.............................................................. >From the New Paradigms Project [Not Necessarily Endorsed]: From: Remy C. <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: endsecrecy list <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: [endsecrecy] A Future Perfect Date: Thursday, May 18, 2000 6:23 PM [From a bunch of folks who think Globalization is a good thing. Interesting that there's not mention of Trilateral or Bilderberg in their index... Remy C] From: http://www.afutureperfect.com/interview.htm A conversation with John Micklethwait and Adrian Wooldridge, authors of A FUTURE PERFECT: The Challenge and Hidden Promise of Globalization Why did you write this book? Who is your target audience? A Future Perfect has two huge aims. The first is to try and make sense of this great, uneven, often wonderful, sometimes contradictory and occasionally cruel process that is globalization. The second is to build a defense of it – a defense that both admits globalization’s weaknesses and also relies on more than just dry economic figures. When most politicians or businesspeople try to defend globalization they talk about it increasing efficiency. That’s fine, but the same could be said for the lemon squeezer or the lavatory. Globalization, we think, needs to be connected to individual liberty. That is its hidden promise. About 800,000 Americans read the Economist, and we think every one of them is a potential reader. But we’d also like to bring in readers who have never even read the Economist. Globalization affects us all, and we have tried to write a lively, opinionated book that everybody can understand. Yes, we deal with meaty questions, but we do so by looking at quirky businesses, like the sex industry and the funeral business, and introducing engaging people, like the king of Los Angeles’s Toytown, Charlie Woo. You point out that “globalization” means all sorts of things to all sorts of people. How do you define it? The simple answer is that it is a process of international integration – of walls coming down and frontiers being undermined. But you have to remember two things. First, it’s not just a commercial phenomenon, but a political, social, and cultural one. Daimler buying Chrysler is part of globalization; but so too is the new Guggenheim Bilbao or grilled Chilean sea bass in a restaurant in Manhattan. And, second, globalization is an unfinished process, not a fait accomplit. The best way to think about globalization is as a series of waves crashing in on a shore. The winds driving these waves – like deregulation and technology – are real enough. But they have left behind an economy which is much less integrated than most people think. For instance, exports to Asia account for just 2.5% of America’s GDP: destroy Asia, and, for most firms, it would be like removing Milwaukee. And you can stretch the wave analogy in two other ways. There is definitely an undertow: the same winds that whip up, say, a global television channel like CNN or MTV also produce ever more local TV programming in most cities in the world. And, second, the tide can change: it can go out. Do you mean that globalization is reversible? Yes. By many measures the world was much more global 100 years ago. Pundits at the time babbled about how wonderful new things like the telephone meant that countries could never go to war, and that trade barriers would continue to fall. But globalization relies on political will. Look around the world, and many of the key political arguments – between Islam and the West, Euroskeptics and Europhiles, the new Left and the old – are all variations on this one underlying conflict. Globalization ought to win, but politically it’s a hard sell. There’s a backlash building up around the world – witness the riots in Seattle and Washington, the conflicts between Europe and the United States over food, the growing resentment against American “cultural imperialism” – that could wreck the current period of global integration. What do you consider the five biggest myths about globalization? First, that it means that big faceless corporations will rule. In fact globalization tends to help small firms, even small low-tech ones like the Madini family’s perfumery in the Bazaar in Tangiers, by bringing the world to their door. Second, that it means the triumph of global products. There are very few Coca-Colas, and even that sugary substance has to change its formula just to keep different parts of Japan happy. Third, that it is a “zero sum game” where one part of the world has to lose for another to win: this is just plain wrong. Fourth, that it has changed basic economics: even such a powerful force as globalization cannot explain why shares should be worth 300 times earnings. And, fifth, that it has killed geography. If you remove barriers, the advantages that come from being based in a particular place, like Silicon Valley or Hollywood, matter more rather than less. What’s the main lesson you draw from the riots in Seattle last December? Seattle was a battle between one group of people with a minimal grasp of politics – the bureaucrats of the World Trade Organisation – and another with a minimal grasp of economics. The WTO is actually one of the more open global institutions, but it still often acts as if it is accountable to nobody. On the other hand the main losers from Seattle were the very people that many of the protesters claimed they were trying to help. The world’s poorest people would gain most from opening up trade. You talk about a new ruling class called the Cosmocrats. Who are they? The cosmocrats are the people who possess the ideas, connections and sheer chutzpah to master the global economy. Cosmopolitan in taste and usually Anglo-American in outlook, these are the people who attend business schools, fill up the business-class lounges at international airports, provide the officer ranks of most of the world’s companies and international institutions. This ruling class