Dancing With Giants: China, India, And the Global Economy

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China is now the world's fourth largest economy and growing very fast. India's economic salience is also on the rise. Together these two countries will profoundly influence the pace and nature of global economic change. Drawing upon the latest research, this volume analyzes the influences on the rapid future development of these two countries and examines how their growth is likely to impinge upon other countries. It considers international trade, industrialization, foreign investment and capital flows, and the implications of their broadening environmental footprints. It also discusses how the two countries have tackled poverty, inequality and governance issues and whether progress in these areas will be a key to rapid and stable growth.

Customer Reviews:

From the perspective of one of the Giants.............2007-05-20

This is a report by the World bank (and a think tank) to study the impact of the growth of China and India on other countries in the World.

Provides a good insight into the China and India story:

(a) Sorry, China and India are not Giants. Though they house 38% of world population they account for 6.4% of World GDP (yes, purchasing power parity is not useful in evaluating your impact on other countries since size of trade and exchange rates are more important than price levels).

(b) Sorry, this will not change even after sustained growth in the next decade. India would grow from being 1.7% of World economy to 2.4% in 2020 (okay, 3.2% if you are optimistic). China would grow from 4.7% now to 7.9%.

(c) Sorry, India is not a dominant player in providing services to the world. India's export of services is just 1.8% of global trade in services.

(d) Sorry, IT just accounts for 6% of India's service revenue. Nope, it is a myth to believe growth in IT sector would transform Indian economy. It did not. It may not.

(e) Nope, energy economists don't need to worry. India accounts for just 3.4% of global oil usage. In the next ten years any hike in oil price is more likely to come from supply side hitches than from increased demand for oil in India or China.

(f) Nope, US current account deficit is not due to China's import barriers or an undervalued currency. US is just not saving enough.

(g) Nope, China and India are not competing head on for their products. The top 25 exports of China and India have only one product in common! (Yes sire, refined petroleum).

(h) Nope, Dhirubhai Ambani alone is not enough to reform our textiles industry. Our textile exports is $ 10 billion a year. Wal Mart alone buys $ 18 billion textiles from China. Did you know one major impediment is the delivery time from India to US? Yes, 24 days!

(In passing, the economists say that the movie industry in India is not known to produce world class movies; though one did come recently: "Bend it like Beckham"! Apologies Mani Ratnam, economists do not know as much about movies as about GDP!)

Have we handled our economy well? We made some mistakes in the way we managed our economy.

(a) We started with one major disadvantage. Inequality.

(b) Economic growth is rarely balanced. It often results in enhancing inequality.

(c) There are good inequalities (differences in income and wealth because some earned more than others) and bad inequalities (lack of access to education or credit to pursue an economic activity). Good inequalities are necessary to maintain incentive for growth. Bad inequalities prevent people from escaping poverty.

(d) We got our philosophies mixed up. Instead of attempting to eliminate bad inequalities by providing access to opportunities for the poor, we went after good inequalities by suppressing incentive for economic growth.

(e) We restrained firms from freely pursuing economic activity (by reserving several activities for the State or for small enterprises and by introducing a license raj that required government permission to start or expand a business).

(f) We prevented efficient allocation of resources (by protective trade policy that perpetuated advantage to existing players, by a directional tax policy, by state control of all funding and by restrictive labor laws).

(g) On the other hand, we did not provide access to education or market driven micro finance delivery to the poor to acquire human capital to escape poverty.

(h) End result: We did not grow enough; but the inequality went up. The poor did not benefit from economic growth at all.

(i) Since our political system depended on popular support, political administrations "blamed" a variety of targets (businessmen, upper caste, land holders, foreign hands) for the failure to eradicate poverty and used the resultant "popular anger" to consolidate their power base.

(j) Thank God we had a crisis in 1991. Debt service rose to 21% of receipts. Interest burden rose to 20% of expenditure. We ran out of spendable currency. No one was willing to lend.

