Thursday, September 03, 2009

Globalization is Good


Click arrow to start video.

The world is an unequal and unjust place, in which some are born into wealth and some into hunger and misery. To explore why, in this controversial Channel Four documentary the young Swedish writer Johan Norberg takes the viewers on a journey to Taiwan, Vietnam, Kenya and Brussels to see the impact of globalisation, and the consequences of its absence. It makes the case that the problem in the world is not too much capitalism, globalisation and multinationals, but too little.

"Globalisation is Good" tells a tale of two countries that were equally poor 50 years ago - Taiwan and Kenya. Today Taiwan is 20 times richer than Kenya. We meet the farmers and entrepreneurs that could develop Taiwan because it introduced a market economy and integrated into global trade. And we meet the Kenyan farmers and slum dwellers that are still desperately poor, because Kenya shut its door to globalisation. The Kenyans are suffering from regulations, corruption and the lack of property rights. The unequal distribution in the world is a result of the unequal distribution of capitalism - those who have capitalism grow rich, those who don't stay poor.

MP: This is from 2003, but the message is as relevant today as it was six years ago. Via the Adam Smith Institute.

Posted 7:24 AM Post Link 4 Comments

4 Comments:

At 9/03/2009 2:47 PM, Blogger QT said...

Excellent video. Would really like to see this type of film shown in schools.

Unfortunately, schools are more likely to run The Story of Stuff or Al Gore's Inconvenient Truth.

 
At 9/03/2009 4:57 PM, Blogger QT said...

Anon.,

There are worse things than socialism.

A few choice quotes from The Club of Rome

..then there's the new Green Jobs' Czar, Van Jones. The link to the origins of cultural marxism aka political correctness makes interesting reading.

 
At 9/03/2009 5:11 PM, Anonymous Benny The Free Marketeer said...

I like free trade, but there is more to it. Culture is enormous, and possibly even innate abilities.
Asians score higher on intelligence tests, and many Asian cultures are renowned for their ethics and work ethics.
In fact, most Asian cultures are not free traders, but state-run economies. And they are roaring past the United States.
I happen to believe they might do better with a dose of free enterprise, but they might reply they are doing fine thank you, and some social stability is worth a point or two in GNP growth.
Israel is another country that has wrested a middle-class lifestyle out of a waste-desert, even with a sword at its throat everyday. It is a socialist country.
The free market and price mechanism do work wonders though.

 
At 9/08/2009 8:32 AM, Anonymous Mark Gendala said...

---GLOBALISING THE GLOBALISERS---

Economics professors - as of tomorrow your lectures will be delivered via videoconferencing screens from Asia for only 10%
of your salaries...
How are you going to feed your families?

Sincerely,
Mark Gendala
Melbourne, Australia
www.ssotu.com

 

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