is more meritocratic that previous ones (anyone who attends a good university or produces a good idea can join it), and it is much broader, numbering some twenty million people world-wide. But it also has severe weaknesses. It is plagued by anxiety: there is always the threat that somebody, somewhere, will produce a smarter idea. And it has no local roots and few local responsibilities. It is no accident that the ugliest center of wealth in human history – Silicon Valley – is also a centre of cosmocrats. What about the people who are worse off because of globalization? Unfortunately, many of the most decent people we met while researching this book were those who had done worst because of globalization. The doctrine of competitive advantage is wonderful if you have advantages with which to be competitive. But what if you have a history of oppression, poor education and malign government? Or what if you are on the wrong side of the technological revolution? We classify the losers into three groups – the has-beens, the storm damage, and the non-starters – and we examine their prospects through detailed studies of three individuals: Dwight Bobo, a car maker in Flint, Michigan; Sergei Orelsky, a Russian yuppie who was wiped out by his country’s economic crisis; and Reginaldo and Rose Marie Gobetti, who live in a Brazilian slum. Naysayers argue that globalization is just another means for the rich countries of the world to exploit the poor countries. Is there any truth to that? Some, but usually the opposite is true. The removal of barriers allows people in poor countries to compete with those in rich ones. And the spread of management ideas, the flow of capital, and a technological revolution that is making computer power ever cheaper makes it easier for poor people to compete on equal terms. The barriers that America and Europe have erected around industries like textiles and agriculture amount to a systematic act of cruelty against countries that can export little else. The people who shout loudest about exploitation are usually vested interests that are unwilling to compete with the rest of the world. Who has a better handle on globalization – Al Gore or George W. Bush? In terms of experience, Al Gore wins hands-down. A consummate global politician, he was a brave defender of NAFTA against Ross Perot. Our worries about him center on some of his hazy environmental thinking and his recent attempts to court union votes by muttering about fair trade. We also think that when it comes to education reform, which will be crucial to America’s future in a global economy, his hands are tied by his allegiance to the Luddite teachers unions. George W. Bush has been a strong supporter of immigration as governor of Texas, a consistent supporter of free trade, and a fairly bold educational reformer. Globalization, properly presented, could be a good issue for Bush. When the Asia crisis hit in 1997, many feared it would wreck the entire global economy. Why did it not? There are two reasons why the crisis didn’t wreck the whole world economy. First, as we said, the Asian economy just isn’t big enough. Second, the Asian contagion was not a disease to which everyone was susceptible. It struck only in countries that met certain conditions. The crisis was essentially a verdict on their poor economic policies: the cronyish relationship between companies and governments, and particularly those governments’ attempt to funnel foreign capital into favored companies. On the other hand, it would be wrong just to write off the contagion as a little local difficulty. The IMF in particular had an uneven record. The markets behaved rationally in one way – they exposed a weakness – but it is hard to claim that the massive swings (in either direction) were fully justified. Our solutions tend to focus on the banks: borrowed money is always the gelignite of financial crises. Will we ever have a single global currency? Would it be a good idea to have one? The idea of a single international currency was actually discussed prior to the post-World War II Bretton Woods conference. In theory, it would put an end to capital flights, competitive devaluation and inflation; above all it would make it more difficult for governments to intervene in business people ’s lives. But the problem lies with the practicality of this solution. It has taken Europe centuries to produce a single currency. And it is hard to see countries at different stages of development and different positions in the economic cycle converging on the same currency. It is much more likely that the world will develop into three regional currency blocks – a dollar zone, a yen zone and the Euro zone. Will globalization lead to the triumph of American popular culture? Disneyfication, McWorld and Cocacolonization are feared wherever chablis is drunk, and in some industries – such as movies – it’s a reasonable fear. Three-quarters of the films watched in Europe are American. But look at, say, pop music, where the British have always given the Americans a run for their money. Fashion is dominated by the Europeans; so too are parts of the theatre industry and publishing. In television, the local shows are always the most popular. Given the number of American kids trading Pokemon cards (a dangerous Japanese import) and parents tuning in to “Who wants to be a Millionaire?” (from Britain), perhaps the United States needs a cultural ministry to thwart such foreign contamination. Globalization does not involve the triumph of any particular culture at the expense of another. It opens people's minds to an unprecedented range of ideas and influences. And it encourages cultural mixing on an unprecedented and thoroughly admirable scale. Some of the products that do well may pander to our worst tastes; others will inspire our better instincts. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Paying too much for organizational calls? Join beMANY! 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