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Category Archives: globalization
>Lester Brown
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>田村秀男
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>Vincent Ferraro
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>Jorge Nef
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>Paul Raskin, Tariq Banuri, Gilberto Gallopin, Pablo Gutman, Al Hammond, RObert Kates, Rob Swart
>Characteristics of Historical Eras
Stone Age | Early Civilization | Modern Era | Planetary Phase | |
Organization | Tribe/village | City-state, kingdom | Nation-state | Global governance |
Economy | Hunting and gathering | Settled agriculture | Industrial system | Globalization |
Communications | Language | Writing | Printing | Internet |
>James Gustave Speth
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>Valérie Fournier
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>Hwy-Chang Moon
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>World Bank
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>Mansoor Dailami
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>Justin Yifu Lin
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>Ken Sweet
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>The Telegraph
>Development Assistance Committee
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>The Economist
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>David K. Randall
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>Kacper Pempel
>CNN
>RIA Novosti
>Людмила Клот
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>Jon Berkeley
>Александр Айвазов
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>Dominique Moïsi
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>Adam Smith
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>Don Young
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Tom Clougherty
Fairtrade purports to work within the market economy but its rise has been largely based on marketing subsidies and public-sector procurement.
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At best, Fairtrade is a marketing device that does the poor little good.
At worst, it may inadvertently be harming some of the planet’s most vulnerable people. There is nothing wrong with being concerned about the working conditions, wages and environment of workers, but we don’t believe Fairtrade is the most effective model.
They make assumptions about agriculture in the developing world – that they must be small farming cooperatives, but this is just not sustainable if countries are to develop.
Free trade was a more effective strategy for reducing poverty, as it encouraged countries to industrialise and develop more efficient farming practices.
>asahi.com
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>Dale Stephens
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>Standard & Poor’s
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Tim Harford
Is the iPhone made in China? The question is harder to answer than you might imagine. At first sight, the statistics seem open and shut. The Chinese make the iPhones, the Americans buy the iPhones, and the result is an increase in the US’s trade deficit with China: $1.9bn in 2009, according to Yuqing Xing of the National Graduate Institute for Policy Studies in Tokyo, and Neal Detert of the Asian Development Bank.
… all these components are imported into China. Some come from the US, some from Germany, and many from Japan, specifically from Toshiba. The Chinese themselves add very little value to the package.
To see why this matters, assume that the Chinese currency appreciates by a hefty 25 per cent. For the $172.50 of components bought from the likes of Japan, assembled and then exported to the US, the currency appreciation would all come out in the wash. The cost would remain $172.50. It’s only the $6.50 of local Chinese costs that would be affected – adding a whopping $1.55 to the cost of the iPhone and barely shifting the US-China trade statistics.
It may well be that many US workers have been hurt by the forces of globalisation. But the iPhone and iPod show why the whole business is complex. Products that are made in China may actually be rewarding producers in Japan and California, and, of course, consumers across the world. It’s a curious paradox: the more pervasive globalisation becomes, the less we understand it by looking at trade statistics.
>Thomas Friedman
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Pankaj Ghemawat
>Thomas Friedman
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>Merrill Lynch
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>William Brittain-Catlin
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Jeremy
End Tax Haven Secrecy is a brand new campaign that launched this week. It’s an alliance that includes Christian Aid, Oxfam, ActionAid, and The Tax Justic Network, and the campaign is geared up to get action on tax havens on the agenda at the G20 gathering in Cannes in November. French president Nicolas Sarkozy will be among the politicians targetted, as he will have a crucial role in hosting the summit.
Tax havens remain a huge drain on the global economy, a place for wealthy elites and global corporations to avoid paying their share. They rob developing countries of around $160 billion in unpaid taxes every year, which is more than they receive in aid.
