The No Nonsense Guide to Globalization

by Wayne Ellwood

Book Overview

Globalisation has become one of the most used and encompassing words over the past decade, of undeniable influence in economics, politics and activism. Globalisation is literally all around; every... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1859843360
• ISBN13: 9781859843369
• Release Date: May 2001
• Publisher: Verso
• Length: 143 Pages
• Weight: 0.30 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.4" x 4.5" x 7.3"

Customer Reviews

over all pretty ok

Nothing to brag about, but no complaints either. Shipping was good, price good, service ok.

a pivotal volume in a great series

If you like leftist Canadian thinkers like John Raulston Saul or Linda McQuaig, you'll love this handy little book. It is less obtrusively philosophical than Saul, less earthily anecdotal than McQuaig, but squarely in their broad line of thought. Albeit in a somewhat muted and oblique way, the volume makes it clear that in its root impulses, globalization is an Anglo-Saxon phenomenon: Nixon's abandonment of the gold standard in 1973, Thatcher's coming to power in the UK in 1978. It is odd for a Canadian based series that the major Canadian player of this era - our dear, late PET, despised by Nixon, Regan, Thatcher -- isn't even in the index. Useful facts: the WTO is founded in 1994; its major instrument becomes the 1997 MAI (Multilateral Agreement on Investment). David Korten features heavily in the debate (his mid-90s WHEN CORPORATIONS RULE THE WORLD is not in the bibliography, even if a 1997 follow-up, THE POST-CORPORATE WORLD, is present). What is perhaps the book's most clutching assertion (one Korten had made more or less made in that earlier volume) is on page 73: "For every dollar that is needed to facilitate the trade in real goods, nine dollars is gambled in foreign exchange markets."

Concise, entertaining guide to complex issues

This is a great intro to corporate globalism, and also a good refresher for the more educated folk. Ellwood wonderfully and consicesly gives a quick history of globalization (ie economic colonialism)describes the Bretton Woods Trio, explains and the problems with the rise of speculative investments, among others. I would recommend this book to anyone.