Book Description
In this vital book, visionary international investment manager Antoine van Agtmael -- the pioneer who coined the term "emerging markets" -- pulls back the curtain on the new powerhouses of the world economy. Picking up where Thomas Friedman's The World Is Flat left off, he persuasively demonstrates that the world's center of gravity is already tipping decisively in favor of the emerging economies. With this seismic shift, competitive challenges and investment risks are also being dramatically transformed, while new opportunities are arising for those who are alert to them.
A new breed of world-leading companies are catching their Western competitors off guard. Household names of today -- IBM, Ford, Sony, and Shell -- are in danger of becoming has-beens as these more innovative new superstars in the emerging markets claim dominance. Understanding how they have become world-class market leaders, and where they are taking the world economy, is crucial to understanding not only the future of globalization, but the future of Western competitiveness.
Each year we are buying more planes from Brazil's Embraer, refrigerators from China's Haier appliance maker, smart cell phones from Taiwan's HTC, and gas from Russia's Gazprom. How have these relative unknowns come so far in the world markets so fast? What are they doing right that their Western competitors are doing wrong, and how can Western companies face the intensifying challenges and survive?
With in-depth, inside knowledge of these emerging powerhouses that's based on his thirty years of working, traveling, and investing in emerging markets and his extraordinary access to the leading companies, van Agtmael trains his experienced analyst's eye on twenty-five of the top emerging giants, taking readers into the executive suites and labs where they are outmaneuvering their Western rivals. Profiling these major players, such as Korea's Samsung Electronics, China's computer maker Lenovo, Brazil's iron ore giant CVRD, and India's Infosys, van Agtmael divulges their strategies for growth, and analyzes how their rise to dominance will change our lives. His unique insights point the way to how we in the West can capitalize on the opportunities these companies represent while also mobilizing a powerful response to the challenges they present.
The Emerging Markets Century is a compelling and necessary read for anyone who wants to understand the true magnitude of change under way in the global economy today.
Customer Reviews:
The update on opportune investments from emerging economies.......2007-09-05
In 1981, fund manager Antoine van Agtmael created the term "emerging markets," as opposed to "Third World," to describe developing countries, from Brazil to China. A pioneer in emerging-market investments, he describes the economic revolution being provoked by corporate activities in emerging markets. Van Agtmael enumerates the forces driving this transformation in the economic relationship between developed nations and their emerging-market counterparts. In the second half of the book, he shares his detailed research into the factors that make emerging-market companies notable and successful. He catalogues market details about 25 specific companies he has analyzed for investment purposes, and presents the lessons they can teach Western managers. We recommend this book to serious investors who want to know about promising non-U.S. companies, and to managers who want to read about their corporations' upcoming competitors - and potential future owners.
Refreshing, easy to read, very informative, empowering book.......2007-03-17
This book is poorly branded in my opinion, just like what is said about the authors original idea on Emerging markets vs. 3rd world.
This book is totally under rated, and under subscribed., do yourself a favour and open it up and read a few random pages, you will soon realize how clearly the book is written, and how compelling and refreshing the ideas are that are presented.
This should/could be a best seller in weeks, but has not been promoted effectively in my opinion.
Antoine, whats with the poor branding again ? You need a new cover design, and maybe new title. Go onto CNBC TV also. Your book is incredible but people won't pick it up based on its visual appearance.
Book Description
Bangladeshi villagers sharing cell phones helped build what is now a thriving company with more than $200 million in annual profits. But what is the lesson for the rest of the world? This is a question author Nicholas P. Sullivan addresses in his tale of a new kind of entrepreneur, Iqbal Quadir, the visionary and catalyst behind the creation of GrameenPhone in Bangladesh.
GrameenPhone—a partnership between Norway's Telenor and Grameen Bank, co-winner of the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize—defines a new approach to building business opportunities in the developing world. You Can Hear Me Now offers a compelling account of what Sullivan calls the "external combustion engine"—a combination of forces that is sparking economic growth and lifting people out of poverty in countries long dominated by aid-dependent governments. The "engine" comprises three forces: information technology, imported by native entrepreneurs trained in the West, backed by foreign investors.
Customer Reviews:
For the masses.......2007-06-20
You Can Hear Me Now will interest a wide variety of readers. On a personal level, the story of Iqbal Quadir, who at age 36, single-handedly coordinated the effort to bring cellular phone service to one of the poorest countries in our world, is an inspriration. Moving beyond the completion of his college studies in America and entering the workforce, Quadir had not forgotten the struggles of the rural poor of his homeland, Bangladesh. Iqbal Quadir's story is one of creativity, passion, and perseverance not only for a project, but for a people. Beyond the book, the story grows. Readers can expect Mr. Quadir will continue to work toward the alleviation of poverty in Bangladesh through continued efforts with new projects.
