What Are We To Believe?

Three new books examine the rise of China and the rest of Asia, and draw starkly different conclusions about what this means for the rest of the world. Here are some clips of the Economist's reviews of the books. It's worth a look. Go here.

Clde Prestowitz's “Three Billion New Capitalists” will make unhappy reading for Americans. China's growing domination of global manufacturing and India's booming IT services sector have led to a shift of skilled jobs from the west to the east.

Another example of the importance of luck comes in Donald Sull's new book, “Made in China”. Mr Sull, a professor of management at London Business School, decided to look at China's entrepreneurs in order to learn about managing in a highly unpredictable market.

Indeed, the point that China is an agglomeration of loosely coupled regional economies—some successful, some less so—is well made by Michael Enright, a professor at the University of Hong Kong, and his colleagues in an excellent and exhaustive new study of the greater Pearl River Delta (PRD) area. See Regional Powerhouse: The Greater Pearl River Delta and the Rise of China.