Faculty of Economics and Political Science Subject: International contemporary issues Fourth grade English section

Its a flat world, After all

Name: Nada Mahmoud Sherif Hassan EL-Hemaily.

Its a flat world, After all is an article wrote by Thomas L.Friedman who wrote a lot about globalization and in this article he claimed that the world is flat so we must prepare ourselves for the flat world. He meant by the flat world that the technology and geo-economics are reshaping our live and that the globalization had entered new phase. Nandan Nilekani explained that through a wall-size flat-screen TV they could hold a virtual meeting of the key players from its entire global supply chain for any project at any time on that supersize screen and he said that there was a massive investment in technology, especially in the bubble era, when hundreds of millions of dollars were invested in putting broadband connectivity around the world, undersea cables and there is a platform where intellectual work , intellectual capital could be delivered from anywhere. He thinks that what globalization all about. So he claimed that we made our world flat. The writer said that globalization 1.0 that is from 1492 to 1800 shrank the world from a size large to a size medium and the main force is countries, Globalization 2.0 that is from 1800 to 2000 shrank the world from a size medium to a size small and the main force is companies, Globalization 3.0 which started around 2000 is shrinking the world from a size small to a size tiny and the main forces are individuals and small groups. The writer concentrated on globalization 3.0 and he explained that it differs from the previous globalization because it empower the individual and it going to be driven by non-western and non white individuals. So by flatting the world we are now in the process of connecting all the knowledge pools in the world together and he gave an example which is Osama bin laden who connected terrorist knowledge pools together through his Qaeda network. Because the world is flat anyone can access to Google and by wireless laptop can join innovation fray so they can innovate without emigrate. -The writer asked main question which is how did the world get flattened and how did it happen so fast? He believed that the flat world was a result of 10 events and forces that were during 1990 and around the year 2000 and they are 3 events and 7 forces and the events are:

First, in 11/9/1989 the Berlin Wall came down so this allowed us to think of the world as a
single space as it can be considered as a symbol of keeping people inside Germany which is isolation from the world and it was preventing the global view.

Second, in 6/1990 the breakthroughs of Microsoft Windows 3.0 operating system which create
a global computer interface that helped the playing field to get flatten.

Third, in 8/9/1995 the Netscape went public so it first brought the internet alive by giving the
browser to display images and data stored on Web site and second it the Netscape stock offering triggered the dot-com boom, which triggered the dot-com bubble. So many countries benefited from the Netscape especially India which had no resources and no infrastructure but due to the fiber-optic cable they can plug into the world from India so the Netscape connected people like never before. So due to this breakthrough it produced new six ways in which individuals and companies could collaborate on work and share knowledge so the forces are:

First, Outsourcing which means that the work of a company can be done by people other than
the company's full-time employees where the work which can be accounting to software and writing could be done better and cheaper by connecting the software applications to each other.

Second, Offshoring which means companies send entire divisions or their entire operation to
another location outside the country like sending the whole factory from Canton, Ohio, to Canton, China.

Third, Open-sourcing which means free collaboration and open sharing of all data like
making engineers collaborating together online and working for free

Fourth, Insourcing which means letting a company like UPS come inside your company
and take over the whole logistics operation from filling the orders online to delivering the goods to repairing them for customers when they break which means they do all the entire operation.

Fifth, Supply-chaining which means creating a global supply chain down to the last atom of
efficiency so there is a global chain which can fill the supply of a certain good and example for this like selling an item in Arkansas, another is immediately made in China.

Sixth, Informing and the writer means Google ,Yahoo and MSN search which can allow
anyone to collaborate with, and dig unlimited data all by themselves. The 10th flattener and the last one are The steroids which means the wireless access and voice over Internet protocol (VoIP). So the steroids can turbocharge all these new forms of collaboration, so it would be easily for the people to do any one of them, from anywhere, with any device. So the writer answered the question by explaining the reasons why the world get flattened so he cleared that the first three flatteners created the new platform for collaboration, and the next six are the new forms of collaboration that flattened the world even more. A global, web-enabled playing field that allows for multiple forms of collaboration on research and work in real time, without regard to geography, distance or, in the near future, even language is a result of all the 10 flatteners so the world become flat. Due to this flat world the countries economics and political systems are all opened up so that their citizens were free to join the free market and the global world so the millions of them will compete and collaborate equally, horizontally and with cheaper and more available tools. He believes that the horizontal collaboration is the most important force shaping global economies and politics The writer presents the other face of the flat world and globalization and its effect on the united states that due to the flatten world Americans will face a new challenge and it may be wont continue leading because there will be new players in the field as they can use technology without worrying about the cost as there were in the old system. Thomas gave two evidences for this challenge that Americans would face. First, Microsoft Research Asia, sent teams to Chinese universities to administer I.Q. tests in order to recruit the best brains from China's 1.3 billion people. Out of the 2,000 top Chinese engineering and science

students tested, Microsoft hired 20 only. Second, he had a conversation with Rajesh Rao, a young Indian entrepreneur who started an electronic-game company from Bangalore and Rao think that there is no time to rest because there are dozens of people who are doing the same thing you are doing, and they are trying to do it better. The long-term opportunities and challenges that are flattening of the world puts before the United States are profound. So America must to rethink again about its strategy. The main challenge to America today comes from the fact that all the walls are being taken down and many other people can now compete and collaborate with us much more directly and from those practicing extreme capitalism, namely China, India and South Korea. So there must be a main objective in this era which is building strong individuals. The writer presented a solution to meet the challenges of flatism which face the Americans as comprehensive, energetic and focused a response. It requires a president who can summon the nation to work harder, get smarter, attract more young women and men to science and engineering and build the broadband infrastructure, portable pensions and health care that will help every American become more employable in an age in which no one can guarantee you lifetime employment. In America there are basic economic and educational tools but the crisis that they are not improving those tools as much as they should and this crisis is due to many reasons and they are: 1-Abmbition gap between the American got lazy compared to the Indian and Chinese 2-Number gap between the demand of engineers and scientists and the real supply. 3-Educational gap as the American workers are not skilled better than the Indian as the American workers are not skilled better than the Indian. Bill Gates gave a solution for the education problem that America faces that lead to this gap which is to get going immediately. It takes 15 years to train a good engineer, because, ladies and gentlemen, this really is rocket science. In a flat world, every individual is going to have to run a little faster if he or she wants to advance his or her standard of living. So in my opinion, I think that the writer explained well what he means by a flat world and how globalization affects our life and changed it and he was very specific when he asked how did the

world get flattened and he answered this question. He didnt explain only the advantage of the globalization and the flat world but he explained the challenges that America faced from it. But I think that he had to mention the other challenges that the other world also may faced not only America because it is the super war as the globalization may had also bad effects.