(k) Prime Minister Narasimha Rao went beyond curing the immediate disease. Rao government cut back industries reserved for State; removed licensing requirements; devalued rupee; allowed current account convertibility; removed quotas and reduced tariffs; and lifted restrictions on foreign investment.

(l) Fortunately the reform process, despite vigorous debate, has developed sufficient consensus to stay on track in succeeding administrations.

(m) We have some more miles to go:

(1) We need to provide access to education and credit to facilitate people escape poverty. Spending money on rural infrastructure alone will not kill "bad inequality". If this is not done, India would continue to be a miracle of "jobless growth" and political consensus for reform would evaporate diluting growth prospects. Equality is not just a nice thing to do; it is essential for going after growth.

(2) We need to get "government" out of "business" even more. Subsidies will have to reduce. Buredensome state enterprises cannot be funded by public expenditure. Bad loans in banks will have to reduce. Regulatory rigidity in labor market will have to reduce.

(3) We need to step up "governance". We need to step up government effectiveness and bureaucracy quality.

(4) We need to manage our "balance sheet" well. We cannot be an economy whose liabilities are in "high cost equity" (FDI and portfolio investments) and whose assets are in "low yield reserves". This asymmetry is expensive.

China has one advantage over us. An early start. China has built a strong manufacturing base with an eye on the global market (40% of its GDP is from exports vs 15% for us). However, in the end, China has one disadvantage. In China the State is determining who will pursue economic activity and who will not by its "hukou" system (license to live in special zones) and "TVE system" (town and village enterprise owned by local governments with limited authority to retain and reinvest super profits). This was useful in creating "private firms" in a socialist economy.

However, this past success is going to be a millstone for China in the future. A very large population got left out in the growth process (though inequality is not as sharp as in India because the inequality in landholding prevented growth in agriculture from reducing inequality in India). Building political consensus to the reform process is going to be even toughter in China when the ability of the government to maintain control over the population reduces. This may hamper growth.

India has a higher chance of sustaining and growing political consensus for reforms because it has developed mechanisms to let differing voices debate vigorously before building consensus. The pace is slow but the traction is firm.

It is nice to think that Left leaders Prakash Karat and Sitaram Yechury, with their wisdom and ability to disagree, may help India build the consensus on a firmer track and perform better than China!

Taiwan's Modernization in Global Perspective

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Taiwan's Modernization in Global Perspective

Manufacturer: Praeger Publishers
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Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0275970809

Book Description

In five decades, Taiwan has shifted from an authoritarian regime to a multi-party democracy, has moved steadily toward modernization, and has become an economically affluent, socially pluralistic society. Its experience provides valuable lessons for developing countries. This book offers a critical assessment of Taiwan's path to modernization, focusing particularly on developments of constitutional democracy and the rule of law, democratic transition and consolidation, internationalization and globalization, and social developments. From its market economy to its democratization, Taiwan provides a valuable case study. On social developments, it provides a unique model of demographic transition, rising women's social status, and the emergence of the nuclear family. In eighteen chapters written by prominent scholars, this book examines the multiple aspects of Taiwan's modernization in a global perspective.

The Trouble With Capitalism: An Enquiry into the Causes of Global Economic Failure

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Is Free Market Capitalism the Only Game in Town??
Can capitalism be fixed?
A challenge to contemporary laissez faire economists

The Trouble With Capitalism: An Enquiry into the Causes of Global Economic Failure
Harry Shutt
Manufacturer: Zed Books
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The Decline of Capitalism: Can the Self-Regulated Profits System Survive?

