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Lexus And The Olive Tree Quotes

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“The World is 10 years old”. This is one of the opening quotes in Thomas Friedman’s book, The Lexus and the Olive Tree. He says it was born when the Berlin wall fell. As soon as the Cold War Era ended, we began a new, prosperous era of globalization. The world is now 26 years old (16 years since Friedman wrote the book) and this era of globalization is more evident than ever. With every day that passes in this somewhat new era, the world shrinks. The 7 billion people that reside on planet earth are more closely connected and intertwined than ever before. Globalization takes all the world’s economies and merges them together, not allowing any action to be taken without a consequence. In his book, Friedman argues that the world is undergoing …show more content…

He develops a metaphor for the system that must be used in order to be successful with globalization. He calls it the Golden Straight Jacket. He first eludes to the previous eras of globalization in which there was more than one system of government and economics that were be using around the globe. But he says that in this era the Golden Straight Jacket must be worn by every country in order to be successful and that is free-market capitalism. Now I feel that for some countries this represents the Lexus as they must innovate to catch up with this system. However for other countries such as the United States and Great Britain, this system has been implemented throughout their histories and is more representative of the Olive Tree. Friedman says that the Golden Straight Jacket keeps the economy competitive, which in counter to arguments made my Mandela and others, means that even though this era of globalization can leave people behind quicker than ever, it can help people financially catch up just as quick. Capitalism provides equality of opportunity in contrast to equality of reward. The world is a competitive place and they like to rank nations to show who the best is and who needs to improve. Freidman does this with another metaphor. He compares countries to a computer processing system. He names the operating system DOSCapital …show more content…

So that must mean that the US has a large role to play in globalization. Freidman explains this role in the four section of his book. He explains that the US is ahead in globalization because of ration exuberance (more assets than liabilities), geographic position, military power, culture, linguistics, economics and finance. I agree with all of these points and I feel that the US is without doubt the best suited country and most powerful country in this globalized system. Probably my argument that Freidman makes in his book is the five gas stations theory (379-380). In this he compares how getting gas in five different circumstances relates to the world on a broad scale. He compares the Japanese where everything is done for you but at a high price, the Western European where the workers do the bare minimum yet still a high price, the third world country where the gas is cheap but you get no service and all the money goes back to a rich owner making millions, the communist system in which all the gas is sold on the black market so that the workers can make more money and finally the American system where gas is cheap but you there are no workers to service your needs. He says that everyone in the world needs to learn the American way of pumping your own gas. I think that this is one of the clearest metaphors in the whole book and I also think that it is America’s role

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