Reading notes:

最近读了一本书（ Fortune Favors the Bold 作者： 麻省理工大学 SLOAN 商学院教授 Lester Thurow, HarperCollins Publishers, 2003 ），作者论述了构建全球一体化经济体系过程中的一些问题和思考。作者思考的角度当然是一个美国学者的角度，但该书就内容和语言表达来说都很有可读性。关于构建世界经济一体化的来自不同人群的不同的声音的论述，我做了一些笔记。

The beginning of the work goes:

Globalization is much like the biblical Tower of Babel . The construction of a global economy has begun. ….

As in the biblical Tower of Babel those involved in constructing the global economy are speaking many different languages. Globalization means many different things to many different people. ….

Here, the many different languages refer to arguments for and against the building of a global economic tower of Babel . And these arguments may

… stop a global economy from being built --- just as they stopped the biblical tower design to go to heaven from being built.

With China as an example, I somewhat understand the arguments for it but I am interested in knowing why there are voices against it and what they are against. I turn to Chapter 4 for the answer.

1.       People in many countries see the American position at the top of the global tower.

To them globalization is an American construction project built without their input and over their objections. …. Public opinion polls show that large majorities of the world’s population, even in traditionally friendly countries, think the spread of American ideas and customs is a bad idea. 50 percent think so is in Britain , 58 percent in Italy , 67 percent in Germany , and 71 percent in France . Only Japan , with 35 percent, comes in at less t6han a majority viewing American ideas  and customs negatively.

The reasons for people to think so are:

Americans have the advantage of having had the experience of playing a very similar game. Americans don’t have to change very much, whereas the rest of the world has to change quite a bit to accommodate globalization.

2.       One anti-globalization group is easy to understand: religious objectors. They want to withdraw from globalization because they it is carrying ideas that threaten their view of the world. They are going to stand aside from globalization to practice their religious belief.

3.       There are objections to globalization from two groups: objections from the left, who wish to build a good society, where economic fairness and personal freedom reign; and objections from the right, who do not wish to see a world with people from all races living happily together. The left wing don’t want to see a society which is the American variant --“cowboy capitalism” or the survival-of-the-fittest capitalism; and the right wing have the fear that immigration threatens national culture and ethnic homogeneity. In their eyes, globalization leads to mongrelization.

Prof. Thurow writes in the conclusion part of the chapter:

Of all the voices objecting to globalization, none may end up being as convincing as SARS. Globalization requires travel. SARS prevents travel. .

What he means to say is :

What the left wants – the end of capitalism – it cannot have; what the right wants – no immigration – it should not get. Keeping out the global culture is possible only if a country is willing to cut itself off electronically so its citizens cannot surf the Internet or get satellite TV. No one is going to do this. Isolated national cultures are headed toward extinction if they are not already extinct.

As to the fears that an invasion of some American-dominated global culture will change a local culture, he writes:

The fears make sense only if the locals believe they have a culture that is ultimately unattractive to their own young people. Similarly, fears that immigrants will destroy a local culture make sense only if locals believe their culture is ultimately unattractive to outsiders. The rational response for anyone with these beliefs is to work to make their local culture more attractive.

China constantly talks about reform, an important part of which is internationalization. Chinese

have a mindset that quickly comes to think of those necessary changes as good things and not bad things imposed by an outside “foreign ” world.

Good or bad, Chinese are ready to change and embrace foreign influences with open arms. We do not seem to care very much about going capitalistic or Americanized or destroying the cultural homogeneity. What Chinese do care about is getting wealthy and powerful. J However, what we do need to think about at the same time is how to restore the attractiveness of the national culture so that to make real contribution to the construction of the global economic tower of Babel, although whether or not the tower can be completed is far from being predictable and it may have the same destiny of the Biblical Tower of Babel.