than cooperation.  The twist in the “Kindleberger Moment” theory is that in a situation where the existing hegemon is in decline but the rising power is unwilling or unable to assume the role, a “trap” begins to open.  That trap is created by the rising power “probing” often regional weaknesses in the hegemon’s strategic architecture and the response to that often is localized tactical violence (often called “containment”), something that can exacerbate the decline of the authority of the established power while doing little to curb (and likely even encourage) the assertiveness of the rival.  Once the hegemon is so engaged, the trap has closed and the point is the “trap” is likely a process rather than a singer decisive event.  Deliberately the phrase echoed the better-known “Thucydides Trap” (the name from the Ancient Greek general & historian Thucydides (circa 460-circa 400 BC)). Describing the idea that when a rising power threatens to supplant the established one, the result is often war (pre-emptive or preventive depending on the spin chosen), either through a fear of being attacked or in an attempt to “contain the upstart”.  So, conceptually, a Kindleberger moment is the situation; the Kindleberger Trap is the recurring structural predicament that can lead to it.

Manias, Panics, and Crashes: A History of Financial Crises (1978) by Charles P. Kindleberger, fifty years on, still the standard work and now in its eighth edition (2023) and, there being no indication there'll not be more manias, panics, and crashes, a ninth edition can be expected, updated to document the latest crises.

The consensus among specialists seems to be the world is not at this point in a Kindleberger Moment because structurally the PRC is not yet able to assume the global role the US has evolved to fulfil since 1945.  These was nothing unique about the shift in 1945, just as the US replaced the UK, the UK had replaced the Netherlands, the Netherlands had replaced Spain and Spain had replaced various Italian city-states.  What however now makes the situation potentially unstable is that the PRC does not accept the existing US-led order, but is not only unable to replicate the global role but uninterested in doing so.  The PRC’s preferred model is “spheres of influence” on a grand scale administered on a “Westphalian basis” (ie non-interference in each other’s spheres).  In that, Beijing’s vision differs from spheres of influence approach during the Cold War in that the earlier model was one of conflict disguised as peaceful co-existence; the PRC’s regarding their mode; as beneficial for all.  Unlike those running the early Soviet Union (1922-1991), the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) has no interest in exporting its system of governance to other states; the lessons have been well-learned from the US attempting to “impose democracy” in places where historically it has never taken root.  The modern CCP does not wish to attempt to transform other places to clones of the PRC; what is wants is for them become good, reliable suppliers and consumers and whether they are run as democracies, theocracies or dictatorships is an “internal affair”.  What matters is peace, good order and a common system of “non-interference”.  The CCP’s collective view is not unknown in the annals of the US State Department, the diplomat and historian George Kennan (1904-2005) in one of his long (and mostly ignored) reports from Moscow in 1945 noting the US should “…remain true to its ideals but should not try to foist them on peoples with entirely different national traditions.”

Leviathan (1651) by Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679).  The etching used for the frontipiece of the original edition was by the French printmaker Abraham Bosse (circa 1604–1676) “with input from the author”.

The One comparison that can be made is between the notion a world hegemon is necessary for a generally stable world economy and the idea the very clever and deliciously wicked English philosopher Thomas Hobbes explored in Leviathan (1651): A strong sovereign (to whom individuals must cede certain “natural rights”) is essential for a peaceful, stable society.  Although striking, there are limitations to the extent the hegemon in Professor Kindleberger's model can be thought an international analogue of the grim vision in Leviathan; it is not a direct application of Hobbesian political theory.  Hobbes argued the fundamental problem in the “state of nature” (ie in which the earliest “societies” came to be formed) was the lack of a sufficiently powerful common authority to prevent individuals from pursuing their interests against one another.  In that model, because each person (at least theoretically) possesses roughly equal capacity to threaten others, rational individuals have an incentive to seek security by establishing a sovereign and one not there merely to coordinate but also with coercive power.  What the existence of a powerful sovereign offered was that in exchange for restrictions on individual freedom (at the most basic, not killing one’s opponents), collective security would be guaranteed.  Because all in the society would be subject to the same authority (and thus the same loss of certain freedoms) the arrangement would come to be accepted, if for no other reason than the alternative(s) being worse: “nasty, solitary, brutish and short” Hobbes’ memorable phrase.

