Since Thomas Friedman, the New York Times columnist, released The World Is Flat in 2005, he's been constantly updating it, expanding the original 488-page tome to a nearly 700-page mammoth on the topic of globalisation and its many contents. That Mr Friedman has needed to revise and expand is no surprise, given that the "flat" world he describes is constantly in flux. At the same time, the mere fact that he thinks he needs to update a physical book and put out new editions betrays one of the author's most apparent flaws: his backwardness and sense of awe at the technology-driven changes in global society and commerce these past 10 years or so.
After all, if he was totally convinced of the flatness of the world, Mr Friedman would put updates online, adding daily, weekly or monthly to his discussion of how the evolution of global economies and the increasing interlinked-ness of global societies is affecting us. Because this is the point of the book: new tools, new technologies and new, young brains are eliminating the friction of trade barriers and information monopolies that in the past stymied economic expansion, kept less-developed countries less developed and helped support authoritarian political regimes across the globe.
It would be interesting to hear school children's responses to Mr Friedman. While hardly a slouch when it comes to foreign affairs and economics, his tone and approach reveal on the one hand a tendency to aggrandise personal experiences ? a taxi ride becomes the touching-off point for a section on human interaction, for example - and on the other hand a stodginess about the changing world. The problem with Mr Friedman isn't that he's old. It's that he doesn't seem to have himself embraced the "flat world" paradigm he promotes. He's watching it unfold, but he's either incapable of or unwilling to fold himself into it. That, I think, casts real doubt on his particular take on globalisation, even if he is mainly in the right. Publisher: Frrar, Straus & Giroux, 2005 Ratings Explained ★★★★★Excellent ★★★★Very good ★★★Good ★★Poor ★Dire * Asa Fitch