>End Tax Haven Secrecy
>James K. Boyce
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>Nicholas Shaxson
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>Karel van Wolferen
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>松浦肇
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>Akin Iwilade
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>Alan Gordon
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>Barry Eichengreen
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>Michael Pento
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>Sankei Shimbun
>于文静
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>フェアトレード情報室
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>Starbucks
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>Fairtrade Labelling Organizations International
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>門倉貴史
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>Sylvain Allemand, Jean-Claude Ruano-Borbalan
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>Forum for a new World Governance
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>Arnaud Blin, Gustavo Marin
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>René Passet
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>Paul Valéry
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>WorldMeets.US
>Kathryn Farr
>Christine Monnier
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Organized criminal organizations have the following traits:
- They are profit-oriented: Their goal is to make money by supplying illegal goods (such as drugs, weapons, human organs, prostitutes or sex slaves) through criminal means (such extortion, protection, corruption, murder or money-laundering).
- Most have high longevity: Some criminal organizations have existed for decades if not for centuries.
- They are organized so as to facilitate criminal activities, such as non-hierarchical and flexible networks.
- They all use violence at every level of their trade: against competitors, customers, suppliers, officials and even their own member as a form of social control.
- They engage in corruption of government and corporate officials as well as law enforcement agents
In the context of globalization, not only have traditional criminal networks, such as the Italian Mafia or the Japanese Yakuza adapted to the new political and economic conditions, but new criminal organizations have emerged precisely as a product of globalization capitalizing on the profitability and high demands for new illegal commodities on a global scale.
>Manuel Castells
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There are three stages involved in money laundering:
(1) The first stage is the placement of the illegal proceeds into the financial system through banks or other financial institutions. Often, criminal organizations use banks located in countries that exercise banking secrecy (they do not disclose financial information to investigators), such as Aruba, the Cayman Islands or Luxemburg.
(2) The second stage is called “layering,” that is, to detach the funds from their illegal source. This can be done by swapping currency (illegal proceeds in US dollars are converted into Euros) or by investing the money into stocks. Thanks to the liberalization of global financial markets, it is easy to transfer vast sums of money all over the world, several times over within seconds.
(3) The third stage is call “integration,” that is, the introduction of the laundered money back into the legitimate economy through various investments. The majority of criminal organizations described above engages directly in money laundering or hire the services of other criminal syndicates to do it.
>Alessandra Dino
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Christian Caryl
… the Japanese mob is still very much alive, and parts of it are thriving. But years of recession, forced restructuring and global competition haven’t just changed the way Japan Inc. does business; they’ve also forced Japan’s criminals to adapt. Back when the country’s economy was booming, a hood’s work was fairly predictable: gambling, protection rackets, and maybe a little drug dealing could ensure a comfortable life. But nowadays, in an age of tougher laws, greater competition and a shrinking, aging domestic market, only those gangsters who can change with the times are flourishing; others are growing poor or dropping out entirely. … “They’ve had to write off bad loans. They’ve had to globalize.”
… savvier gangsters were already focusing on growth industries like the bankruptcy business. … gangsters in Japan function like attorneys and arbitrators in the West, settling creditor claims and recovering assets. They’ve also become big investors. After the bubble, American investment companies like Goldman Sachs and Merrill Lynch came in and bought up distressed assets like golf courses. So did the Yamaguchi-gumi.
And the Yamaguchi have proven the most inventive at coming up with new scams. … an affiliated gangster had taken over a tech company that, among other things, was running one of Japan’s leading Web sites for college alumni. … he was planning to sell off the company after hyping its shares. … police arrested two Yamaguchi members over a con involving the abuse of government credit guarantees for small businesses.
Of course, financial manipulation takes a lot of sophistication, but Yakuza 2.0 has become adept at recruiting the necessary talent. …
Then there’s the matter of foreign competition. … media reports about local gangs being squeezed out by rapacious Chinese and Russians. In reality, Japan’s mobsters have usually managed to co-opt outsiders. …
It’s helped the Yamaguchi-gumi that it has more experience operating globally than many Japanese corporations. Indeed, the yakuza were early pioneers of the internationalization of organized crime. The process started when the Japanese tourist industry exploded in the 1960s and ’70s, with the yakuza organizing sex tours and drug deals across Southeast Asia. Nowadays they’re known to work closely with the Russian mafia, buying seafood spirited illegally out of Russian waters and selling it for huge markups in Japan. One new sphere of operations is Uzbekistan, from which the Yamaguchi-gumi has been known to charter direct flights—perhaps to transport Uzbek women for prostitution.