ASIN: 1856495663

Book Description

We have grown accustomed to the notions of the end of history and that the current variant of free market capitalism is the only game in town. But how sound are the foundations of the global economy? The remarkable analysis contained in this book forsakes the shibboleths of both the Left and liberal economists to examine the actual behavior--patterns and tendencies--of economic institutions in the OECD countries of the 1980s and 90s. The conclusions are disturbing. The author uncovers profound sources of instability. Low growth has become endemic. There is a chronic surplus of capital. New technology is not solving either of these problems or structural unemployment. Meanwhile, the pursuit of neo-liberal economic orthodoxy by an emasculated state has only worsened the situation and the evidence of social dislocation is all about us. This is a book that must be read by every politician and thinking citizen still harboring illusions about the capacity of mere shifts in policy to return us to the golden era of the Sixties when high growth and full employment were the norm.

Customer Reviews:

Is Free Market Capitalism the Only Game in Town??.......2004-08-18

+++++

The objective of this book, by economist and economic consultant Harry Shutt, is "to expose the realities of the...evolution of the global capitalist economy, and thereby to dispel the illusions which lie behind the neo-laissez-faire prospectus [a policy that states the economy works best with no governmental regulation or control]." Shutt does not take random potshots at the capitalist system but instead uses a historical approach with regard to the origin of capitalism in order to identify problems with the present system. As well, this book "attempts to bring together different fields of economic analysis (such as the impact of technological change, the evolution of financial markets, and Third World development) which are all too often considered in isolation from each other."

This book also "steps beyond the confines of economics to consider [other factors such as] the cultural, ethical, and geopolitical ramifications of...capitalist development." In other words, this book considers the human side of capitalistic economics and does not only concentrate on economic principles and market forces. Too often books on economics (especially basic economic books) concentrate only on economic principles without even considering the human element. The result is that everything appears well on a theoretical economic basis but the majority of people who have to survive in a particular economy are having difficulty.

Before jumping into the main thrust of the book, there is an introduction that caught my eye immediately. Here, Shutt mentions three reasons as to why the claims that the capitalistic free market system is the best may not be true despite what "official propaganda" and rhetoric tells us. He ends his introduction with this startling statement:

"As failure to resolve the world's profound economic distortions gives rise to more and more symptoms of social breakdown and civil strife in every continent, the need to focus wider public attention on their causes and effects has never been more pressing."

Shutt's journey on the origin of capitalism takes the reader to such highlights as the Industrial Revolution, the span from the 1920's economic boom and the 1930's Depression, World War Two, the postwar years, and the Soviet collapse. It ends in the present.

The majority of this book becomes an analysis of how bad things have become thanks to such things as capitalist profit maximizing; globalization; privatization; deregulation; leverage buyouts; hostile takeover mergers; monetarism (theory which holds that economic stability and growth result from maintaining a steady rate of growth in the supply of money); "creative" accounting; redundant excess capital; fraud; corruption; organized crime; and the biggest problem of them all -- sluggish economic growth.

The last chapter of this book is the best. It reveals the author's profound main conclusion: the maximization of profit will cease to be the main basis of allocating resources.

What I found interesting about this book since it was published in 1998 is that many of the problems it discusses have increased. In fact, a few new ones have been added.

Included in this book are a few tables and graphs to aid in the analysis. At the end of each chapter are (foot)notes and references.

There are three problems I found with this book:

First, there is no glossary. Economic terms are presented but not defined. Thus, a glossary would have been of great value.

Second, chapters three to ten in this fourteen chapter book are discussed in an overly scholarly manner requiring one to have an above-average vocabulary. I managed to get through these chapters but some readers may find these chapters tedious. However, chapters one, two, and eleven to fourteen are relatively easy to comprehend.

Lastly, the author gives the impression that the capitalist system is on a continual decline leading to a major breakdown. Perhaps this will occur but Shutt gives no account of the resilience of the capitalistic economic system. For example, crises often lead to reforms that strengthen the system.

In conclusion, this book gives a fairly good account of the problems that need to be fixed in the global capitalistic economic system. In other words, it shows that all is not well with this system!!

(published 1998; about the author; acknowledgements; introduction; 14 chapters; main narrative of 230 pages; tables and graphs; references; index.)

