| I have an “impossibility theorem” for the global economy that is like that. It says that democracy, national sovereignty and global economic integration are mutually incompatible: we can combine any two of the three, but never have all three simultaneously and in full. |
| any reform of the international economic system must face up to this trilemma. If we want more globalization, we must either give up some democracy or some national sovereignty. |
| deep economic integration requires that we eliminate all transaction costs traders and financiers face in their cross-border dealings. Nation-states are a fundamental source of such transaction costs. They generate sovereign risk, create regulatory discontinuities at the border, prevent global regulation and supervision of financial intermediaries, and render a global lender of last resort a hopeless dream. The malfunctioning of the global financial system is intimately linked with these specific transaction costsRead more at rodrik.typepad.com |
| according to a recent and very convincing essay published in the magazine Foreign Affairs, a dual demographic and economic trend is taking place that will result in spectacular shifts by the middle of this century. The Western world will represent only 12% of the world’s population, with Europeans reduced to 6%. (In 1913, a year before the outbreak of World War I, Europe was slightly more populated than China.) Economically, the West will account for around 30% of global output – a level that corresponds to Europe’s share in the eighteenth century and down from 68% in 1950 |
| The West’s long period of global dominance is ending, encouraged and accelerated by its own mistakes and irresponsible behavior. We are entering a new historical cycle, in which there will be proportionally fewer Westerners, more Africans and Middle Easterners, and – with greater relevance economically and strategically – many more Asians.Read more at www.project-syndicate.org |
| The global warming movement as we have known it is dead. |
The movement died from two causes: bad science and bad politics.
After years in which global warming activists had lectured everyone about the overwhelming nature of the scientific evidence, it turned out that the most prestigious agencies in the global warming movement were breaking laws, hiding data, and making inflated, bogus claims resting on, in some cases, no scientific basis at all. This latest story in the London Times is yet another shocker; the IPCC’s claims that the rainforests were going to disappear as a result of global warming are as bogus and fraudulent as its claims that the Himalayan glaciers would melt by 2035. It seems as if a scare story could grab a headline, the IPCC simply didn’t care about whether it was reality-based. Read more at blogs.the-american-interest.com |
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Global integration of the economy cannot co-exist with both democracy and soveregnity