>INHOPE
INHOPE is the International Association of Internet Hotlines.
The mission of the INHOPE Association is to support and enhance the performance of Internet Hotlines around the World, ensuring swift action is taken in responding to reports of illegal content making the internet a safer place.
The key functions of the Association are:
- Exchange expertise
- Support new hotlines
- Exchange reports
- Interface with relevant initiatives outside the EU
- Educate and inform policy makers, particularly at the international level.
Values
- Freedom of the Internet.
- A commitment to positive uses of the Internet
- Shared responsibility for protection of young people by government, educators, parents and the Internet industry
Goals
- To establish and support effective national hotlines.
- To train and support new hotlines
- To foster ongoing Internet safety awareness and education throughout Europe
- The establishment of effective common procedures for receiving and processing reports
警察庁
世界的規模で活動する犯罪組織は、世界各地にネットワークやインフラを構築する過程で新たな犯行手口を取り込んでいる。こうした犯罪組織の我が国への浸透は、国内の伝統的な犯罪集団に対して、これらのネットワークやインフラを提供し、新たな犯行手口を知らしめることとなり、「犯罪ビジネスモデル」を再構築させ、新手の犯罪を敢行させかねない。このように、国際犯罪組織の我が国への浸透にとどまらず、国内の犯罪組織の変質をももたらす犯罪のグローバル化は、国内治安の「正面の脅威」となる危険性がある。したがって、この新たな脅威である犯罪のグローバル化に対して、今後、組織の総力を挙げて、的確に取り組んでいくことが求められる。
>Theodore Levitt
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>Jeremy Page
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>Ian Bremmer, David Gordon
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>織田信長
>ExchangeRate.com
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United Nations
The dollar has proved not to be a stable store of value, which is a requisite for a stable reserve currency. …
>IMF
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With effect from January 1, 2011, the IMF has determined that the four currencies that meet the selection criterion for inclusion in the SDR valuation basket will be assigned the following weights based on their roles in international trade and finance:
U.S. dollar 41.9 percent (compared with 44 percent at the 2005 review)
Euro 37.4 percent (compared with 34 percent at the 2005 review)
Pound sterling 11.3 percent (compared with 11 percent at the 2005 review)
Japanese yen 9.4 percent (compared with 11 percent at the 2005 review)
>Stephen Leahy
>Investors from Saudi Arabia have leased large tracts in land in Ethiopia, Senegal, Mali and other African countries amounting to several hundred thousand hectares. “How can African countries hope to have food security by signing long-term leases to foreign interests?” Kuyek told IPS.
When South Korea’s Daewoo Logistics tried to buy 1.3 million hectares, or one-third, of Madagascar’s farmland in 2008, violent protests erupted and the government was toppled. South Korea still has at least a million hectares in long- term leases elsewhere and China 2.1 million ha, mainly in Southeast Asia.
Some of the leases are for 99 years at a one dollar a hectare, but local people “are not eligible for the deals being promoted in countries where millions of people remain dependent on food aid”, said Howard Buffett, a U.S. farmer and philanthropist whose father is Warren Buffett, the well- known billionaire investor.
Howard Buffet reports being offered land deals where African governments promise to provide 70 percent of the financing, all utilities, and a 98-year lease requiring no payments for four years.
