jarango

The Future Belongs to China

MSNBC has an illuminating feature on China’s growing power. A must-read to understand where commerce, politics, and culture are heading over the next decade or so.

[...] tariffs and walls are not the way to prosper in the emerging global economy. It’s not just China but India, Brazil, South Africa and Thailand, among others, that are all entering the global market with sophistication and skill. The answer for Western countries cannot be to shut themselves off from this new reality. After all, they benefit from the expansion of global commerce. The European Union’s exports to China have risen 600 percent in the past 15 years. More broadly, countries that have tried to wall themselves off from the rest of the world in the past—to maintain their economy or culture—have stagnated. Those that have embraced change have flourished. China is simply the biggest part of a new world. You cannot switch it off.

How these scenarios play out will depend greatly on how effectively we’re able to communicate across cultural divides. One thing’s clear to me: I’m signing up for Chinese lessons.

May 14, 2005 | Archived in Business, Culture, Globalization