Kindleberger's argument was developed in his book The World in Depression, 1929–1939 (1973) and concerned something analogous to what Hobbes described but at the international economic level.  His thesis was that (1) with an economy damaged by involvement in World War I and the consequent “difficulties” of the following decade, the UK was no longer able to provided the international economic leadership it had delivered before the war while (2) the US was unable or unwilling to assume the role.  With no stabilising hegemon, nations resorted to acting in short-term self interest, leading to reductions in trade, wealth and employment; Professor Kindleberger's key insight was that whatever their granular nature, in international economics these things must be thought public goods but, of course, individual countries each had incentives to have others bear the cost of maintaining them, thus the famous “Kindleberger Problem”: Who pays for the system?  That the UK was not prepared to go deeper into debt and the US preferred to focus on its own problems he held to be the major factors that made what might have been a sharp but relatively short recession into the Great Depression of the 1930s.  It was the leadership vacuum that created the conditions leading to the collapse of the international economic order.

The limitation in pursuing the analogy is of course that neither the UK in the nineteenth century nor the US since 1945 were the sovereign of the international system in the Hobbesian sense; Hobbes’ sovereign had juridical and coercive supremacy over subjects while the international hegemon does not because, although in the modern age state sovereignty is no longer the fabulous beast it was once claimed to be, individual nations remain still independent with some (though much varied) capacity to resist a hegemon.  In other words, Kindleberger's hegemon can help to provide order through preponderance in economic, political and political capabilities whereas the Hobbesian sovereign, within their territory, enjoyed absolute authority.  So the problems can be seen as similar but the solutions differ, Hobbes describing a rigid hierarchy and Kindleberger a leadership that administers anarchy by making it “managed chaos”.

US National Debt: US$40 trillion by August 2026.

All the history and economic theory is of course of interest but of immediate concern is (1) whether a Kindleberger moment is to hand (protagonist and antagonist being the US and PRC) and (2) whether the consequences of soch a moment will be economic disruption (of unknown extent or duration) or armed conflict (of unknown extent or duration).  The world is in a most unusual situation in that although the US continues of operate as hegemon, debatably it shouldn’t be able to because of its US$40 trillion debt (about 123% of GDP (gross domestic product)) and other problems.  While it’s true US debt was nudging 120% immediately after World War II (1939-1945), the US position at that time (vis-à-vis the rest of the planet) was unique and the debt trend was downwards whereas now it’s upwards.  There are those who argue things have changed and the US$40 trillion number is no longer an expression of “debt” in the conventional sense of the word but merely a way of describing the “new” mechanism of managing the US money supply.  The notion the US Treasury could at any time mint a single US$40 trillion coin, add it to the balance sheet and declare a net-debt free status has been offered as one example of why “deficits don’t matter” and while not all accept that, just about the whole world is now dependent on the US sustaining the existing system with this ever-growing debt so, in the absence of another country (or “demi-country” such as the EU (European Union (1993)), the multi-national aggregation which evolved from the EEC (European Economic Community), the Zollverein formed in 1957)) able and willing to fulfil the role of hegemon, the world economy and the US remain engaged in what some fear is a kind of economic danse macabre and there seems no way to use the numbers to predict if it's a debt level of US$50, 75, or 100 trillion that risks triggering a crisis.

Presidents Xi (left) and Trump (right).  With sufficient (1) goodwill or (2) amorality, the art of the deal can be done.  With enough of the latter, the former may one day emerge.

Of course the ultimate wild card (others might prefer “joker”) is that Donald Trump (b 1946; POTUS 2017-2021 and since 2025) is in the White House and while his idiosyncratic methods of governance intrigue political junkies, so marvellously unpredictable are his actions that it’s hard to map onto the dynamics a well understood concept like the Kindleberger Moment.  At heart a CEO (chief executive officer) rather than a democrat operating within constitutional norms, it’s suspected that left to his own devices, Mr Trump would sit down at the map table with comrade Xi Jinping (b 1953; General Secretary of the CCP and paramount leader of the PRC (People's Republic of China) since 2012) and divide up their respective spheres of influence.  Like Mr Trump who wants as little as possible to do with the internal affairs of America’s suppliers and customers (ie other countries), Mr Xi has no wish to waste effort or resources on “pointless squabbles” and not since a couple of horse-traders like Winston Churchill (1875-1965; UK prime-minister 1940-1945 & 1951-1955) & comrade Stalin (1878-1953; Soviet leader 1924-1953), needing nothing more, than pencil, paper and limitless cynicism divided up the Balkans into bite-sized spheres have two great powers been headed by a pair as suited to “doing the art of the deal”.  Of course, for those in places like the “renegade province of Taiwan”, there would be a cost but as at was demonstrated at the Yalta Conference (February 1945), somebody “always has to pay the price” and that may be a better trap to spring than risking the jaws of a Kindleberger Trap.

