Sonic Boom: Globalization at Mach Speed
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There are signs the recession is about to end. So what comes next? Growth will resume. But economic uncertainty will worsen, making what comes next not just a boom but a nerve-shattering SONIC BOOM. Gregg Easterbrook – who "writes nothing that is not brilliant" (Chicago Tribune) – is a fount of unconventional wisdom, and over time, he is almost always proven right. Throughout 2008 and 2009, as the global economy was contracting and the experts were panicking, Easterbrook worked on a book saying prosperity is about to make its next big leap. Will he be right again? SONIC BOOM: Globalization at Mach Speed presents three basic insights. First, if you don't like globalization, brace yourself, because globalization has barely started. Easterbrook contends the world is about to become far more globally linked. Second, the next wave of global change will be primarily positive: economic prosperity, knowledge and freedom will increase more in the next 50 years than in all of human history to this point. But before you celebrate, Easterbrook further warns that the next phase of global change is going to drive us crazy. Most things will be good for most people – but nothing will seem certain for anyone. Each SONIC BOOM chapter is based on examples of cities around the world – in the United States, Europe, Russia, China, South America – that represent a significant Sonic Boom trend. With a terrific sense of humor, pitch-perfect reporting and clear, elegant prose, Easterbrook explains why economic recovery is on the horizon but why the next phase of global change will also giveeveryone one hell of a headache. Forbes calls Easterbrook "the best writer on complex topics in the United States" and SONIC BOOM will show you why. Kirkus Reviews Global prosperity is just around the corner, says Atlantic Monthly and New Republic contributing editor Easterbrook (The Progress Paradox: How Life Gets Better While People Feel Worse, 2003, etc.) in this upbeat view of the coming benefits of globalization. The immediate economic outlook may seem gloomy, he writes, but history shows that whenever a trend like the rising prosperity of the past three decades is interrupted, the trend resumes. In this readable but slight, repetitive book, Easterbrook maintains that globalization has just gotten under way and will usher in a "hectic, high-tech, interconnected world" where most nations will enjoy the free-market advantages of the West. Most people's lives will be better, but the tremendous pressures of constant change will foster stress, anxiety and dissatisfaction. The author offers striking examples of globalization at work: the extraordinarily busy young port of Shenzhen, China; the burgeoning high-tech zone of the former factory town Waltham, Mass., and a Chinese home-appliance manufacturer's opening of its North American headquarters in sleepy Camden, S.C. Now notable, such outcomes will become commonplace, he writes, as global forces advance the spread of economic growth, a global middle class, free economics, democracy, technical progress, education, urbanization and entrepreneurialism. As it moves from the Factory Age to "a Sonic Boom era dominated by desk jobs and education," the world will provide higher-quality, less-expensive goods for all, as well as more competition and economic turmoil, compounded by the effects of climate change. There will also be more inequality of wealth as ideas become more valuable than labor andresources. While his prognostications are provocative, Easterbrook devotes much of the narrative to making familiar observations on the increasing stressfulness of modern life, the importance of education and ideas in an information-driven society and the need to be prepared for frequent job changes and hybrid careers. He also uses too many annoying cutesy terms, such as "Super Bowl of stress."A disappointing update on globalization that nonetheless offers hope for the recession-mired. Local author promotion in Washington, D.C. Agent: Michelle Tessler/Carlisle & Company
Introduction A Trailer for the Docudrama of the Twenty-first Century1 Shenzhen 32 Waltham 363 Yakutsk 584 Erie 735 Leipzig 886 Arlington 1087 Chippewa Falls 1268 Camden 1499 Los Angeles 17210 Sao Jose dos Campos 18911 Your Town 207Acknowledgments 211Notes 213Index 233