As an academic book, readers will discover a revolutionary economist in Quadir. He has used traditional economic theories to develop, solidify, and test his own. He is a noted original thinker and a man of action. "Connectivity is productivity" is Quadir's cry. He is changing the world's view of the risk of investment in developing countries. He is a victor of the race to end poverty.
Mr. Sullivan's well-written references to and explanations of economic concepts are clearly written and easy to understand. This book is a must-read for all students of economics, business, and entrepreneurship. If instructors do not require the book, students should be delving into the material on their free time.
Globally, the impact of Quadir's work in Bangladesh has rippled throughout the developing world with his economic practices and business models duplicated successfully. Iqbal Quadir's story brings hope for a better future for millions of people, and personally, his actions inspire me to question what role I play.
Worth it!.......2007-03-14
It is a story about a man with a vision to empower the poor in Bangladesh (one of the 50 poorest countries in the world according to many global economic reports). Iqbal Quadir had faith in his strategy and the intelligence to lay it in ways to get investment from Grameen Bank and other powerful investors, who may have once been reluctant. If you already have grassroots business ideas, this book is not only an inspiration but it also loosely illustrates the challenges in BOP markets.
Wonderful example of thinking outside our cultural constraints..........2007-02-25
To the typical American (and other developed nation citizens), the cell phone has become part of the normal fabric of life. Communication with anyone at any time from anywhere is just expected. But in countries like Bangladesh, only a very small number of people have access to any type of telephone communication. The book You Can Hear Me Now: How Microloans and Cell Phones are Connecting the World's Poor to the Global Economy by Nicholas P. Sullivan does an excellent job of showing how something as simple as the cell phone can break the cycle of poverty and aid for millions of people.
Contents:
Part 1 - The GrameenPhone Story: Connectivity Is Productivity; Dish-Wallahs of Delhi (and Other Early Models); Cell Phone as Cow - A New Paradigm in Search of Investors; On The Money Trail in Scandinavia; Building a Company; Building a Network
Part 2 - Transformation Through Technology: Wildfile at the Bottom of the Pyramid; Cell Phone as Wallet; Wealth Creation and Rural Income Opportunities; Beyond Phones - In Search of a New "Cow"; Eyeing the Dhaka Stock Exchange
Epilogue; Notes; Resources; Index
The book is split into two parts. The first part covers the story of GrameenPhone's launch in Bangladesh, and the second part is more of a look at the forces behind using technology at the "bottom of the pyramid" (the vast number of people who globally live at poverty level) to connect them to the world's trade economy. Iqbal Quadir was a Bangladeshi who studied and worked in the US and was doing quite well. But he was also concerned about the massive levels of poverty in his home country. Once day he was standing on the street and had an epiphany about communication equaling productivity. His people worked hard, but they had no way to reliably communicate with others except by face to face meetings. All that wasted time meant there was untapped potential just waiting to be utilized. He started talking with Muhammad Yunus, founder of Grameen Bank (originator of microloan programs) to see how communication technology could be rolled out to the entire country, making a phone available to anyone near a village. Without government aids and grants, Quadir put together a consortium of foreign investors and Grameen Bank to build GrameenPhone, a life-altering company. Using a fiber-optic line already laid next to the country's rail line, they were able to place cell towers in areas to cover all the rural areas of Bangladesh. Then using microloans from Grameen Bank, "phone ladies" could buy a cell phone for the village, offer the phone service, and sell the time in small increments. The cell phone gave a business to the village, in addition to creating subsidiary jobs and opportunities with the communication that was enabled by having phone service throughout the country. It's this use of technology that's advocated in the second part of the book as an example of how business opportunities can remove the grip of poverty from nations and lead to living wages instead of handouts.
You Can Hear Me Now is an inspirational book with plenty of lessons for those who are willing to look outside the normal constraints of what we consider business opportunities.
An excellent book that shows how ICTs are effective development tools..........2007-01-29
This is a well-written, well-researched book that clarifies the substantial role that ICTs are playing in developing countries. It showcases Iqbal Quadir, who founded GrameenPhone in Bangladesh, and shows how he risked his investment banking career on Wall Street to go back to his native country to improve it. There is a lesson here not just for US/EU immigrants from poor countries, but for everyone interested in developmental economics and aiding poor countries: charity is not the only way. In fact, as the World Bank conceded, its efforts at poverty alleviation are failing. This book shows how GrameenPhone, a company that generates profit and is majority-owned by a European telecommunications company, is a positive force for improving Bangladesh. It has provided cell phone service, where no telephones existed. It has created jobs and made the entire economy more efficient. Indirectly, it has empowered the masses and connected them to the global village.
For readers with an interest in Grameen Bank, Professor Yunus (2006 Nobel Peace Prize), telecommunications, but also entrepreneurship, I think you will find that this book is a must-read. Also, for those following the Jeffrey Sachs, Bono, Bill Gates, UN Millennium Goals, Stiglitz, Easterly debate this is also very relevant. I hope that Mr. Sullivan follows this book up with another one that showcases how innovative men and women like Quadir can change the world and also make a profit for investors (which encourages them to continue to invest in developing countries).
