|
The Lexus and the Olive Tree
|
||||||||||||||||||||
Buying Choices |
| 49 new from $2.59 |
| 268 used from $0.01 |
| 25 collectible from $2.99 |
(as of 2012-10-07 02:16:40 PST)
Description
The Pulitzer Prize-winning author of "From Beirut to Jerusalem" offers a brilliant investigation of globalization, the most significant socioeconomic trend in the world today, and how it is affecting everything we do--economically, politically, and culturally--abroad and at home.| Check All Offers | Add to Wish List | Customer Reviews |
Editorial Review
One day in 1992, Thomas Friedman toured a Lexus factory in Japan and marveled at the robots that put the luxury cars together. That evening, as he ate sushi on a Japanese bullet train, he read a story about yet another Middle East squabble between Palestinians and Israelis. And it hit him: Half the world was lusting after those Lexuses, or at least the brilliant technology that made them possible, and the other half was fighting over who owned which olive tree.Friedman, the well-traveled New York Times foreign-affairs columnist, peppers The Lexus and the Olive Tree with stories that illustrate his central theme: that globalization--the Lexus--is the central organizing principle of the post-cold war world, even though many individuals and nations resist by holding onto what has traditionally mattered to them--the olive tree.
Problem is, few of us understand what exactly globalization means. As Friedman sees it, the concept, at first glance, is all about American hegemony, about Disneyfication of all corners of the earth. But the reality, thank goodness, is far more complex than that, involving international relations, global markets, and the rise of the power of individuals (Bill Gates, Osama Bin Laden) relative to the power of nations.
No one knows how all this will shake out, but The Lexus and the Olive Tree is as good an overview of this sometimes brave, sometimes fearful new world as you'll find. --Lou Schuler
Book Details | ||||
| Author: Thomas L. Friedman | Publisher: Farrar, Straus and.. | Binding: Hardcover | Language: English | Pages: 289 |
Comments |
Become a fan of Book Presence on Facebook for the inside scoop on latest and most exclusive books.