Director

Director (pronounced dih-rek-ter or dahy-rek-ter)

(1) A person or thing that directs others or other things (Director of Engineering, Director of Sales etc).

(2) In corporate law, one of a group of persons chosen to control or govern the affairs of a company or corporation, usually as a member of a board of directors and sometimes also including executive functions.

(3) The person responsible for the interpretive aspects of a stage, film, or television production; the person who supervises the integration of all the elements, as acting, staging, lighting etc.

(4) In musical or other artistic productions (stage, art galleries, opera etc) one in charge of all artistic (and sometimes administrative) matters (in larger operations the roles sometimes specialized: sound director, script director etc).

(5) The manager or chief executive of certain schools, institutes, government bureaux etc.

(6) In military use, a mechanical or electronic device that continuously calculates firing data for use against an airplane or other moving target, configured usually graphically to display (in real-time) the targets of a weapons system.

(7) In chemistry, the common axis of symmetry of the molecules of a liquid crystal.

(8) In music, a synonym for conductor (US use, now less common).

(9) A counsellor, confessor, or spiritual guide (now less common).

1470-1480: The construct was direct(us) + -or.  A borrowing in the sense of “a guide” from the Anglo French directour & the French directeur the agent noun from the Latin dirigere (set straight, arrange; give a particular direction to) and its source, the Late Latin directorem, from the Latin dīrectus, the perfect passive participle of dīrigō (straighten, direct), the construct being dis- (asunder, in pieces, apart, in two) + regō (to direct, to guide, keep straight; make straight; rule), from the primitive Indo-European root reg (move in a straight line).  The -or suffix was from the Middle English -our, from the Old French -eor, from the Latin -ātor and reinforced by the Old French -or and its source, the Latin -tor & -tōrem.  It was used to create an agent noun, often from a verb, indicating a person or object (often machines or parts of them) that do the verb or part of speech with which they are formed.  In electrical engineering it has the specific use of being appended to the names of members of classes of components, especially those that have an extensive property name of the same root suffixed with -ance (eg to convey the sense that resistors possess resistance and inductors possess inductance).  The alternative spelling directour became rare in the late eighteenth century and is long obsolete.  Director, directorate & directorship are nouns, directing is a verb, directed is a verb & adjective, directorial is an adjective and directorially is an adverb; the noun plural is directors.  The feminine forms of the noun (directress & directrix) were always rare and are now thought extinct (and by some probably proscribed).

Lindsay Lohan with Spanish fashion designer Estrella Arch (b 1974), on the catwalk, Emanuel Ungaro's Spring-Summer show, Paris, October 2009.  Ms Lohan was employed as a creative director at the House, founded in 1965 by French fashion designer Emanuel Ungaro (1933–2019).

The noun director (corporate sense of “one of a number of persons having authority to manage the affairs of a company” was known as early as the 1630s; the theatrical sense of “the leader of a company of performers” dates from 1911 and it was from here the use was picked up by those in charge of the artistic or technical aspects of movie-making.  The noun directorship (condition or office of a director) has been in use since the 1720s, the adjective directorial known since 1770.  The noun directorate was used first in 1834 of “a body of directors” and may immediately have be used individually of the “office of a director” but this was certainly first documented in 1837.  Director is a word defined both by its history of use (film director, director of football etc) and law (company director) so although titles like supervisor, head, manager, leader, administrator, chief, boss etc certainly implies “one who directs”, they’re traditionally not used as direct synonyms because “director” is a “loaded word”.  It’s also modified as needed (art director, managing director, sub-director etc).

1967 Imperial Crown Coupe with "Mobile Director Package"; note the rearward facing front passenger seat.  

Although the brand had since the 1920s been used for some of Chrysler's more expensive lines, between 1955-1975, the corporation re-created Imperial as a separate, stand-alone division (albeit with some intra-corporate sharing of engines, transmissions and certain other components), the way Ford positioned Lincoln (GM's (General Motors) Cadillac then still with unique engines although much else was shared).  In the early years, the approach yielded some success (most notably with the dramatic 1957 models) but the separation didn’t survive the troubled decade of the 1970s (by which time the platform and body-shells were shared with the other divisions and much of the earlier distinctiveness had been surrendered); a couple of subsequent, half-heated, revivals proved abortive.