After reading this book, I bought several copies for people I know in Business School, because I think it will inspire them to be successful and also think about how to improve economic opportunity in the developing world, through bottom-up entrepreneurship.
Book Description
War is now an important part of development discourse. Aid agencies have become involved in humanitarian assistance, conflict resolution and the social reconstruction of war-torn societies. This deeply thoughtful book explores the growing merger of development and security. Its author unravels the nature of the new wars - in Africa, the Balkans, Central Asia - and the response of the international community, in particular the new systems of global governance that are emerging as a result.
The breakdown of order is seen as symptomatic of long-term social processes: economic crisis, the social exclusion of wide strata of populations and internal conflict. Instead of the historic goals of modernity, development to reduce inequality, and a central role for the state, we have a neo-medieval situation in which overlapping and fragmented sovereignties confront an increasingly weakened central authority.
The consequences, as Duffield shows, are far-reaching. Development now focuses primarily on the shortcomings of structures within the South. Aid is privatized. A rising level of violence and misery are accepted as normal, and new forms of humanitarian aid intervention, far from solving the problem, accommodate and coexist with this instability and inequality. Pessimistic perhaps, but this book is profound in its insights and pregnant with policy implications.
Customer Reviews:
A Must for Serious Thinkers of International Affairs.......2007-01-08
Professor Mark Duffield has done the near impossible, he has given a detailed description and explanation of one of the most complex assemblages ever devised: the post-Cold War, free market/free trade-driven international order. In excruciating detail, professor Duffield explains how the WTO-structured global economic system - what we think of as "globalization" - works to: attenuate state power, deregulate and disrupt traditional economies, create ever-more "complex and opaque forms of transaction and ownership," and essentially restructures international governing bodies to fit into this new world system. Professor Duffield manages to do this with no discernible political "spin." His gaze is unremitting and clear-eyed whether it falls on corrupt third-world governments, U.N. and NGO developmental types, western donor nations, politicians of all stripes, or African and Afghani warlords.
If one wants to understand the underlying forces driving the conflicts extant in today's world and the global community's responses to these crises, there is no better place to start than with professor Duffield's "Global Governance and the New Wars."
Book Description
For over a decade now, the reigning consensus has held that the combination of free markets and democracy would transform the third world and sweep away the ethnic hatred and religious zealotry associated with underdevelopment. In this astute, original, and surprising investigation of the true impact of globalization, Yale Law School professor Amy Chua explains why many developing countries are in fact consumed by ethnic violence after adopting free market democracy.
Chua shows how in non-Western countries around the globe, free markets have concentrated starkly disproportionate wealth in the hands of a resented ethnic minority. These “market-dominant minorities” – Chinese in Southeast Asia, Croatians in the former Yugoslavia, whites in Latin America and South Africa, Indians in East Africa, Lebanese in West Africa, Jews in post-communist Russia – become objects of violent hatred. At the same time, democracy empowers the impoverished majority, unleashing ethnic demagoguery, confiscation, and sometimes genocidal revenge. She also argues that the United States has become the world’s most visible market-dominant minority, a fact that helps explain the rising tide of anti-Americanism around the world. Chua is a friend of globalization, but she urges us to find ways to spread its benefits and curb its most destructive aspects.
Download Description
For over a decade now, the reigning consensus has held that the combination of free markets and democracy would transform the third world and sweep away the ethnic hatred and religious zealotry associated with underdevelopment. In this astute, original, and surprising investigation of the true impact of globalization, Yale Law School professor Amy Chua explains why many developing countries are in fact consumed by ethnic violence after adopting free market democracy.
Chua shows how in non-Western countries around the globe, free markets have concentrated starkly disproportionate wealth in the hands of a resented ethnic minority. These "market-dominant minorities" -- Chinese in Southeast Asia, Croatians in the former Yugoslavia, whites in Latin America and South Africa, Indians in East Africa, Lebanese in West Africa, Jews in post-communist Russia -- become objects of violent hatred. At the same time, democracy empowers the impoverished majority, unleashing ethnic demagoguery, confiscation, and sometimes genocidal revenge.
She also argues that the United States has become the world's most visible market-dominant minority, a fact that helps explain the rising tide of anti-Americanism around the world. Chua is a friend of globalization, but she urges us to find ways to spread its benefits and curb its most destructive aspects.
"Provocative, evocative, nuanced, and highly readable.... Amy Chua deserves our gratitude."
THE WASHINGTON POST
"Fascinating and disturbing... with an authority born of rigorous research."
BUSINESS WEEK
"World on Fire deserves to be widely read. It is a welcome antidote to the recycled mantras of the market-cheering right and the tired rhetoric of the anti-globalization left."
THE AMERICAN PROSPECT
"Superb.... Encourages us to confront the world as it is, and our actual place in it, with a humane and intellectually formidable imagination."
THE NEW YORK OBSERVER
"A riveting and original book that challenges key tenets of American political faith."
