现代大学精读英语4 lesson eight课文(外语教学出版社).doc

Lesson 8 Globalizations Dual PowerAt the edge of a new century, globalization is a double-edged sword: a powerful vehicle that raises economic growth, spreads new technology and increases living standards in rich and poor countries alike, but also an immensely controversial process that assaults national sovereignty, erodes local culture and tradition and threatens economic and social instability. A daunting question of the 21st century is whether nations will control this great upheaval or whether it will come to control them. In some respects globalization is merely a trendy word for an old process. What we call the market is simply the joining of buyers and sellers, producers and consumers and savers and investors. Economic history consists largely of the story of the markets expansion: from farm to town, from region to nation and from nation to nation. In the 20th century, the Depression and two world wars retarded the markets growth. But after World War II ended, it reaccelerated, driven by political pressures and better technology. The Cold War, from the late 1940s through the 1980s, caused the United States to champion trade liberalization and economic growth as a way of combating communism. A succession of major trade negotiations reduced average tariffs in industrialized countries to about 5 percent in 1990 from about 40 percent in 1946. After two world wars, Europeans saw economic unification as an antidote to deadly nationalism. Technology complemented politics. Even before the Internet, declining costs for communication and transportation from jet planes, better undersea telephone cables and satellites favored more global commerce. By the early 1990s, world exports (after adjusting for inflation) were nearly 10 times higher than they had been four decades earlier. Globalization continues this process but also departs from it in at least one critical respect. Until recently, countries were viewed as distinct economic entities, connected mainly by trade. Now, this is becoming less true. Companies and financial markets increasingly disregard national borders when making production, marketing and investment decisions. As recently as 1990, governments either individually or through such multilateral institutions as the World Bank provided half the loans and credits to 29 major developing countries (including Brazil, China, India, South Korea and Mexico), according to the Institute for International Finance, a banking industry research group in Washington. A decade later, even after Asias 1997-98 financial crisis, private capital flows dwarf governmental flows. In 1999, private flows (bank loans, bond financing, equity investment in local stock markets and direct investment by multinational companies) totaled an estimated $136 billion to these 29 countries, compared with government capital flows of $22 billion, according to the institute. Meanwhile, multinational companies have gone on an international acquisition binge. In the first half of 1999 alone, the value of new cross-border mergers and acquisitions passed $500 billion in both advanced and developing countries. The total roughly matched the amount for all 1998 ($544 billion) and was almost seven times larger than the 1991 levels ($85 billion), according to the World Investment Report by the United Nations. The recent takeover struggle between British and German wireless giants Vodafone AirTouch PLC and Mannesmann AG is exceptional only for its size and bitterness. Behind the merger boom lies the growing corporate conviction that many markets have become truly global. By trying to maximize their presence in as many nations as possible, companies seek to achieve economies of scale that is, to lower costs through higher sales and production volumes and to stay abreast of technological changes that can now occur almost anywhere. In addition, companies increasingly organize production globally, dividing product design, component manufacturing and final assembly among many countries. But it is not just multinational companies, seeking bigger sales and profits, that drive globalization. Governments do, too. In Europe, the relentless pursuit of the single market is one indicator. This reflects a widespread recognition that European companies will be hard-pressed to compete in global markets if their local operations are hamstrung by fragmented national markets. Among poorer countries, the best sign of support is the clamor to get into the World Trade Organization. Since 1995, seven countries Bulgaria, Ecuador, Estonia, Kyrgyzstan, Latvia, Mongolia and Panama have joined. And 32 (the largest being China) are seeking membership. There is a belief that global trade and investment can aid economic development by providing new products, technologies and management skills. Its no myth. Countries succeed or fail mainly based on their own workers, investment and government policies. But engaging the wider world economy can help. Consider Asia. Despite its financial crisis, rapid trade expansion and economic growth sharply cut the number of the desperately poor. From 1987 to 1998, those in the region, including China, with incomes of $1 or less a day dropped to 15 percent from 27 percent of the population, the World Bank estimates. Meanwhile, Latin America and sub-Saharan Africa whose embrace of the world economy has been late or limited fared much less well. In Africa, for example, the World Bank reckons that 46 percent of the population lived on less than $1 a day in 1998, exactly what the percentage was in 1987. Well, if globalization is so good, why is it also so risky? The answer is that two problems could neutralize its potential benefits. The first is economic instability. The global economy may be prone to harsher boom-bust cycles than national economies individually. The theory that international trade and investment raise living standards works only if investment funds are well used and if trade flows do not become too lopsided. The Asian financial crisis raised questions on both counts. In the early 1990s, most of Asia thrived because it received vast flows of foreign capital as bank loans, direct investment in factories or stock-market investment in local companies. The ensuing spending boom in turn aided Europe, Japan and the United States by increasing imports from them. Then the boom abruptly halted in mid-1997 when it became apparent that as a result of crony capitalism, inept government investment policies and excess optimism, much of the investment had been wasted on unneeded factories, office buildings and apartments. What prevented the Asian crisis from becoming a full-scale global economic downturn has been the astonishing U.S. economy. Its relentless growth helped the rest of the world by purchasing more and more of their exports. Since 1996, the U.S. current-account deficit in its balance of payments the broadest measure of the countrys international trade has more than doubled, from $129 billion to an estimated total of $330 billion in 1999. The world economy, as Treasury Secretary Lawrence Summers has repeatedly said, has been flying on one engine. The trouble is, as Mr. Summers has also warned, this cannot go on forever. The great danger is that the world has become too dependent on American prosperity and that a slowdown or recession reflecting a decline in the stock market, a loss of consumer confidence or higher interest rates might snowball into a international slump. By economic forecasts, Europe and Japan are going to do better. In 2000, the European Unions gross domestic product will grow 2.8 percent, up from 2.1 percent in 1999, according to projections by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development in Paris. Japan is projected to grow 1.4 percent, the same as the OECD is predicting for 1999 but a big improvement from the 2.8 percent drop in 1998. If the forecasts materialize and the OECDs growth estimates for Japan exceed most private forecasts they will restore some balance to the world economy and relieve fears of a global recession. Asia and Latin America can continue to recover without relying solely on exports to the United States. But until that happens, no one can be certain that Asias financial crisis has truly ended. It remains possible that abrupt surges of global capital, first moving into Asia and then out, will have caused, with some delay, a larger instability. Globalizations other problem is political, cultural and social. People feel threatened by any kind of economic change and change from abroad naturally seems especially alien and menacing. The street protesters at the Seattle meeting of the World Trade Organization in early December may have lacked a common agenda or even a coherent case against trade. But they accurately reflected the anxiety and anger that globalization often inspires. So do European fears of genetically modified food or nationalistic opposition to cross-border mergers. What is local and familiar is suddenly being replaced or assaulted by something that is foreign and unfamiliar. And even if trade helps most people, it will usually create some losers. In the United States, workers in some high-cost industries steel and autos, most conspicuously suffered from intensified import competition. Just because globalization is largely spontaneous propelled by better communications and transportation does not mean that it is inevitable or completely irreversible. Governments can, in subtle and not-so-subtle ways, shield local industries and workers against imports o