End of the Line
By Barry C. Lynn
Rating – 5 stars
February 19, 2006
Global Diversification Re-examined
On September 21, 1999 an earthquake that registered 7.6 on
the Richter scale
rocked Taiwan. Despite the death toll of 2,400, the quake barely registered in
the consciousness of most Americans.
Watching the news would lead even the most cosmopolitan
American observer to conclude that people in this country were more interested
in North Carolina. Hurricane Floyd dropped more than 28 inches of rain there the
week before.
Yet the shock wave from the quake was felt within days.
Xilinx, a highly-specialized American semiconductor designer and manufacturer,
lost two of its factories that day in Taiwan. Soon, thousands of assembly-line
workers located from California to Texas, were furlogued.
The chain reaction did not stop there. Wall Street
traders began to place the Taiwanese natural disaster in its proper
prospective. Shares of Dell, Apple and Hewlett-Packard began to tumble.
By Christmas, American shoppers were scurrying to avoid the
shortages of laptop computers, Barbie cash registers and Furby dolls.
In short a disaster that only 10 years prior would have
been a localized disaster, cascaded into a worldwide crisis. The Taiwanese
earthquake had elevated itself into a symbol of how closely connected the world
has become. Perhaps, more important, Barry Lynn, a fellow at the New American
Foundation in Washington, D. C. illustrates how that out-sourced world faces
different risks.
Lynn argues today’s worldwide economy is an improvisation
that creates and distributes wealth in ways beyond the control of its designers.
In this well-written and well-researched monograph is an at
times angry look at globalization. It offers a departure from the now familiar
argument that interconnected, worldwide capitalism is good. In its place, the
author offers a subtle and often scary look at a risk-laden system beyond any
government's control.
Lynn’s arguments promise to add clarity to this nation’s
growing global debate.
