What is deconstruction?
The late investing legend Chandrakantbhai Sampat, who I remember and whose presence I miss, used to always talk about philosopher Jacques Derrida’s deconstruction theory. I’m going to try to explain this in absolutely simple language. If you have ever listened to someone explain a book, a movie or even a magazine article and you wanted to interrupt and say that you had seen something that contradicts what he or she were saying, then you have practiced deconstruction. I’m using the term here as a philosopher and not as a systems engineer, who would define deconstruction as breaking down a larger system into its modules. The philosophical interpretation is that the world is understood in terms of binary oppositions, one element of which is generally suppressed. Deconstruction is central to good investing.