+++++

Can capitalism be fixed?.......2002-12-20

This book has pierced the hubris of laizze-faire thought so common amongst the current economic pundits. It is a clear evaluation of the limits of capitalism and its failure in light of the human notion of an expanding economy. It should be read with an analytical attitude and should not be prejudged solely because of the title. It elucidates "the trouble with Capitalism" and why it will continue to spawn the normal up and down cycles. It presents clear examples of how political expediency, practiced by most OECD governments in their quest to appear as defenders of the public good, continues to play into the hands of private investment seeking contined increases in returns at the expense of real value. If you have ever wondered why taxes continue to rise, this book will explain how the public purse has become the corporate trough for ever increasing returns. He gives some interesting solutions of how the future could unfold if society can refocus its prioities and look to the "real" public good. A good read for any student of economic thought. The quote attributed to Marx that "the trouble with capitalism is that it eats its young" may come to mind after reading this book.

A challenge to contemporary laissez faire economists.......2001-10-21

Harry Shutt makes a strong case that private for-profit capitalism is nearing the end of its useful lifespan. He argues that capitalism's crisis is marked by an oversupply of capital desperately seeking investment opportunities in a world possessing a limited supply of secure, profit-producing activities.

The author has written an unique and insightful economic history of the post-WW II world, tracing many contemporary problems back to their root causes and exposing official explanations as propaganda. For example, the privatization of state assets has been aggressively promoted principally because they provide new homes for investment dollars -- not necessarilly because the private sector can more efficiently run these enterprises (which in fact they often can not).

Shutt suggests that the industrial economies have created an untenable situation for themselves. Public debt has been increased in order to prop up asset values (witness the Savings and Loan bank bail-out in the U.S. and other corporate welfare policies), making it difficult for governments to invest in either their own infrastructures or third world governments. This means that the world economy can not grow at a fast enough pace to satisfy the needs of private capital. Eventually, the oversupply of capital will lead to a crash in asset values.

Events that have occurred after the book's publication suggest that the author was on the mark. The Internet stock investment mania and its subsequent collapse illustrates how desperately capital latches onto any opportunity that might promise above-average profits, however risky it may actually be.

Shutt finishes the book with an outline of what the world might look like following a crash of the present system. The author suggests that an institution such as the European Union (or more precisely, an expanded and modified version of the E.U.) could be used to manage a more just and equitable system: namely one that balances the needs of labor, environment and capital, with primacy given to local, sustainable business enterprises that are fully accountable to the public.

This is a highly readable and stimulating book. Anyone with an interest in contemporary political economy should enjoy it.

Dictating Development: How Europe Shaped the Global Periphery
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Useful study of the effects of colonialism

Dictating Development: How Europe Shaped the Global Periphery
Jonathan Krieckhaus
Manufacturer: University of Pittsburgh Press
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Binding: Paperback

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States, Scarcity, and Civil Strife in the Developing World

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ASIN: 0822959143

Book Description

Dictating Development presents a powerful and original analysis of how colonialism has profoundly impacted the varying economic growth of developing nations. While previous studies have focused primarily on the domestic neoliberal policies of government and the political capacity of developing states, Dictating Development argues that economic growth is equally influenced (positively and negatively) by colonial powers. Jonathan Krieckhaus examines both historic colonial influences (on human capital and state structures) as well as contemporary ones (war, market access, and foreign aid). Based on an in-depth study of the regionally diverse nations of Mozambique, Korea, and Brazil, and a statistical analysis of growth in ninety-one countries from 1960 to 2000, Krieckhaus effectively demonstrates that most seemingly domestic political variables are in fact the byproduct of relationships with colonial powers. While not denying the role of neoliberalism as an important factor in development, Dictating Development reveals the roots of these policies: how colonialism influences the very nature of government and societal productivity.