Bowing to economic reality, the Imperial in 1967-1968 had switched from the separate frame used since 1955 to the unitary construction of the full-sized ranges offered by other divisions but maintained a certain degree of difference by virtue of a unique body, albeit one with dimensions slightly reduced (not seen by all as a virtue at a time when things were again trending larger).  While styled with an elegance derived from its simplicity of line, the Imperial continued to not quite match the timeless modernity of the Lincoln or the indefinable but incomparable allure of the Cadillac and although sales did improve in 1967, volumes were only ever a fraction of its two competitors.  The basic engineering though was sound, the TorqueFlite 727 transmission as responsive and robust as any (although it didn’t quite slur as effortlessly between ratios as the Cadillac’s TH400 Turbo-Hydramatic 400) while the 440 cubic inch (7.2 litre) V8 was a notch better, something the others wouldn’t match until 1968.  Significantly, reviewers at the time often were prepared to acknowledge the Imperial was the more capable road car although, given it operated in a market where quietness and isolation from the environment were afforded more of a premium than handling prowess, among potential buyers, any perception of real-world advantage probably was marginal.

The more stylish if less roadable opposition: 1967 Cadillac Coupe DeVille (left) & 1967 Lincoln Continental Coupe (right).

In those years however, the Imperial did offer something truly unique.  The “Mobile Director Package” was available exclusively on the Imperial Crown Coupe and reflected (within the limits of what the available technology would then permit) what Chrysler thought a company director would most value in an automobile being used as a kind of “office on the move”, including (1) an extendable walnut-topped table (secured to the floor by a stainless-steel stanchion) able to be unfolded over the rear seats, (2) a Tensor high-intensity lamp with a gooseneck mount enabling the light to be directed anywhere in the cabin and, most intriguingly (3) a front passenger seat mounted on swivelling base enabling it to rotate 180°, the apparatus permitting someone comfortably to use the table and interact with those in the rear.  Conveniently, in a sign of the times, the car was supplied with four cigarette lighters and the lamp could be plugged into whichever was closest to need.  The package was available only for those two seasons and in its first years cost US$597.40 (some US$6,000 adjusted for 2026 values) but only 81 buyers ticked the option box and even reducing the price the next season to US$317.60 did little to stimulate demand; only 70 ordered as a dismal swansong.  Even if the threat of new safety regulations hadn’t been looming, it’s doubtful the Mobile Director Package would have appeared on the option list for 1969 when the new “fuselage” Imperials debuted.

Imperial's advertising always emphasised the "business" aspect of the package but the corporation also circulated a photograph of the table supporting a (presumably magnetic) chessboard and another with silver compote holding a shiny red apple and a bunch of grapes, dangling seductively.  The latter may have been to suggest the utility of the package when stopping for a picnic with one's secretary; at an advertising agency, once someone suggested using the motif of "forbidden fruit", nobody would have been able to resist.

The advertising copy at the time claimed the package was “designed for the busy executive who must continue his work while he travels”, serving also as “an informal conference lounge”.  The Imperial was a big car (previous generations had been larger still) though “lounge” was a bit of a stretch but “truth in advertising” laws were then not quite as onerous as they would become.  More accurate were the engineering details, the table able to “pivot to any of four different positions, supported by a sturdy chrome-plated pillar and in the forward position, it can convert into a padded armrest between the two front seats while extended, it opens out to twice its original size with a lever on the table swivel support to permit adjustments to the height”.  It was noted “a special tool is used for removing the table and storing it in the trunk” the unstated implication presumably that in deference to the secretary’s finger-nails, that would be a task for one’s chauffeur.  The US$597.40 the option listed at in 1967 needs to be compared with the others available and only the most elaborate of the two AC (air conditioning) systems was more expensive.

Imperial option list, 1967.

1967 Imperial Crown Coupe with Mobile Director Package.  Note seatbelt mounting point.

The publicity material associated with the Mobile Director Package did suggest the rearward-facing seat would likely be occupied by a director’s secretary and, as one might imagine, the configuration did preclude her (in 1967, secretaries almost always were women) using a seatbelt but she would always have been in arm’s reach of at least one cigarette lighter so there was that.  The (male) end of the front seatbelts sat on the sill panel, adjacent to the seat’s squab (back), a placement dictated by the need not to restrict access to the rear-compartment and that worked well for the standard coupe but, obviously, rendered the belt useless when the seat was rotated.  While Chrysler can be criticized for not providing rearward-facing secretaries with what’s now regarded as an essential safety feature, the rest of the US industry and legislatures (federal & state) were in 1967 little less cavalier.  While some state registration authorities had during the decade mandated the provision of seatbelts for front-seat passengers, no US jurisdiction then compelled their use.