THE BALTIMORE SUN
"This hard-hitting book should be read by everyone who still imagines that free markets can solve all the world's ills. Chua's work is provocative, creative, and important; it turns conventional wisdom on its head, and no one interested in globalization can afford to ignore it."
BARBARA EHRENREICH, AUTHOR OF NICKEL AND DIMED: ON (NOT) GETTING BY IN AMERICA
"Provocative.... Shocking.... It should make Americans think twice about exporting their political culture wholesale without a thought of who dislikes whom."
SEATTLE TIMES
"[World on Fire] makes for compelling reading and sounds a sobering warning that should be heeded by all supporters and critics of globalization."
MILWAUKEE JOURNAL-SENTINEL
"A profound book, written in plain English, and challenging the very foundations of some glib -- and dangerous -- assumptions behind American foreign policy. This book should be read in the highest circles of decision-making, as well as by all those who like to consider themselves 'thinking people.' It should provoke some re-thinking -- and, for some, really thinking for the first time."
THOMAS SOWELL, HOOVER
Customer Reviews:
Brilliant and mind-shifting.......2007-04-25
For someone who used to hate reading economics books, this book was a breeze. Amy Chua has cleverly and clearly explained why economic and social development in developing countries should have an inside-out approach. Western models don't always work and I've seen and experienced this, having worked for the Philippine government and dealing with consultants from international development agencies, and foreign consultants in general who come to the Philippines to recommend policies and systems that have been successfully implemented elsewhere. Each country is different, and each culture is unique. There is no one right answer to problems - so beware of consultants who have ready, packaged solutions.
Culture is the Underlying Motivation for All Decisions.......2007-02-04
I have been recommending Amy Chua's book, WORLD ON FIRM, for several years now. I think from an academic standpoint, it is far more valuable than that of THE WORLD IS FLAT by Thomas Friedman. Chua is an academic, but also the child of immigrants from another country. She has lived experience in her writings from cultural and ethnographic viewpoints, and not simply from the "gee wiz it's business" that Friedman tends to favor.
Chua's book is the first book I have seen on globalization that talks about culture in a clear and valuable sense.
I will continue to recommend her book to all of my undergraduate and MBA students and I hope she either updates this book for a future date or writes again on this topic.
Dr. Eileen Wibbeke
California, USA
A profound book.......2007-01-27
This is a very profound book. It deserves to be widely read and discussed. Chua is way before her time.
Contrary to what you may think upon reading the title, this book is not anti-free market or anti-globalization. It is a reality check. In numerous areas of the world, ethnic minorities hold disproportionate economic power. This creates resentment(envy really) among the majority group. Add democracy to the mix, and you can imagine what kinds of lunatics can be elected. For obscure reasons, this situation is virtually ignored until yet another vicious bloodbath manifests. And even then, people fail to understand what has really happened. Regardless, the problem is not going to go away by itself.
antidote to neoconservativsm.......2007-01-18
Amy Chua paints a dark picture of the volatile forces that can be unleashed when three forces, commonly thought of as unalloyed goods, combine--economic free markets, political democracy, and ethnic identities.
When we look at the world, says Chua, what we observe in many countries are what she calls "market-dominant minorities." These ethnic minorities often command and control hugely disproportionate sectors of their country's wealth by exploiting, sometimes legally and sometimes illegally, free markets. Traveling in Manila some time back, for example, I remember a snide comment about the Chinese there as "the Jews of Asia." The domination of ethnic majorities by market-dominant minorities comes at a huge price, according to Chua. One of three things typically results.
First, there can be a backlash against the very idea of free markets by those who feel they have been exploited. In Zimbabwe, for example, the democratically-elected Robert Mugabe openly encouraged the violent takeover of white-owned farms. In Venezuela, free elections brought the anti-market Hugo Chavez to power. Second, in order to protect their market dominance, the powerful ethnic minority will sometimes jettison democracy in favor of some form of autocracy. Third, horrific violence can be unleashed by the ethnic majority against the dominant minority, as happened in Rwanda in 1994 when the Hutus (about 85% of the country) slaughtered 800,000 Tutsis who controlled the country.
Contrary to popular views here in the West, the globalization of free markets and the rise of free elections can have disastrous effects. In Iraq, only time will tell what violent powers the United States has unleashed among Kurds, Shias, and Sunnis. According to Chua, countries must establish free and stable political economies before they embark upon political democracies. Some Americans might not like to admit it, but the volatile cocktail of free markets, free elections and intense ethnic identity can cause more harm than good. There might be some places where this threefold combination simply won't work, or will only work with more patience and nuance than many in the west have exhibited.
How democracy and free trade is not the cure- all some say........2007-01-09
In the ever revolving world of money, politics, nationalism and envy this book lays out in concise terms the very reasons why our assumptions of the world order do not always hold water. If ever anyone wants to understand why people and nations do what they do, just read this book. Amy Chua disects the issues that make us scratch our heads in bemusement through clear repeated examples taken from all over the globe. This book answered questions that most others merely comment upon and allowed me an insight into a world I never knew existed. I have and would recommend this book to anyone with even half an interest in the world beyond our TV screens.