Customer Reviews:

Useful study of the effects of colonialism.......2006-08-07

In this brilliantly original book, Jonathan Krieckhaus, assistant professor of political science at the University of Missouri-Columbia, contends that international factors, like colonialism, wars, market shocks and aid, have huge economic impact. He presents both a statistical analysis of growth from 1960 to 2000 in 91 countries and detailed case studies of Mozambique, South Korea and Brazil.

He shows why policy-centred accounts of economic growth like neo-liberalism are inadequate. He explains, "most economic policies are not robustly correlated with growth in statistical models ... they are less important than initial conditions in determining economic growth."

Krieckhaus sums up colonialism's impact, "a small handful of countries avoided European colonialism, and were hence left free to imitate the European model without suffering European exploitation. Though rarely noted, this was by far the most effective route to economic success over the last forty years. Of the five countries that enjoyed the most rapid economic growth since 1960, it is quite striking that not one was a European colony. Japan, Thailand, and China all escaped Europe's control and used this freedom to construct efficacious states and extensive human capital. Japan then transferred the model to Korea and Taiwan, which also enjoyed rapid growth. Not every country that enjoyed independence from Europe subsequently enjoyed rapid growth, but such independence has historically been a necessary condition for extremely rapid growth.

"Among those countries that did fall under European control, one can further distinguish between early and late colonialism. Late colonialism, beginning approximately in 1885, was substantially more exploitive than its earlier forms. The rapid increase in the geographic scope of colonialism led Europeans to run its territories cheaply, while simultaneously extracting whatever resources they could. Europeans therefore did not attempt to build state capacity or invest in human capital ..."

Krieckhaus shows that British colonies grew no more rapidly than others. Very few children ever got to primary school in the colonies, fewer than 3% in Sierra Leone, Gambia and Northern Nigeria. He notes, "British colonists were particularly reluctant to provide health services, and Sir Hugh Clifford, governor of the Gold Coast, explicitly wrote that the `Medical Establishment [was] maintained almost exclusively for the benefit of the European population.'"

Wars also harm development. Krieckhaus examines South Africa's attack on Mozambique, which displaced a third of the population, killed 600,000 people, and destroyed 40% of the country's assets. Market shocks can have a huge impact, as with the 1980 Thatcher-Reagan interest rate hike, which caused the worldwide slump. International aid too can have major effects: Krieckhaus shows how US spending on its wars against North Korea and then Vietnam funded South Korea's growth.

The Four Asian Tigers: Economic Development & the Global Political Economy

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The Four Asian Tigers: Economic Development & the Global Political Economy

Manufacturer: Academic Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0124074405

Book Description

This book critically examines the geopolitical and economic contexts of the region's export-oriented industrialization. The first part of the book focuses on the global and regional elements of the economic system and recent geo-politics. The second part of the book focuses on the domestic actors and institutions which played critical roles in the miracle economies of East Asia. This collection of original papers describes the economic developments and environment that underlie the East Asian NICs. Through a comparison of the Four Tigers-South Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Singapore-the contributors deliver a case-oriented study that explains the region's most successful economies. This book is the first region-wide comparative study to provide readers with country-specific information about economic environments and development.

Key Features
* Authors examine the transferability of this region's experience to others
* Charts the successful dynamic relationships between geopolitical, economic, and social resources
* Relevant to sociological and economic studies
* In-depth case studies combined with comparative analysis within the region
* Incorporation of global security and economic contexts in the analysis of economic development and democratization

Industrial Development Global Report 1997

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Industrial Development Global Report 1997
United Nations Industrial Development Organization
Manufacturer: Oxford University Press, USA
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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Book Description

The UNIDO Industrial Development Global Report provides annual description and analysis of industrial development on both a global and a regional scale. The 1997 Report addresses the challenge of diminishing global economic expansion and the falling per capita income of many developing countries by focusing on the long-term dynamics of investment and economic growth. As its central message, it emphasizes the crucial importance investment as a necessary condition for economic growth.

