ITRN 603.001 Office (202-682-9110)
Monday 7:05 – 9:35 p.m.
Arl-Old #253
Spring 2001
Required Readings:
·
The Work of Nations (An outstanding
conceptualization of the fact that the marketplace is the world, and
corporations in particular, have altered themselves to accommodate this
reality. Many of the ideas go back to Peter Drucker and “The New Realities,”
although Reich has described the trends, especially the knowledge worker, in a more
lucid way. It is also surprisingly a
spirited defense of the free flow of foreign investment. This book also lays out many of the ideas
which undergird the phenomenon of globalization and many of the ideas
propagated in The Lexus and the Olive
Tree.)
Publisher:
Knopf (Available in Paperback)
·
Trading Places (One of my students in a
recent course evaluation said that we should get rid of Trading Places and get something more up to date regarding
Japan. I respectfully disagree. Trading
Places still remains the definitive book in understanding how the Keiretsu
system in Japan actually works and how the so called private sector and public
sector in Japan collaborate. While the
publication date of the original Trading
Places is some years ago, the analysis of how the system works remains true
today and, indeed, despite globalization, despite entrepreneurial innovations
in many other parts of the world, Japan has not fundamentally changed its
system – the Prestowitz analysis still holds true.)
Publisher:
Basic Books (Available in Paperback)
·
Embracing Defeat – Japan in
the Wake of World War II (If you want to understand what
has been delineated by Prestowitz, and if you are intellectually curious as to
why Japan is what it is today, then this is a must-read book. Contrary to the conventional wisdom that
Japan and the Japanese system has its roots in the Samurai tradition and other
ancient customs, this book convincingly explains that much of the modern Japan
is attributable to the time between
the surrender of Japan in 1945 and the end of the occupation by U.S. military
troops in the early 1950s. This is a
fascinating read by an historian with genuine expertise on Japan, and the book
fills a very important void in terms of Western understanding of Japan.)
Publisher:
Norton & Company/The New Press (Available in Paperback)
·
The Lexus and the Olive Tree
(A best
seller by the Foreign Affairs columnist for The
New York Times. It is all about
globalization, which Friedman says is the integration of capital, technology,
and information across national borders and is so intense a phenomenon
sovereign borders are becoming less and less important. He further notes that globalization is creating
a single global market and that globalization has fundamentally replaced the
relationships based on a Cold War with relationships based on economics and
trade.)
Publisher:
Farrar, Straus and Giroux (Available in Paperback at Anchor Books)
What is This Course About?
It is pretty straight forward as the title of the course suggests. We will examine the U.S. relationship with other countries and trading blocks and we will look at how those relationships have changed over the last 5-10 years and how they may change dramatically yet again as a result of the concept of globalization and the increasing dominance of the American high-technology sector. During the semester we will deal with the following issues and questions:
1. What is this phenomenon that is called globalization? Is it really fundamentally altering not just trade relations but how trade is conducted and are trade relations becoming more a function of the private sector than the collaboration of governments.
2.
What
is the importance of trade policy promulgated and agreed to by government
entities during an era when more and more trade is outside the boundaries and
control of a given nation state.
3.
Why
is it trade policy appears to be less important during periods of domestic
prosperity.
4.
U.S.
trade laws and trade agreements – what is the impact of these on relationships
with our trading partners and competitors.
5.
The
World Trade Organization – will it fulfill the expectations of its architects
that it will make the world safer for free trade or has globalization already
made it irrelevant.
6.
What
are the current commonalties and frictions with U.S. trade relationships with
Europe, with Japan, with Asia in general and to some degree with Latin America.
7.
Is
the United States becoming more isolationist and even protectionist. What are the consequences of these attitudes
in terms of our trade relationships with the world.
8.
How
does the United States comeback in the field of high technology alter trade
relations and to some large degree even formal trade policy.
9.
What
is the near-term future of trade relations between the United States and its
partners and even between or among its competitors.
The era of the knowledge worker and how it is changing trade and trade relations.
Required
Reading: The Work of Nations (You should have read the entire book.)
·
A
look at Reich’s conceptualization of the new world of trade relations and a
kind of a peek at the concept of globalization.
·
We
have looked at the intellectual underpinnings or antecedents of this
phenomenon. Now let’s look at this
phenomenon itself. We will also look at
a case study of globalization e.g. the American high-tech industry.
Required
Reading: The Lexus and the Olive Tree
Globalization (Continued)
·
This
week I will be posing the question to you, “what countries or trading relations
with the United States have been the most affected by globalization either
positive or negative.”
WEEK #6 – February 26
Guest
Lecturer: Dr. W. Kendall Myers, Former
Director of European and Canadian Affairs, National Foreign Affairs Training
Center, U.S. Department of State
Guest
Lecturer: Bruce Stokes, Senior Trade
Analyst for the Council on Foreign Relations, and Trade Editor of The National Journal
China,
the Colossus of the 21st Century?
·
Has
China displaced Japan as the Untied States’ most important trading partner? If it hasn’t yet, will it in the very near
future? If by the time of this class
China has joined the WTO, will they comply with international trading rules? Despite record levels of trade investments,
particularly American, is China’s policy some time early in the 21st
century to say thank you for training our workers, thank you for transferring
technology, we will take it from here, goodbye?
·
Has
the United States won? Why is it that
only eight or nine years ago there was a palpable fear that Japan is taking
over the economic world, but this fear seems to have either disappeared or has
greatly diminished. Has Japan seen the
light? What are the historical reasons
for the current structure of the Japan economic system? Are the Japanese so
wedded to that system that they can safely ignore the trends of globalization
that we discussed earlier?
Required
Reading: Embracing Defeat and Trading
Places
U.S./Japan (Continued)
Required
Reading: Embracing Defeat and Trading
Places
·
Will
the developing world be left out of the technology revolution or will the
technology revolution allow these countries to jump start their economies and
become major players on the world economic stage?
·
What
have you learned? What is still on your
mind? How does all of this affect your
own perspectives in understanding trade policy and trade relations?