Book Description
An intimate and powerful account of living in
Bolivia
during a time of crisis and change.
Long the obscure “Tibet of South America,” Bolivia emerged as a world flashpoint during the four years William Powers lived there as an aid worker. CNN and the New York Times have shown images of Aymara women in bowler hats standing down tanks; citizen protests have ousted multinationals and two pro-globalization presidents. In A Natural Nation, Powers breathes life into the recent struggles of the Bolivian people. When he arrives in the rainforest, he meets an extraordinary Chiquitano Indian named Salvador who is fighting the extinction of his people. At the same time, the clock ticks for three multinational energy companies forced to curb global warming. Both goals depend upon the survival of a stretch of pristine jungle. But as Indians and oil giants join to launch the world’s largest Kyoto Protocol project—using forests to absorb dangerous planetary greenhouse gasses—Salvador’s life is threatened by loggers collaborating with a racist Bolivian oligarchy. The quest for a single rainforest is subsumed in a movement of national liberation. A Natural Nation goes beneath the headlines, gracefully weaving memoir, travel, history and reportage into an unforgettable chronicle of a “poor little rich country” attempting to engage the world without losing its soul.
Customer Reviews:
Important true-life on environmental front lines.......2007-08-05
So much good writing is being done about the need to develop sustainable life styles that it's difficult to sort out the best. This is a very important and readable book in that context. William Powers was there in Bolivia struggling with the tension between an indigenous Amazon tribe and the attempt of apparently well-meaning nonprofits and industrialists to change the natives. For those who think we can go back to living in the pre-industrial world, and for those who are looking for a better answer, this is an engaging story of great importance.
Informative book on an important topic........2007-03-09
I learned of the concept of carbon credits when I read Big Coal. It seemed like an interesting idea, but I was curious about investigating it from the perspective of those countries participating on the other side of things. Whispering in the Giant's Ear was an excellent choice to reveal the conseqenses of our exploitation of non-renewable resources on "less developed" nations. Powers does an outstanding job of providing an interesting narrative with which to educate the reader about the role carbon credits are playing in the struggle of indigenous people to gain political power in a nation that is caught up in the process of globalization. The number of characters is not so many as to cause confusion, but enough to provide insight into several segments of Bolivian society. A sympathetic portrait of the indigenous peoples of the poorest of South American nations.
Great book on environmental efforts, relationships in Bolivia.......2006-09-12
I have to say, I'm envious of Bill Powers' writing abilities and his experience in Bolivia. Thanks to his detailed descriptions of character conversations, speeches, emotions, reactions, etc., I feel like I could easily recognize any of his Conservation International colleagues - Salvador, Smithers, Len - if I saw any one of them on the street...or deep in the Bolivian jungle. I did wonder whatever happened to the author's relationships with Daniel and Anaí - two of the author's close friends - but at the same time both side-stories were pleasantly left open to the possibilities. This book provides a highly readable, history of Bolivia and it's current political and environmental challenges. In addition, it provides a detailed look into the relationships between a "gringo" do-gooder and his Bolivian counterparts.
An Era of a Revolution Encompassing the Whole Planet.......2006-06-16
Now I have a better appreciation of Bolivia-its geography and culture. WHISPERING IN THE ELEPHANT'S EAR extends my understanding of globilization beyond our Western concerns of the East. It makes me equate the impact of globilization similar to that of the Industrial Revolution. In retrospect, the progress of that revolution ultimately involved all nations without particular attention to geography and culture. Now we hope to integrate the two without paying the price environmentally.
Powers' descriptive writing is powerful. I could have used a glossary of Spanish words. Although his personal anecdotes are entertaining they seem secondary in a book of such importance. Perhaps more anecdotes on indiginous people would have been more significant.
WHISPERING IN THE ELEPHANT'S EAR is a must read for those interested in our complex planet.
Simply a must-read.......2006-06-02
I thought I'd just grab a primer on Bolivia, but got a whole lot more when I picked this book up. This guy is so multi-faceted, you never know what he's going to write next. Nearly every passage in his work make you angry, make you take sides, make you pause with a sense of befuddlement. Sometimes I folded it in front of me just to let a particularly beautiful revelation or moment sink in.
For anyone who is eager (or compelled) to learn about the actualities of Bolivia's incredible past five years, its "war on globalization", this is the book to read. Powers, who was one of the few "there", talking and sharing with those involved and wholly understands what occurred. This is apparent in his telling of the Indian road-blocks, impending rain-forest catastrophe, and the stories of real people that you can relate to.
After reading William Powers, the world becomes a far stranger, grander, mythical, more intriguing--and puzzling-- place than ever before.