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Mundania

The Global Competitiveness Report 2000
Michael E. Porter , Jeffrey D. Sachs , Andrew M. Warner , Chris Moore , John M. Tudor , Daniel Vasquez , Klaus Schwab , Peter K. Cornelius , and Macha Levinson
Manufacturer: Oxford University Press, USA
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The Global Competitiveness Report 2001-2002 (World Economic Forum)

ASIN: 0195138201

Book Description

Many argue that developing countries should now strive for greater Competitiveness. At the same time the term has been widely criticized for being a dangerous obsession: a vague code-word for pro-business, anti-worker, anti-environment, and anti-poor policies. This report is part of a series of Competitiveness Reports first published by the World Economic Forum in 1979. In this 2000 edition, co-authors Jeffrey Sachs and Andrew Warner of Harvard University define Competitiveness more precisely as the ability to achieve rapid economic growth over a long time period. Michael Porter of Harvard University defines a competitiveness index that ranks countries on the ability to achieve high current productivity. The first is called the growth competitiveness index and the second is called the current competitiveness index. According to the growth index, countries are deemed Competitive if they score high on economic indicators that have been shown empirically to be related to recent cross-country growth rates. The rankings that come out of this process show that competitive countries do not tend to be high-inequality countries nor anti-environment countries. This book includes these two competitiveness rankings, an executive summary that describes the framework behind these two rankings, and further articles on globalization, economic creativity, the underpinnings of productivity, environment, the euro and education. The book also includes country-profiles that summarize the strengths and weaknesses of each country, and an extensive body of data from the Forum's executive opinion survey.

Customer Reviews:

Mundania.......2001-01-29

Good for research but not exactly coffee-table blurb.

The Global Economy in the 1990s: A Long-Run Perspective

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The Global Economy in the 1990s: A Long-Run Perspective

Manufacturer: Cambridge University Press
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Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0521617901

Book Description

The 1990s were an extraordinary, contradictory, and fascinating period of economic development. Specifically, the 'boom' of the 1990s and the way that it ended evoked many historical precedents, particularly, past bubbles and 'busts'. In this book, contributions by eminent economic historians examine key issues such as the causes and sustainability of productive growth in the U.S., the sluggish growth in Europe and stagnation in Japan. They assess whether, seen in long-run perspective, the 1990s does actually fall into a familiar pattern of economic activity or whether it represents a watershed in economic history.

Asian NIEs and the Global Economy: Industrial Restructuring and Corporate Strategy in the 1990s

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Asian NIEs and the Global Economy: Industrial Restructuring and Corporate Strategy in the 1990s
Gordon L. Clark , and Won Bae Kim
Manufacturer: The Johns Hopkins University Press
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Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 080185105X

Book Description

Industrial restructuring in the Asian newly industrialized economies (NIEs) has become very important. Existing strategies may no longer deliver employment or income growth in many of the Asian NIE's labor-intensive industries. The complex process of restructuring will involve economic adjustment and political realignment among industrial sectors and between industry managers and state policy makers. Asian NIEs and the Global Economy explains how the Asian NIEs have responded to the costs of success, including escalating real wages and prices, slowing growth rates of productivity, and increasing competition in markets they once dominated.

This integrated collection of ten essays -- based on a long-term porject sponsored by the East-West Center -- introduces the reader to this timely issue by examining industrial restructuring in the most industrialized economies of East Asia: Hong Kong, Singapore, Korea, and Taiwan. The contributors begin by describing the global context, theory, and practice of restructuring. Five case studies then examine important labor intensive industries, including apparel, footwear, and electronics, all of which have had strong export markets. The final section draws out the broad implications of these studies and assesses the near-term future of the Asian NIEs as China undergoes rapid industrialization and enters the global marketplace. Contributors to the volume are Gordon L. Clark, Won Bae Kim, Michael Webber, Stephen Chiu, Tai-lok Lui, K. C. Ho, Sam Ock Park, Jung Duk Lim, and Ching-lung Tsay.