The familiar modern three-point (lap & sash) seatbelt evolved in the late 1950s with much input from US designers but it was Swedish manufacturers that first made them universal (Scandinavia being often dark and icy, drivers sharing the roads with large elk).  The modern seatbelt design (conceptually unchanged to this day) is credited to Swedish mechanical engineer Nils Bohlin (1920–2002) who was employed by Volvo, the company making them a standard fitting in 1959, following the example of Saab that had added them the previous year.  During the 1960s, US states gradually imposed a requirement they be fitted until federal law mandated they be installed in all passenger vehicles produced after 1 January, 1968.  The laws requiring people actually to use the things proved more difficult to implement but other countries quickly made both fitment and use compulsory, initially only for those seated in the front but eventually this extended to all passengers.  Although examples existed early in the twentieth century (fitted often by those with experience in aviation) rudimentary seatbelts first appeared in US production cars during the 1950s but the manufacturers must have thought the public indifferent because their few gestures were tentative such as in 1956 when Ford had offered (as an extra-cost option) a bundle of safety features called the “Lifeguard Design” package that included:

(1) Padded dashboards (to reduce head injuries).

(2) Recessed steering wheel hub (to minimize chest injuries).

(3) Seat belts (front lap belts only)

(4) Stronger door latches (preventing doors flying open in a crash)

(5) Shatter-resistant rear-view mirror (reducing injuries caused by from broken glass).

In Western popular culture and advertising, there have been many friendly bears, including this one happily buckled-up with a “Ford seat belt. One third stronger than required for airliners.”

The standard features included (1) the Safety-Swivel Rear View Mirror, (2) the Deep-Center Steering Wheel with recessed post and bend-away spokes and (3) Double-Grip Door Latches with interlocking striker plate overlaps.  Optional at additional cost were (4) Seat Belts (single kit, front or rear, color-keyed, nylon-rayon with quick one-handed adjust/release aluminium buckle) (US$5).  There were also "bundles" (always popular in Detroit), “Safety Package A” consisting of a Padded Instrument Panel & Padded Sun Visors (US$18) while “Safety Package B” added to that Front-Seat Lap Seat Belts (US$27).  On the 1956 Thunderbird (with a significantly different interior design) the options were (1) the Lifeguard Padded Instrument Panel (US$22.65), (2) Lifeguard Padded Sun Visors (US$9) and (3) Lifeguard Seat Belts (US$14).

Years later, internal documents would be discovered revealing conflicts within the corporation, the marketing department opposed to any mention of "safety features" because that reminded potential customers of car crashes; they would prefer they focus on new colors, higher power outputs, sleek new lines and such.  So, with not much done to promote the “Lifeguard Design”, public demand was subdued and soon the option quietly was deleted.  At the time, apart from improving the quality of roads (resulting in higher average speeds with obvious implications) the government had done little about either safety or vehicle emissions but both the rising highway death toll and the worsening air quality in cities was attracting attention, meaning things would change, decades of legislation soon to unfold.  The first decisive step came as a provision in FMVSS 208 (Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard No. 208) requiring all passenger cars manufactured from 1 January, 1968 onward be equipped with seatbelts at the designated seating positions though this was a federal manufacturing requirement, not a law requiring motorists to buckle up, something not imposed until 1984 when New York made their use mandatory, other states following the lead.

FMVSS emerged from the US NHSB (National Highway Safety Bureau (that in 1970 became the NHTSA (National Highway Traffic Safety Administration) under the newly created DOT (Department of Transportation), established by an act of Congress on 15 October, 1966 and beginning operation on 1 April, 1967).  That alphabet soup of activity in a field previously little explored by government came in the wake of the publication of Ralph Nader’s (b 1934) book Unsafe at any Speed (1965) documenting the flaws in the design and construction of US automobiles and industry’s indifference to the consequences.  Regulation ever since has been a growing industry, something emblematic of a theme in Western political culture since the end of World War II (1939-1945): The erosion of personal freedom in exchange for perceived (or dictated) benefits (in the case of the FMVSS, safer cars; other agencies gave us cleaner air).  All of this is fought out in various fora (legislatures, the streets, social media, Fox News etc); sometimes the state giveth, sometimes the state taketh away.