Book Description
This comprehensive introduction focuses on the effects of globalization to tie concepts together for students and show them how the fates of developing nations and developed nations are intertwined. This new edition features an expanded focus on globalization, a student-friendly design, and all material has been updated to reflect the most recent world events.
Book Description
Many prominent critics regard the international financial system as the dark side of globalization, threatening disadvantaged nations near and far. But in The Next Great Globalization, eminent economist Frederic Mishkin argues the opposite: that financial globalization today is essential for poor nations to become rich. Mishkin argues that an effectively managed financial globalization promises benefits on the scale of the hugely successful trade and information globalizations of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. This financial revolution can lift developing nations out of squalor and increase the wealth and stability of emerging and industrialized nations alike. By presenting an unprecedented picture of the potential benefits of financial globalization, and by showing in clear and hard-headed terms how these gains can be realized, Mishkin provides a hopeful vision of the next phase of globalization.
Mishkin draws on historical examples to caution that mismanagement of financial globalization, often aided and abetted by rich elites, can wreak havoc in developing countries, but he uses these examples to demonstrate how better policies can help poor nations to open up their economies to the benefits of global investment. According to Mishkin, the international community must provide incentives for developing countries to establish effective property rights, banking regulations, accounting practices, and corporate governance--the institutions necessary to attract and manage global investment. And the West must be a partner in integrating the financial systems of rich and poor countries--to the benefit of both.
The Next Great Globalization makes the case that finance will be a driving force in the twenty-first-century economy, and demonstrates how this force can and should be shaped to the benefit of all, especially the disadvantaged nations most in need of growth and prosperity.
Customer Reviews:
Get down in the trenches of 21st century globalizationm.......2007-02-12
Whilst Mishkin tells it like it is, you just may want to follow on with "EXTREME COMPETITION" by Fingar, and "THE WORLD IS FLAT," by Aronica and Ramdoo to get to the "what do I do tomorrow."
Great book, Mishkin... readers, keep reading!
Book Description
In this new and expanded edition of Chossudovsky's international best-seller, the author outlines the contours of a New World Order which feeds on human poverty and the destruction of the environment, generates social apartheid, encourages racism and ethnic strife and undermines the rights of women. The result as his detailed examples from all parts of the world show so convincingly, is a globalization of poverty.
This book is a skilful combination of lucid explanation and cogently argued critique of the fundamental directions in which our world is moving financially and economically.
In this new enlarged edition -which includes ten new chapters and a new introduction-- the author reviews the causes and consequences of famine in Sub-Saharan Africa, the dramatic meltdown of financial markets, the demise of State social programs and the devastation resulting from corporate downsizing and trade liberalisation.
Published in 11 languages. More than 100,000 copies sold Worldwide.
Customer Reviews:
Another brilliant book by Chossudovsky!.......2007-04-16
Chossudovsky is a brilliant economist and a burning torch for the truth that people are unable to see, hear, or accept due to the propaganda schemas that are embedded in their minds (like a microchip programming) by the global media cartel and the political demagogues.
Chossudovski analyzes the past and the present in relation to debt, globalization, and international financing. He dispels the myth of the good samaritan (like the IMF, the World bank, and the Federal Reserve, etc) that destroys economies of other countries, and impoverish them under the guise of capitalism (actually corporate socialism) and freedom, in order to own them. He clearly elucidates the dollarization process and its role in the New World Order. This book makes a powerful reading that sheds the light on a vanishing truth. I would highly recommend this volume to anyone who is interested in world finance as well as their future, and the future of their children.
Brilliant and Comprehensive.......2006-05-06
Although it saddens me to see a strong literature emerging today that was largely anticipated and ignored by people like David Barnett with his Global Reach work in the 1970's, it is a good thing that strong voices like those of this author are now making very comprehensive documented cases for how corporate power and privatized wealth are collapsing nations, bankrupting economies, and impoverishing more and more people unnecessarily.
The table of contents of this book is extraordinarily details and brilliant in its organization. Although the book is mostly case studies that one can read through rapidly if accepting of the author's key points, this may well be one of the finest itemizations of the ills of the 21st century: corporate power run amok, privatization and concentration of wealth (which is, incidentally, one of the precondition for revolution), the collapse of national and local economies (e.g. Wal-Mart), the dismantling of the welfare safety net in most countries, and the outbreak and spread of famine and civil war.
The author is probably the foremost scholar and commentator on how the "free" market is not so free, and how the existing capitalist system is predatory, aided by locked in privileges that the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank impose on nations foolish enough to accept their intervention. In this the author is consistent with Jeffrey Sachs (The End of Poverty) who has put forward the need for a complete make-over of developmental economics, to include an end of the normal business practices of the IMF and the World Bank.
I was tempted to remove one star for lack of sufficient reference to the works of others, but the personal insights and comprehensive review caused me to leave the ranking at five stars. I see a clear pattern emerging in the literature (see my other 700+ reviews) and what I am waiting for is for someone to cut the spines off all these books and "make sense" of the total picture in a manner comprehensible to the indivdual voter.