"Asian NIEs and the Global Economy provides a fine comparative analysis of restructuring in the Asian NIEs, focusing on firm-level strategies based on surveys of shared questions -- an important but understudied topic. The book will be of interest to specialists and students in international business, political economy, economics, international relations, and political science." -- Eun Mee Kim, University of Southern California

China Against Herself: Innovation or Imitation in Global Business?

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Fairly gravitas free
NEW INSIGHT ON CHINA'S ASCENT TO THE WORLD STAGE

China Against Herself: Innovation or Imitation in Global Business?
Yuko Arayama , and Panos Mourdoukoutas
Manufacturer: Quorum Books
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Book Description

Will China's growing economy outstrip the economic power of Japan and the advanced industrialized democracies of the West? No. For China to continue its phenomenal growth and develop sustainable comparative advantage, it needs to sustain a huge world market for its products and the technological and organizational capacity for innovation. According to Arayama and Mourdoukoutas, because China cannot secure these economic conditions, its role in the world economy will be limited to that of a mass producer of certain types of products. China's strength is its low-cost, mass-production capacity--but the lack of an ingrained capacity to innovate constrains China to transforming foreign innovations into lower-priced imitations. Arayama and Mourdoukoutas detail their argument carefully and precisely, in a well-written analysis that will be necessary reading for business decision makers and their academic colleagues, and for others who are seriously interested in the future of world business.

Customer Reviews:

Fairly gravitas free.......2002-09-22

This book has not really said anything new that has not been said in other books-- particularly "The China Dream" (J. Studwell). It's just that they spent a lot less time analyzing their assertions.

It just seems a bit, well, incomplete.

1. They spend a lot of time worrying about the balance of trade. On the one hand, they talk against mercantilism and label it as "bad," but on the other, they attribute Japan's technological advance as the reason for its trade surplus. Nevermind that the trade surplus has gotten higher during the worse parts of their extended economic crisis, or that the US trade deficit has gotten more negative during the longest expansion in our history.

2. Countries are NOT corporations. They assert that there are production chains (of a sort), in which there are companies that invent, others that innovate, and still others that manufacture. So, by this line of reasoning, the US (with its great commitment to basic research) is an inventor, Japan (with its great commitment to reinventing the wheel/ improving existing technology) is an "innovator," and China (with neither the capability to invent things, nor "innovate" them) is a manufacturer. Is this really what one observes in real life? The United Kingdom may actually have MORE publications in basic research (when adjusted for the population size) than the US, but its economy is no more productive than that of, say, Singapore. In fact, the GDP percapita in Singapore is actually HIGHER than in the UK.

3. There have been more chances for China to get involved in world trade and "The Global Economy," than the authors mentioned. But each time, they have failed. The authors threw this out, but did not spend enough time detailing any of the examples that they gave. For example: The authors asked if China was "able" to innovate. Rather than speaking of this in terms of their infrastructure (insufficient access to public universities, etc) and organization, they gave some vague, grasping reasons for their failure.

4. What does a "technology trade balance" mean? France has a negative balance of trade with roughly 40% of the number of patent applications as the USA (which has a huge postive balance of trade in that area). Japan, on the other hand, has a balance less than 1/15th of that of the US, but with three times the number of patent applications. Does this mean that foreigners find that their investment in technology goes further in France and choose to invest it there (hence the negative balance of trade)? Does this mean that the average patent is less fruitful in Japan than in the USA? There is almost no discussion of this chart in the text.

In summary, I would prefer just a bit more detail/ gravitas and a little less Japanese chauvinism in this book.

NEW INSIGHT ON CHINA'S ASCENT TO THE WORLD STAGE.......1999-06-25

This book provides new insight for those interested in the formulation of business strategy in entering China's market. It offers a fresh perspective, especially to those interested in breaking into this lucrative and enormous market. Dr. Mourdoukoutas has a keen grasp of the issues and presents them thoughtfully and logically.

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