The profound recent shift in this mechanism is not the process but the participants: As “big tech” became dominant, that collective gave much to consumers who benefited from what appeared substantially to be “free” while surrendering much that was once by philosophers and political scientists thought precious but which clearly is regarded by many as an abstraction, the loss of which is a price worth paying for TikTok, Instagram, generative AI (artificial intelligence) and such.  In that, big tech’s model is essentially the same as that of the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) and that seems to have worked well so we should imagine, as the twenty-first century unfolds, we’ll get “more of the same”.  In political theory, what the social contract theorists at big tech are doing is right because we all have clicked on the boxes agreeing to their 30-plus pages of terms and conditions and have certified we have read and understood every clause.  The political process handling this societal overlay is neither static nor lineal; structurally it follows much the same pattern as earlier contests between power and individuals: As governments react to pressure groups by seeking to curb the worst of the consequences, fixes, work-arounds and obfuscations will interact with a flow of money into the coffers of governments, parties (and, now and again, pockets) in a way that will permit most of what big tech plans to do while giving the appearance things are being done to stop them doing at least some of what many people think they should stop doing.  To anyone who remembers the maneuvers and compromises that for more than a decade would flow around the best-laid plans of the NHTSA, it will all be familiar.

1968 Imperial Crown Coupe with Mobile Director Package.  The seatbelt (lap only) was now attached directly to the frame.

Imperial’s designers were compelled by the law to be more imaginative than most.  For the swivelling front seat in the 1968 cars, the seatbelt mounting points were integrated directly into the steel frame of the seat base itself, rather than the vehicle's floor pan.  To achieve the necessary strength, (using techniques borrowed from the seats in airliners), the engineers had both inboard and outboard lap-belt ends bolt directly to reinforced anchor points on the lower structural framing of the seat.  This made seat, mechanism and belts wholly self-contained (a la a military aircraft’s ejector-seat!) and permitted the 180^o swivel effect, belts rotating seamlessly with passenger.  Chrysler did however obtain from the authorities a partial-exemption.  While FMVSS 208 required front-seat shoulder belts, that would have been difficult to implement for the swivelling seat (not impossible because ejector-seats have frame-mounted shoulder-belts) so the restraint system was limited to the two-point lap-belt (admittedly an improvement over what she'd been provided in 1967: nothing).  Secretaries on the move presumably were grateful but the safety feature didn’t see sales improve, despite the slashing of the price.

1966 Chrysler 300X show car.

In 1966, the “swivelling seat thing” must have been exerting a powerful influence in Chrysler’s design offices because also shown that year was the 300X, based on a 300 Convertible (and despite the appended letter, a vehicle not in the tradition of the just-retired “letter series” 300s (1955-1965), the “X” believed a reference to eXperimental) and although mechanically unchanged, the cockpit was packed with “futuristic” ideas, some of which did eventually enter mainstream use (although the swivelling front seat remained one of history’s unwanted orphans).  Rather than a conventional steering wheel, the driver used handgrips and the “steering unit” included button controls for lights, wipers, turn signals, and door locks, enabling use of all functions with a finger or thumb, all the while keeping a both hands on the mechanism.  Door handles were replaced by a keypunch card used also for the ignition while a truck-lid mounted TV camera and monitor on the dashboard replaced the rear-view mirrors.  Rear-seat passengers (and the front-occupant when “swivelled”) were able to enjoy watching a small television, mounted on a bracket allowing it to be stowed away when not in use. Construction of the 300X was out-sourced to the prolific customizer and fabricator Roger Winfield (1927–2025) whose creations became well-known from their appearances in film and television including Blade Runner (1982) and Get Smart (1965-1970).  The 1965 Sunbeam “Tiger” be built for Get Smart was actually a visually almost identical Sunbeam Alpine, chosen because its compactfour-cylinder engine left sufficient under-hood space for the “special accessories” (including a retractable machine-gun) whereas the Tiger’s Ford V8 filled the space to the brim.  To solve the “aural deficit”, the distinctive burble of a Tiger’s V8 was added during the editing process.

