varnam

One of my favourite books is The Lexus and the Olive Tree, which was a great introduction to the fundamentals of Globalization. After that I read two of Friedman's books, Longitudes and Attitudes : The World in the Age of Terrorism and From Beirut to Jerusalem both excellent books. Now he has a new book, The World Is Flat: A Brief History of the Twenty-first Century.

The reviewer in WaPo writes

Friedman also does not have a compelling rebuttal for Harvard's Michael Sandel, who calls Flat World's new horizontal collaboration "just a nice name for the ability to hire cheap labor in India." For instance, Indian techies had the manpower and ambition to do the "huge, tedious job" of fixing the West's Y2K computer bug, giving India a surge of IT business that Friedman calls "a second Indian Independence Day." But India's Y2K windfall could be read just as easily as a sign of dependence, of reliance on tasks that American workers no longer want. Friedman rightly notes that "low-wage, low-prestige jobs in America . . . become high-wage, high-prestige jobs" when outsourced to India. But in an era where, as Friedman puts it, both pride and humiliation get served up to you via fiber-optic cable, it's not at all clear we'll like the long-term geopolitical consequences of having emerging powers reliant on scraps from the American economic table.

While The World Is Flat is not a classic like From Beirut to Jerusalem, it is still an enthralling read. To his great credit, Friedman embraces much of his flat world's complexity, and his reporting brings to vibrant life some beguiling characters and trends. If his book is marred by an exasperating reliance on the first person and a surplus of catch phrases (" 'Friedman,' I said to myself, looking at this scene, 'you are so twentieth-century. . . . You are so Globalization 2.0' "), it is also more lively, provocative and sophisticated than the overwhelming bulk of foreign policy commentary these days. We've no real idea how the 21st century's history will unfold, but this terrifically stimulating book will certainly inspire readers to start thinking it all through. �?� [The Great Leveling]

The Economist has scathing review

This kind of imprecision�??less kind readers might even use the word �??sloppiness�?��??permeates Mr Friedman's book. It begins with an account of Christopher Columbus, who sets out to find India only to run into the Americas. Mr Friedman claims that this proved Columbus's thesis that the world is round. It did nothing of the kind. Proof that the world is round came only in 1522, when the sole surviving ship from Ferdinand Magellan's little fleet returned to Spain.

Undaunted by this fact, Mr Friedman portrays himself as a modern-day Columbus. Like the Italian sailor, he also makes a startling discovery�??this time on a trip to India�??though it turns out to be just the opposite of Columbus's. An entrepreneur in Bangalore tells him that �??the playing field is being levelled�?� between competitors there and in America by communications technology. The phrase haunts Mr Friedman. He chews it over, and over, and over. And then it comes to him: �??My God, he's telling me the world is flat!�?�

Of course, the entrepreneur, even by Mr Friedman's own account, said nothing of the kind. But Mr Friedman has discovered his metaphor for globalisation, and now nothing will stop him. He shows his readers no mercy, proceeding to flog this inaccurate and empty image to death over hundreds of pages. [Confusing Columbus (subscription required)]

I can see the Economist's point of view as Friedman is big on metaphors and theories like "no two nations having McDonald's have gone to war". But that apart, what is fascinating in his books is the amount of travel he does and the types of people he meets. He is not an armchair quarterback and his theories come from interacting with newsmakers and ordinary folks all around the world.

This is one book I have added to my list of books to be read.