A Future Perfect - Softcover

Micklethwaite, John

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0712673989 ISBN 13: 9780712673983

Publisher: Random House Business Books, 2001

Synopsis

This text is a powerful, level-headed defence of globalization - a phenomenon which is enhancing our concept of individual freedom. It looks at the shanty towns of Sao Paulo and the London that has revolutionized the telecommunications industry, to answer questions about the future in this age of globalization. The book questions aspects of politics and society and unveils a new meritocratic global ruling class, which it dubs "Cosmocrats", as well as addressing the winners in the globalization process it covers the losers - from car workers in the US to the environment in Bangkok.

About this title

Review

"Globalisation is the single most important force in the world today", write journalists John Micklethwait and Adrian Wooldridge, both of The Economist (and coauthors of The Witch Doctors):

The integration of the world economy is not only reshaping business but also reordering the lives of individuals, creating new social classes, different jobs, unimaginable wealth, and, occasionally, wretched poverty. From Washington to Beijing, politicians are increasingly defined in terms of their attitudes toward globalisation. The key political arguments of the next few years--between Islam and the West, Eurosceptics and Europhiles, the new left and the old--will all be variations arising from one underlying conflict: the one between globalisers who want to see the world reshaped in their own image and traditionalists who want to preserve fragments of traditional culture and local independence.

Micklethwait and Wooldridge are advocates of the former, not the latter. In A Future Perfect--a rich synthesis of anecdote, analysis, and argument--they make a strong case both for globalisation's economic benefits and its classically liberal underpinnings. They acknowledge frustration with public debates over globalisation that "always seem to involve a shuttered textile factory in South Carolina, never a young African child sitting at a computer; always a burning Amazonian forest, never a young Brazilian investment banker; always The Lion King or the Spice Girls, never the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao." A Future Perfect relentlessly reports the upside of globalisation--the book is full of stories--and makes the vital point that more than economics is at stake. At bottom, write Micklethwait and Wooldridge, the issue is freedom. They bemoan "restrictions on where people can go, what they can buy, where they can invest, and what they can read, hear, or see. Globalisation by its nature brings down these barriers, and it helps to hand the power to choose to the individual." Like a good article in The Economist, A Future Perfect is well written and concise. It also renders complicated subjects understandable, and has the welcome effect of making readers feel more intelligent for having cracked its spine. Much has been written about globalisation; this book may be the best of the lot thus far. --John J. Miller

Review

‘A spectacular success.’ -- Foreign Affairs

‘Entertaining and instructive’ -- Sunday Times

‘Fills a yawning void with a magisterial case for the most powerful - and life enhancing - force on earth: globalisation.' -- Tom Peters

‘Makes a strong liberal case for globalisation...clear and even light-hearted...an excellent book.' -- Independent

‘One of the few clear-headed books on [globalisation].‘ -- The Times

‘Persuasive...important...passionate and readable... they take up the argument for globalisation with refreshing candour and verve' -- The Industry Standard

‘This well-informed and often entertaining book will do much to build the Mickelthwait and Woolridge brand – globally of course’ -- Sunday Telegraph

About this edition

• Publisher: Random House Business Books
• Publication date: 2001
• ISBN 10: 0712673989
• ISBN 13: 9780712673983
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 432