1969 Ford Aurora II Concept Car.

The most obvious thing that might puzzle those first seeing the Mobile Director Package is why it was available only in a two-door model when four-door coachwork would seem to make the configuration more obviously functional.  Had Imperial in 1967 sold several thousand of the things it’s at least possible Chrysler would for 1968 (or even mid-way through 1967) had extended availability but that would have been a more demanding process than it may appear, the existing swivelling mechanism unable to be used.  The difficulty was the four-door models (both sedan and hardtop) had respectively a full or partial B-pillar, the latter ending at the belt-line where the greenhouse begins, the structure required to provide a secure anchor point for the rear door's hinges.  The coupes used doors longer than front units on the four-door models, meaning the B-pillar sat further forward than the trailing-edge of the coupe’s door; there was thus a sufficient aperture for the seat to rotate when the coupe’s door was open but the gap would have been too narrow on the four-door cars.  So to offer the package in the four-door body it would have been a matter either of re-designing the doors or the swivelling seat and while the former would have been an expensive exercise (prohibitively so if the only justification was to accommodate a low-volume option), the seat and its base could have been re-engineered but after finding only 81 buyers in 1967 and 70 the next season, investment would have been hard to justify.

1960 Facel Vega Excellence EX1 (left) and 1959 Lancia Appia Series III (right).  Facel Vega produced France's finest cars of the post-war era but while undeniably glamourous, the flaws in the design of the Excellence's door-latches were never resolved and by the time the factory was shuttered in 1964, total Excellence production stood at 148 EX1s (Series One; 1958-1961) & 8 EX2s (Series Two; 1961-1964).  Lancia perfected pillar-free body engineering, using doors with sturdy window frames, permitting latch points at both sill and roof, the configuration offered on a number of sedans including the Ardea (1939-1953), Aurelia (1950-1958) & Appia (1953-1963).  The locking mechanism was intricate but the engineering was simple and proved reliable.  It's sad the company's later attachment to FWD (front wheel drive) ultimately doomed Lancia because in every other aspect of engineering, few others were as adept at producing such fine small-displacement vehicles.

1969 Ford Aurora II Concept Car.

Ford's 1969 Aurora II Concept Car gave an indication of quite what what would have been required to make the Mobile Director Package conveniently functional on the platform of what was then the standard "full-size" four-door US automobile.  The "wrap-around" rear seat was an idea borrowed from the Ford Thunderbird, contemporary reviewers praising the visual impact but noting that as something for humans to sit on it was less comfortable than a conventional design; in the Aurora it probably worked better and certainly lent the cabin the desired "lounge-room" vibe.  The problem of providing (1) space for the seat to swivel and (2) allowing elegant ingress & egress was of course afforded by the the four doors (in "suicide" configuration) and elimination of the B-pillar.  That combination provided unprecedented ease of accessibility but its doubtful it could successfully have been implemented in series-production.  The French concern had earlier tried the approach with their Excellence model but, despite retaining a vestigial hump where a B-pillar would have attached to the sill, the company never solved the problem of the door-locking apparatus "springing open" while the car was in motion, usually when the mechanism was subject to lateral forces such as when cornering.  Because these forces could be exerted at high-speed, having doors suddenly "flying open" was an obvious safety concern.  Lancia in the 1950s solved the problem of doing without a fixed central pillar buy using doors with conventional, full-height frames, thereby enabling locking mechanisms to be fitted top & bottom.  Curiously, the Aurora was based on the LTD Country Squire that came only with fully-framed doors so Lancia's approach could have been adopted but there's no indication Ford ever contemplated series-production, the "concept car" created just to generate interest on the show circuit.

1967 Imperial Crown Convertible (with subsequently added Mobile Director package).

Imperial over two seasons might have managed to sell only 151 of the Mobile Director packages but one owner of a 1967 Crown Convertible was so smitten they cannibalized a coupe to create a unique (if wholly fake) "convertible Mobile Director".  Exactly emulating what the factory did would not have been as simple as it may appear because the floor under the passengers swivelling seat needed to be strengthened with additional bracing and a "baffle" was welded to the transmission tunnel where the table's stainless-steel stanchion was attached (off-set to the driver's side to avoid the drive-shaft).  Although apparently as significantly pointless as the original, it's a novelty that would attract interest at events like "cars & coffee" and may even be more functional in that it would seem an ideal place comfortably to sit and enjoy one's picnic while watching something like polo (on the model of the way the Country Life set re-purpose the tailgates on their Range Rovers).  That said, had the factory in 1967-1968 made the package available on the convertible, almost certainly it would have been just as unsuccessful as the coupe. 

Stewart-Warner's desk-based DataFax (circa 1958).  The process of miniaturization in electronics was by 1966 still embryonic but enough shrinkage had been attained to make a fax fit in Imperial's show car.  Unlike fax machines, the pencil skirt never goes out of style.