If we are to restore informed democracy and moral capitalism, this book is one of the foundation stones.
A rigged free market system.......2006-03-30
M. Chossudovsky attacks head on the New World Order imposed by the World Bank (WB0), the IMF and the WTO, calling their economic 'reforms' enforced on countries in distress not less than genocides.
Their 'free market' system is rigged. The WTO agreements grant entrenched rights to the world's largest financial and industrial conglomerates, derogating the ability of national governments to regulate their economies. The IMF programs enforce governments to privatize big chunks of their national economy, liberalize their markets and downsize social provisions (education, health, social security).
Their 'free' market system is synonym of human poverty, destruction of the natural environment, social apartheid, racism and ethnic strife, undermining of women's rights, economic dislocations, forced displacements, landless farmers, shuttered factories and jobless workers.
More, he accuses the IMF of supporting the appropriation of global wealth by speculators through manipulation of currency and commodity markets. It even manipulates itself its economic statistics in order to show that its policies work. Finally, it cooperates with warmongerers and 'peace keepers'.
He illustrates his verdicts with a host of examples.
Somalia: the entire social fabric of the pastoralist economy was undone through duty-free beef and dairy products from the EU.
Rwanda: the restructuring of the agricultural system precipitated the population into destitution, leading to a genocide.
Ethiopia: the Structural Adjustment Programme caused starvation.
Bangladesh: a devaluation and price liberalization exacerbated famine. Deregulation of the grain market meant dumping of US grain surpluses.
Brazil: enhancement of social polarization by supporting the land-owning class.
Peru: after liberalization, the price of bread increased more than 12 times.
Russia: helping the oligarchs.
India (Andhra Pradesh): repeal of minimum wages and support of caste exploitation
Yugoslavia: serving the strategic interests of Germany and the US by cutting the financial arteries between Belgrade and the republics.
Korea, Thailand, Indonesia: the vaults of the central banks (100 billion $) were pillaged by international speculators. The bail-outs of those countries were underwritten and guaranteed by the same Wall Street banks involved in the speculative assaults.
The author proposes a solution which will be extremely difficult to implement in our actual world, where media and governments are controlled by the powerful: democratization of the economic system and ownership structures, disarming of speculation, redistribution of income and wealth and rebuilding the Welfare State.
Michel Chossudovsky's book constitutes a devastating denunciation of an inhuman system sold by economic strangulating wolves clad in sheepskins.
It confirms the forceful analysis of globalization by Joseph Stiglitz.
A must read.
I also recommend a voice from the South: Walden Bello.
The Road to Serfdom.......2005-01-11
I was originally born in Uganda and I can assure you that Africans have always been suspicious of the so-called "aid" they receive since it almost always comes after a crisis that they can't quite explain (like how did a bunch of poor, illiterate preteens get the money to buy those fancy weapons, or why won't aid agencies buy food from the local farmers and distribute THAT).
Suspicions and rumors are insufficient to counter what appears, on the surface, to be international generosity. That is why I am grateful for Chossudosky's contrarian masterwork. It confirms the fears and suspicions regarding a return to colonialism and economic slavery. The fact that Chossudosky was willing to put his career on the line to write this hard-hitting book is worthy of our attention. He shows, without a shadow of a doubt, that there is a deliberate and systematic campaign of "economic genocide" against Africa and all other resource-rich regions. Neoliberalism have mastered the British colonial-era double-speak of "liberty", "democracy", "markets", etc. "Market liberalization" is nothing more than armed robbery. And "investment" is really nothing more than "asset stripping". The Adam Smith phraseology of free-trade and free markets is used, much like their British predecessors, to recolonize the world. Chossudosky shows how the "Washington Consesus" has embarked on a foreign policy strategy of economic sabotage and "strangulation." As Kissinger famously ordered, in the now declassified National Security Memorandum 200, Africans should be kept from becoming consumers of their own raw materials.
Chossudosky does an enormous favors to us neophytes by decoding the neoclassical econo-babble. His brilliant deconstruction of IMF structural adjustment policies is worth the price of this book alone. But he goes beyond that. He shows how nations can be brought to their knees through currency devaluations and speculative attacks. The whole cynical process of creating the crisis then blaming it on the victims, i.e. the "Asian" Crisis which is in fact an American Crisis, or the excuse used to maintain Odious Debt on impoverished nations: "their corrupt leaders are to blame for the Odious Debt". Yes but those "corrupt" leaders were trained at American military bases (much like the 9/11 hijackers), and are killing us with American made weapons (thanks again Kissinger). Besides, everytimes Africans (or Latin Americans) try to put a reformer or socialist democrat in power, he develops a nasty habit of being assisinated.
