Product Description
The new global economy is linking the fortunes of every nation on every continent -- for good or for ill. Its hallmark is a rising instability and a growing inequality between the first and third worlds, in spite of rising average incomes. The United States and other first world economies are finding it hard to recover after the boom of the 1990s and the bust of the early 21st century. Financial crises in the third world come frequently and are increasingly severe. Globalization is invoked to explain riots, civil disobedience, and as a factor in the rise of terrorism.
Lester Thurow argues now is the time to shape globalization into what we want it to be -- before it's too late. Today, he explains, we are at a critical crossroads in the development of the global economy. We can sit back and let it grow as it will, or we can seize the moment and build economic systems that will minimize instability, allow second and third world countries to thrive, and protect and enhance our own American interests. In short, a win/win global economy that benefits all participants.
Globalization, says Thurow, can be shaped.
In Fortune Favors the Bold, Thurow provides an insightful analysis of the ills of globalization and, more important, offers solutions. He tackles subjects such as:
- The dangers of the burgeoning U.S. trade deficit and the falling dollar
- Solving the problem of intellectual property rights violations
- Restarting Japan's stagnating economy
- How best to help underdeveloped countries enter the global economy
- Reforming the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund
Further, Thurow shows how the economic successes of Ireland and China provide a model for other countries to follow. He even proposes creating anew role for a "Chief Knowledge Officer" to help guide companies and governments in the developing global knowledge-based economy of the 21st century.
Globalization will continue whether we like it our not. We are at a critical moment; great challenges lay ahead, and our economic future is at stake. Now, with Fortune Favors the Bold, we have a map and guidebook to a prosperous economic future.
Amazon.com Review
With Fortune Favors the Bold: What We Must Do to Build a New and Lasting Global Prosperity, Lester Thurow follows on his bestsellers The Zero-Sum Society and The Future of Capitalism by addressing the path to globalization. Thurow--a Professor of Management and Economics at MIT's Sloan School--draws uncompromising conclusions: only a bold embrace of globalization will bring prosperity, and nations that fail to engage in global economics will fall behind the world's dominant powers. He sees three simultaneous revolutions that fuel the rush to global business: the birth of knowledge-based industry, the creation of a global economy built on a worldwide information infrastructure, and the victory of capitalism. But Thurow is not naively optimistic about the prospects for prosperity in this new framework. The U.S. trade deficit, the Chinese export economy, the SARS epidemic, and the stagnating Japanese economy all offer real threats to short-term and long-term well-being.
Some readers will be frustrated that Fortune Favors the Bold does not deliver a detailed set of solutions to these impediments to global prosperity, despite Thurow's thorough research. The U.S. trade deficit, like the absence of international intellectual property rights, he labels a "dilemma": a problem that has no prescriptive answer. Crises will occur, he suggests. The challenge is to prepare for them and manage them well. Thurow urges the creation of new institutions to confront these dilemmas head on, notably the creation of a Chief Knowledge Officer (CKO) for governments and major corporations. The CKO will provide a central intelligence to steer nations and corporations through the difficulties of economic revolution. For Thurow, fortune will favor those leaders who boldly shape globalization and invest in emerging technologies. Those who stand by will be doomed to marginalization. --Patrick O'Kelley
Average Customer Review:
0 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
Pragmatic and well thought, 2005-12-31
Lester Thurow has a penetrating mind. His ideas and arguments are intellectually pure and for that reason invaluable. He is a true CKO - Chief Knowledge Officer.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
Nothing new here, 2005-10-10
I bought this book recently while in Thailand, hoping that Thurow would offer-up something interesting - more or less along the lines of the early 90s work, such as "Head to Head." Not here. I checked the date and the book was initially published in 2003, which means he probably wrote the mainstay in 2002. To me, if you have never thought about globalization and its implications, then buy it. If you have already, then this is nothing more than a collections of truisms that anybody with any interest in the subject would know already.
6 of 17 people found the following review helpful:
How can one be wrong so much and still be called an expert?, 2004-06-08
It is so sad how wrong someone can be proven over and over again and still, he/she is rewarded, called a genius and is allowed to teach our youth. Here is a quote from the author: "Can economic command significantly... accelerate the growth process? The remarkable performance of the Soviet Union suggests that it can... Today the Soviet Union is a country whose economic achievements bear comparison with those of the United States." This was in 1989, just shortly before the Societ Union collapsed. Unfortunately, being this wrong in economics gives one awards and allows you to teach college students while being described a genius. Sad. Mr. Thurow may be a 'genius', but geniuses can be wrong too.
5 of 10 people found the following review helpful:
Infrastructure, 2004-05-29
One of the wildest claims in this book has to do with the question of infrastructure. Thurow claims India has better infrastructure than China. But today the chairman of GE, Jeff Immelt, told his audience in India that they would never catch up with China unless they improve their infrastructure. Immelt said India lagged behind China in health and in things like airports and roads. And this, he said, was a major reason why India was a "disappointing" market for GE.Somebody must be wrong - either the GE chairman or the MIT professor. There are many other errors in this book, not only in facts and statistics, but also in analysis. (Another whopper, of the analysis variety: Thurow says that Confucianism and Communism combined to emphasize education in China, and that this is one reason why China is so highly educated for a developing country. I don't know about Confucianism, but I do know that for years Mao decimated higher education in China, so that at one point college students had the reading ability of a junior high student while junior high students could barely read.)
2 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
Logical and important., 2004-04-20
A thorough and logical overview of economics and globalization, with predictions as well as prescriptions to manage potential problems. Although the predictions may or may not come true, the book is important because it allows readers the opportunity to understand in a clear, readable and factual manner, the issues we face as a "world economy".
If you want to read only one book which explains globalization, the rationale behind government run fiscal policies, the impact of trade deficits, and changing roles of governments and the world bank, this is a great one.