The specification of Chrysler's package as it appeared in showrooms for the 1967 season was actually modest compared with the “Mobile Executive” car the corporation sent around the show circuit a year earlier; that Imperial had been fitted with a telephone, Dictaphone, writing table, fax machine, reading lamp and stereophonic sound system; a typewriter and portable television also used in many displays although neither were "fitted".  Also a Crown Coupe, the 1966 show car was much more ambitious, anticipating advances in mobile communications that would emerge over the next quarter-century.  At the time, car phones were available (the first service in the US offered in certain cities in 1946) but they were expensive and the nature of the bandwidth, combined with a lack of data compression, meant the range was limited as was capacity, only several dozen calls able simultaneously to be sustained.  In the 1966 car, there had even been the novelty of a Stewart-Warner Datafax, able to send or receive a US Letter-sized (slightly smaller than A4) page of text in six minutes.  That sounds unimpressive in the 2020s (or compared even with the 14.4 kbit/s for Group 3 FaxStream services of the 1990s) but the appropriate comparison is with the contemporary alternatives (driving, walking, a courier, or using the US Mail) and six minutes would have been a considerable advance.  While more expensive than a stamp and envelope, for the target market the costs would anyway have been a legitimate business expense and thus "a deductible".  As it was, the tempting equipment awaited improvements in infrastructure such as the analogue networks of the 1980s and later cellular roll-outs, these technologies contributing to an extent of use delivering economies of scale that eventually would make possible the smartphone.

The 1966 car that toured the show circuit demonstrated the concept which, in simplified form, would the next year appear on the option list but things like telephones and fax machines anticipated the future by many years (although fax machines in cars (Audi and Toyota among the handful to offer them) never became a thing).  The Dictaphone did however make the list as one of Chrysler's RPOs (regular production options) in the early 1970s and the take-up rate was surprisingly high although the fad quickly passed, dealers reporting the customers saying the hardware worked well but they "never used them".  In the collector community, a surviving Dictaphone in something like a Plymouth 'Cuda is a minor attraction; while not increasing value as would something like and original Hemi V8, it is a legitimate "period piece".

Glovebox-mounted fax machine in 1995 Toyota Celsior (the JDM (Japanese Domestic Market) Lexus LS).

The problem with the scaled-down Datafax was even had it been possible to produce the things at a manageable cost, in 1966 the solid-state electronics that would have made the thing reliable when subject to constant vibration and jolts were still years away (Chrysler’s Bendix “Electrojector” fuel injection in 1958 had fewer moving parts and that didn’t end well).  However, even if reliability could have been "engineered in", there is no guarantee demand would have existed whatever the price-point.  In the 1990s, despite it being installed with Toyota’s typical neatness and attention to detail, there were few buyers for the "fax machine in the glovebox" and if the notion was going to catch on anywhere, it would have been in that nation of early adopters.  While there were many features in the 1966 300X truly that were "ahead of their time", the Mobile Direct Package was a genuine cul-de-sac, at least as implemented in a conventionally sized car (and certainly a two-door coupe).  In 1966, rearward-facing seats had for some years been seen in the "vis-à-vis" arrangement used in some LWB (long wheelbase) limousines and as child-seats in the rear-most compartments of station wagons but those seats had been either fixed or folding and although the Ford Aurora II presumably dazzled a few impressionable souls, the industry showed little inclination to follow Chrysler's swivelling lead.

2021 "Maybach-Look" Mercedes-Benz Metris.  The passenger compartment is a similar configuration as the 1966-1967 Imperials (two forward facing seats, two rearward ("fold-away" rather than swivelling)) and there were folding tables as well as features unimaginable in the 1960s (seat massage, starlight-pattern headliner, flatscreen TV, internet connectivity, touchscreen infotainment system and a Burmester sound system with subwoofers).  Unfortunately, a fax machine wasn't part of the build but by 2021, they were close to extinct even in bricks & mortar offices.   

Flawed though Chrysler's implementation in 1966-1967 may have been, in the twenty-first century, production-line economics made it possible to realise the concept's implications, "big-box" vans able to be outfitted as genuinely functional mobile offices from which communication can be maintained with just about any part of the planet.  Of course, based on the same body used by plumbers, Amazon delivery drivers and such, the Metris doesn't have quite the gravitas of the Mercedes-Benz 600 Grossers of old (it's debatable whether the faux "Maybach-Look" stuff makes things better or worse) but there's more interior space and room for a big-screen TV so it's all a matter of what one wants from life.  Noting that, some operations have fitted-out interiors as offices or luxury transports which eschewing the exterior bling, some (often wisely) preferring to travel as inconspicuously as possible.