Respond to Amiri in 100 words
Discussion response to globalization
Other than ancient geographers who believed the world being flat, I haven’t seen the term coined in a recent article. There are conflicting opinions regarding the ” Earth being flat”, not in a geographic sense but referring to a political point of view. In some ways, I agree with both perspectives as they both have a valid point backed up with evidence. I can definitely see the Earth being flat is some scenarios and not in others. However, after reading both articles, I see myself leaning toward Ghemawat’s point of view. There are many reasons for this. First of all, many people on this planet barely leave their home cities, let alone visit another country. Because of this, it may seem to the ordinary civilian that the world is indeed flat but that can be misleading as not many of us have visited and lived in communities in other countries. How many of us have lived in an African city or lived in the Middle East. That is precisely why I agree with Ghemawat’s statement on how we have not experienced Globalization to it’s fullest extent yet and therefore we can’t say that the world is truly ” flat”. There are many nations that are half developed and many that are considered to be failed states. The world that we know of around us is totally different a few hundred miles to the south. The difference is larger than night and day. Even though the rate of globalization has defiantly increased as of recent, there is much work that needs to be done in order to complete this ambitious goal. Another major factor is that half of the world will always be more modernized than the other half. Electric cars are not existent in many countries yet are a major part of Californian lifestyle. Not all countries are democratic as well. In this present day, Socialism and Authoritianism still holds a major grip on a significant portion of the global population. I also agree that Friedman definitely exaggerated in his report. Sure the idea is compelling and is definitely a possibility in the future but that is still years ahead of us. There are also many things stopping us from reaching that goal. War in Ukraine, tension between China and the West regarding Taiwan and Hong Kong, and a degrading environment are all major red flags that we can’t shy away from. I believe that in order to reach globalization, we need to start working to preserve our environment, achieve world peace, and spread democratic ideas. Much of the world is suffering. People are starving in many countries and many are being massacred such as the Rohingya of Myanmar and the Uighurs of Western China. We cannot turn a blind eye to these global events. Globalization is defined as spreading international influence. Much of the world is actively suppressing western and modern ideologies. The world economy is in shambles in many countries. Africa is still a shell of itself. Iran and North Korea are still developing Nuclear weapons. Russia just setback Europe’s globalization progress by at least 40 years by invading the second largest country in Europe, Ukraine, causing an international crisis. This is not the only present International crisis. And here in the United States, people are being massacred due to a lack of gun control laws. Covid 19 is still a major pandemic that continue to spike despite vaccination efforts. We are not close to Globalization but we are closer than we were 30 years ago. The progress we have made is astounding and continues to climb. And because of this, Globalization is very much possible. Just not yet.
Discussion political economy of development
Word count 200
This week, we are going back to our early discussion on Haiti. We are going to revisit the topic that was surfaced by David Brooks, the role of culture in economic development. We are going to do so using different articles and through looking at different locations (Israel and Palestine). While these articles are a bit older, they offer such a perfect lens into these ideas that they are worth exploring and still quite relevant. Interestingly, the authors of one of our articles (Acemoglu & Robinson) also provided the counter argument to Brooks’ piece that we saw earlier.
Read:
“Uncultured: Mitt Romney Doesn’t Know Much About Economic History” from Foreign Policy
Try this pdf if you can’t access the Foreign Policy Link
“Romney Hasn’t Done His Homework” from The New York Times
Try this pdf if you can’t access the NY Times.
“Culture Matters — Just Not as Much as Romney Thinks” from Bloomberg Businessweek
Try this pdf if you can’t get the link to work!
Before Wednesday at 11:59pm: respond to the following initial question(s)
Question: Poor Mitt Romney! I don’t want you all to feel that I am trying to pick on him with the selection of articles this week. However, his remarks generated a wealth of responses that are invaluable in helping us look at the role of culture with a variety of responses from qualified experts.
Here are the questions you need to answer: Three selections here (Acemoglu and Robinson, Diamond, and Kenny) offer three different perspectives on whether development is shaped mainly by culture, by institutions, or by geography and other conditions that cannot be altered.
Which of these perspectives is most intuitively appealing to you? – Why?
Now, assume that a classmate finds another perspective more appealing. What are the challenges that would arise if you try to “prove” to her or him your preferred theory is the most effective? Do these challenges imply that debates of this kind cannot be resolved?