>Tony Karon
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>Daniel Hannan
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>Hervé Hannoun
>Hossein Askari, Noureddine Krichene
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John Foley
A warning sign is the price of traded staples like wheat, corn and rice. Prices shot up in 2010, soaring 26 percent from June to November and brushing the peaks of 2008, according to the Food Price Index kept by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations. That hits poor countries that import much of their food, including the Philippines, Mexico, Nigeria and Pakistan. …
It isn’t shortages. True, demand for staple grains is predicted to rise 2 percent in 2011, even as production falls 4 percent. But grain reserves run to almost 17 percent of total use, according to Rabobank, which is about the level generally seen as a sensible buffer.
Nor are the main problems population trends or changing eating habits in developing markets. That extra demand may be making the world a bit more crisis-prone, but more productive, mechanized farming methods in China, India and Africa have potential to create some slack.
The main cause looks to be too much money. Governments have effectively printed the stuff to help their economies recover.
>富坂聰
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新华社
“政府工作报告在提出‘坚决打击取缔非法收入’的同时,首次提出‘规范灰色收入’。我记得我们有工资和工资外收入,是坚决不允许‘灰色收入’的。”全国人大代表、虎山集团董事长张剑星在审议政府工作报告时说。
“我印象里‘灰色收入’都是不好的,红包、回扣,这些就是‘灰色收入’吧?政府工作报告这么写,跟人感觉今后可以送可以收了?”张剑星代表一席话,引起了大家的笑声。
涉及到法律问题,坐在张剑星代表对面的全国人大代表、浙江省高级人民法院院长齐奇接过他的话说:“你说的那个收入恐怕有一部分要算‘黑色收入’。”
齐奇代表表示,有些教授出去讲课收点讲课费、明星走穴出去挣点演出费,他没有纳税,但是付出了劳动,收入有合理性,这是“灰色收入”。“这不能说不合理,但是要规范。”
全国人大代表、全国人大法律委员会副主任委员刘锡荣说,行贿受贿是犯罪,可不能说是“灰色收入”,“要不然,大家还要不要反腐败了?”而且,“规范”也不等于就允许,可以收,但是要“阳光化”、要纳税。
刘锡荣代表认为,对于这个民间早就作为习语,但却首次在政府工作报告中亮相的“灰色收入”,“我建议政府工作报告关于‘灰色收入’的表述,要么应该搞个名词解释,避免表述不清,要么就不要写上去。”这话赢得了与会代表们的赞同。
>Nature news
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>クォン・ヨンソク
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>James Daily, Ryan Davidson
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>The New York Times
>Andrew Batson
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>火星网友
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>Taerim Kim
>Marija Gimbutas
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Michel Beaud
Tout simplement parce que les transformations de la réalité rendent déjà inopérants, et rendront de plus en plus désuets, les schémas traditionnels de pensée.
L’économie nationale est de moins en moins ce qu’elle était. Elle est de moins en moins close en ses frontières, assise en son territoire, unifiée sous la tutelle de son État. Et pourtant, elle ne se dissout pas, ni ne se disloque : elle mue.
Pour les pays dominants, elle est de plus en plus « expansée » à l’échelle du monde à travers les grands marchés, les réseaux d’informations, de crédits, de paiements, de financement et de spéculation ; elle s’ancre, s’implante, se développe sur d’autres territoires nationaux ; elle devient mondiale (à travers l’international et le multinational) tout en restant nationale. Ainsi se constituent des « économies nationales »… mondiales, ou des économies « nationales/mondiales », bref des « économies mondiales… nationales » (américaine, japonaise, allemande…) ; et dans leur interaction se structure « l’économie mondiale ».
>Paul Valéry
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>Lord Dunsany
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>Mary Boyce
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>David Harvay
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- 1500-1840 (best average speed of horse drawn coaches/sailing ships was 10 mph)
- 1850-1930 (steam locomotives averaged 65 mph; steam ships averaged 36 mph)
- 1950s (propeller aircraft 300-400 mph)
- 1960s (jet passenger aircraft 500-700 mph).
>Johannes Dragsbaek Schmidt, Jacques Hersh
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>Emmanuel Todd
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>Sisan Strange
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>John Gray
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>Kautilya
>孙子
>Frank J. Lechner, John Boli
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