This book will make you angry at how long and how often you've been lied to. Everything you thought you knew about economics will be tested as the Machiavellian machinations of international creditors, grain companies, and financial "investors" is revealed in page after riveting page. I also recommend Michael Hudson's Super Imperialism and Horowitz' Emerging Viruses. If it's not out of print then get The Merchants of Grain. Some publishing companies are refusing to publish some of these books because of their controvesial nature so get them before they're made "out of print".
"There are none so blind . . . ".......2004-03-29
With the North American governments and their media flacks noisily championing "economic liberalisation", dissenting voices are muted. The voices of those most directly affected by "globalisation" are fainter yet. Michel Chossudovsky attempts to overcome the raucous proponents of "international free trade" with an examination of just what it does and how it impacts civil societies. The picture he provides isn't pleasant. However, turning away will not cause it to fade from lack of our attention. In fact, reading this book is an eye-opening, if not eyebrow raising experience.
Among the rare critics of globalization Chossudovsky has "on-site" credentials beyond his academic base. He's been on the scene of several nations subjected to International Monetary Fund and World Bank policies. He examines the results of these and other international financial agencies' policies. From Chile through Rwanda to Somlia and Korea, he shows how a new form of warfare is under way. Conquest no longer requires bullets to occupy a nation nor suppress a people. Conquerers now wield position papers, American dollars or Euros and trade impositions. Surrender agreements come in the form of "conditions" accompanying loans and investments. These dicta result in the stripping away of social programmes, alienation of subsistence farm holdings and displacement of vast numbers. These people, deprived of income, traditions and opportunity have become a new breed. They are the hopeless poor for which no amount of "aid" can provide succour.
As he demonstrates repeatedly, the mechanism is simple. The formation of the IMF gave financiers, chiefly North American, a cudgel to change governments, force farmers and pastoralists to convert to cash crop economies, and reduce or eliminate government services. The initial steps were instituted by the Bretton Woods conferences designed to restore nations devastated by World War II. Private financial institutions imposed conditions on loans granted to recovering countries. "Recovering" countries rapidly expanded into "developing" countries as these institutions recognised the value of cheap labour in them. Accepting "foreign investment" led to indebtedness difficult to repay. Defaulting was unacceptable to both borrower and lender, leading to new rounds of loans. These, however, rarely reached the borrowing nation since the new funds were set against the older debt. "Servicing the debt" meant imposition of stringent conditions, ranging from privatisation of services, amalgamation of small land holdings to produce crops to be purchased cheaply, but sold at inflated prices. The consumers of these goods are you and your neighbours.
Each of the nations Chossudovsky examines suffers the same schedule of "structural adjustment programmes" imposed by the IMF. These SAPs outline the changes a nation must endure to receive the "benefits" of globalization. Restrictions on outside investment must be eliminated, with the concomitant privatisation of state-owned facilities and services. Where workers aren't laid off, their wages are frozen or reduced. Local currencies must be adjusted to American dollars, which has the impact of intense inflation spirals almost overnight. The result is a populace under increasing pressure, marginal or famine-stricken and powerless. Civil unrest isn't an option, since disruption brings reprisals - often, of course, the withdrawal of investment, failure to renew loan guarantees or simply real military action.
Although the repetitive nature of the manipulations of the financial institutions on national sovereignty leads Chossudovsky to some redundancy, the reader should understand we are dealing with a global crisis. "Bitter medicine" and "bitter irony" recur, because the circumstances he describes are redundant. An imposing and sometimes intimidating account, he is careful to shift the responsibility to institutions rather than consumers. It is, however, the developed country consumer that provides motivation for many levels of the problem. Chossudovsky's analysis is thorough, well-founded and expressive. He shows why social unrest in "developing" countries is the result of imposed conditions, not unstable populations and environments. That he offers little in the way of solutions for the predicament the world now suffers is only testimony to the immensity of the task ahead. [stephen a. haines - Ottawa, Canada]
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From Modernization to Globalization: Perspectives on Development and Social Change (Blackwell Readers in Sociology)
J. Timmons Roberts
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The Globalization Reader
ASIN: 0631210970 |
Book Description
Why are some countries poor? What can they do to turn their situations around? What happens to countries and individuals when they move towards being "modern"? What does it mean to "develop" and be "modern" anyway? What are the social effects of the processes of worldwide economic, cultural, and political integration called globalization? From Modernization to Globalization is a reference for scholars, students and development practitioners on the issues of processes of social change and development in the 'Third World'. It provides carefully excerpted samples from both classic and up-to-date writings in the development literature, as well as, a general introduction. Part One reviews formative ideas on the transition to modern society with brief readings from classical theorists. The second part addresses the modernizationists' discussion of how development changes people. The response from dependency and world-system theorists is reviewed in Part Three. The final section includes eight of the most influential writings on the social effects of globalization. Together, this represents an unprecedented compilation important of writings on international development.
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S and S or Scholars and Students.......2000-03-29
Wonderful resource for a birdseye view of significant observations of the world changes for 2000plus. Stimulates individual thought and also excellent for a group discussion launching pad. Scholars and students will find it engaging and meaningful.
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