Summary Of Joe Studwell S How Asia Works

Until the catastrophic economic crisis of the late 1990s, East Asia was perceived as a monolithic success story. But heady economic growth rates masked the most divided continent in the world - one half the most extraordinary developmental success story ever seen, the other half a paper tiger. Joe Studwell explores how policies ridiculed by economists created titans in Japan, Korea and Taiwan, and are now behind the rise of China, while the best advice the West could offer sold its allies in South-East Asia down the economic river. The first book to offer an Asia-wide deconstruction of success and failure in economic development, Studwell's latest work is provocative and iconoclastic - and sobering reading for most of the world's developing countries. How Asia Works is a must-read book that packs powerful insights about the world's most misunderstood continent.

“A good read for anyone who wants to understand what actually determines whether a developing economy will succeed.” —Bill Gates, “Top 5 Books of the Year” An Economist Best Book of the Year from a reporter who has spent two decades in the region, and who the Financial Times said “should be named chief myth-buster for Asian business.” In How Asia Works, Joe Studwell distills his extensive research into the economies of nine countries—Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, the Philippines, Vietnam, and China—into an accessible, readable narrative that debunks Western misconceptions, shows what really happened in Asia and why, and for once makes clear why some countries have boomed while others have languished. Studwell’s in-depth analysis focuses on three main areas: land policy, manufacturing, and finance. Land reform has been essential to the success of Asian economies, giving a kick-start to development by utilizing a large workforce and providing capital for growth. With manufacturing, industrial development alone is not sufficient, Studwell argues. Instead, countries need “export discipline,” a government that forces companies to compete on the global scale. And in finance, effective regulation is essential for fostering, and sustaining growth. To explore all of these subjects, Studwell journeys far and wide, drawing on fascinating examples from a Philippine sugar baron’s stifling of reform to the explosive growth at a Korean steel mill. “Provocative . . . How Asia Works is a striking and enlightening book . . . A lively mix of scholarship, reporting and polemic.” —The Economist

40 or 50 families control the economies of Hong Kong, Singapore, Thailand, the Philippines and Indonesia. Their interests range from banking to property, from shipping to sugar, from vice to gambling. 13 of the 50 richest families in the world are in South East Asia yet they are largely unknown outside confined business circles. Often this is because they control the press and television as well as everything else. How do they do it? What are their secrets? And is it good news or bad for the places where they operate? Joe Studwell explosively lifts the lid on a world of staggering secrecy and shows that the little most people know is almost entirely wrong.

Please note: This is a companion version & not the original book. Sample Book Insights: #1 In a country in the early stages of development, typically 75 percent of the population is employed in agriculture. The problem with agriculture in pre-industrial states with rising populations is that when market forces are left to themselves, agricultural yields tend to stagnate or even fall. #2 The question of efficiency depends on what outcome you are looking for. Big capitalist farms may produce the highest return on cash invested, but that is not the agricultural efficiency that is appropriate to a developing state. #3 The world of the home fruit and vegetable gardener is very familiar to the post-war east Asian peasant family with its mini-farm. The labor-intensive gardening approach to cultivation gets more out of a given plot of land than anything else. #4 The problem is that the gardening level of output needs so much labor. If Mr. Doiron gardened full time, he might be able to maintain his yields for 1,000 square meters of land. But that would still require ten Mr. Doirons to earn $135,000 across one hectare before costs.

“An entertaining, if cautionary, tale of Western business woes in China, stretching back seven hundred years” (The Wall Street Journal). In The China Dream, acclaimed business journalist Joe Studwell challenges the predictions that China will become an economic juggernaut on the world stage in the twenty-first century—and instead foresees an economic crisis. Tracing the most recent developments in China from Deng Xiaoping’s “liberalization” of its market in the 1980s through the opening of its economy to foreign investment in the 1990s, Studwell examines the roadblocks to the continuation of the country’s unprecedented expansion and why its economy will fail once more—but this time, harder than ever before, and with potentially catastrophic results. Provocative and flawlessly researched, The China Dream analyzes what’s really going on in China—and what we can do to prepare for the coming crisis. “The much-needed antidote to the delusions . . . about the riches to be made from investing and selling in China. Brimming with . . . statistics.” —The Washington Post “[A] detailed account . . . An excellent examination of the political and economic history of China, fascinating and mostly unknown to Westerners.” —Booklist (starred review) “Lays bare much of the stuff and nonsense that surrounds the China dream, and traces how myth and misunderstandings—compounded by hype and lashings of snake oil—have bewitched some of the world’s most respected corporations and led them to ruin the proverbial $1.3 billion consumer market . . . As such, it deserves to help redefine the debate on the nature of the China market.” —James Kynge, China bureau chief of the Financial Times

Together these countries pioneered new technologies that have made them ever richer.

A New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice "A brilliant and empathetic guide to the far corners of global capitalism." --Jenny Odell, author of How to Do Nothing From FSGO x Logic: stories about rural China, food, and tech that reveal new truths about the globalized world In Blockchain Chicken Farm, the technologist and writer Xiaowei Wang explores the political and social entanglements of technology in rural China. Their discoveries force them to challenge the standard idea that rural culture and people are backward, conservative, and intolerant. Instead, they find that rural China has not only adapted to rapid globalization but has actually innovated the technology we all use today. From pork farmers using AI to produce the perfect pig, to disruptive luxury counterfeits and the political intersections of e-commerce villages, Wang unravels the ties between globalization, technology, agriculture, and commerce in unprecedented fashion. Accompanied by humorous “Sinofuturist” recipes that frame meals as they transform under new technology, Blockchain Chicken Farm is an original and probing look into innovation, connectivity, and collaboration in the digitized rural world. FSG Originals × Logic dissects the way technology functions in everyday lives. The titans of Silicon Valley, for all their utopian imaginings, never really had our best interests at heart: recent threats to democracy, truth, privacy, and safety, as a result of tech’s reckless pursuit of progress, have shown as much. We present an alternate story, one that delights in capturing technology in all its contradictions and innovation, across borders and socioeconomic divisions, from history through the future, beyond platitudes and PR hype, and past doom and gloom. Our collaboration features four brief but provocative forays into the tech industry’s many worlds, and aspires to incite fresh conversations about technology focused on nuanced and accessible explorations of the emerging tools that reorganize and redefine life today.

Vogel brings masterly insight to the underlying question of why Japan and the little dragons--Taiwan, South Korea, Hong Kong, and Singapore--have been so extraordinarily successful in industrializing while other developing countries have not.