The World in 2020

by McRae, Hamish

• ISBN13: 9780875846040
• ISBN10: 0875846041
• Edition: Reprint
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 1995-03-01
• Publisher: Harvard Business School Pr

Summary

In The World in 2020, acclaimed commentator and best-selling author Hamish McRae paints a vivid competitive landscape in which culture and values will be the new sources of advantage for the industrialized nations. In the year 2020, all having embraced market capitalism, the North American, European and East Asian countries will be engaged in fierce economic competition. With each nation increasingly able to imitate the others, innovations will cross borders within more days and weeks, removing technological prowess as a source of sustained advantage. McRae sees the "old motors for growth" - land, capital and natural resources - being replaced by more qualitative assets - quality, organization, motivation and self-discipline of the people. Everywhere, governments will take a less active role in the social and economic life of the nation. In such a world, the best predictor of success will be how a nation strikes a proper balance between creativity and intellect on the one hand, and social responsibility on the other. Thus the leading world economic powers of the next generation are just as likely to include China and Australia as the United States and Japan.

Table of Contents

List of Tables And Graphs	ix
Preface	xi
Part I. Where the World Stands Now
What Makes Countries Grow	3	(21)
North America: The Giant in Retreat	24	(23)
Europe: The Babble of Many Tongues	47	(23)
East Asia: The Fragile Boom Continues	70	(27)
Part II. The Forces for Change
Demography	97	(23)
Resources and the Environment	120	(21)
Trade and Finance	141	(23)
Technology	164	(21)
Government and Society	185	(24)
Part III. The World in 2020
North America	209	(16)
Europe	225	(20)
East Asia	245	(18)
The Prize	263	(16)
A Note On Sources	279	(4)
Notes And Sources	283	(10)
Index	293